Alienware Area-51 ALX Desktop Helps Light the Way for London's Royal Opera House

When the Royal Opera House auditorium isn't filled with the melodious tones of a Royal Opera performance, its walls echo the sounds of more than a century of London's finest performance art displays. Since 1728, English royalty, as well as millions of ladies and gentlemen, have shared in the bold movements of the Royal Ballet and high harmony of some of history's greatest operatic voices. Despite two separate 19th-century fires that destroyed the original buildings, the current building, built in 1858, has withstood nature's wrath for more than a century and has allowed singers and dancers to "bring down the house" night after night with every phenomenal performance.

The Show Must Go On – Quickly

While the greatest names in ballet and opera perform on the Royal Opera House stage, behind the scenes, an equally talented army of technicians, designers and producers are responsible for bringing each production to life. In the late 1990s, the Royal Opera House, located in the heart of London's Covent Garden, underwent renovations to modernize the theatre and bring it up to speed with new technology, including lighting and lighting design. In the past, setting up the lights required a full crew and hours of intricate work on stage to focus the roughly 300 conventional lights over and around the stage. During performances, the Royal Opera House's George Panait said lights would have to be adjusted and refocused manually for each scene change. "Essentially, it was a very time consuming process," Panait said. "While you're up there working on the lights, nothing could happen on stage. It wasn't very efficient. As the productions became more complex, the schedule grew tighter, so we introduced an overhead rig with moving lights. That started to solve the problem, but it still required a lot of time for rehearsals and setup."

That's when innovation took the lead role. The Royal Opera House's Geoff Wheel, David Harvey and Panait helped lead the house team in creating a virtual version of the theatre, in which lighting and set changes can be designed and animated using computers. The group invested a year in producing a highly accurate 3-D model of the opera house's auditorium, complete with interactive lighting visualization, using advanced software that included ESP Vision, Autodesk Maya, 3D StudioMAX and AutoCAD. With each new incoming production that's scheduled to perform, Panait takes the AutoCAD files of the newly designed sets and builds an accurate virtual model. Once the entire 3-D model is finalized, he exports the set into the "virtual opera house." It is at this point where Panait and other lighting technicians can virtually choreograph lighting cues with specific scenes without having to use the actual stage.

To run the graphic-intensive software at fast speeds, Panait needed a computer that could go above-and-beyond the standard desktop while meeting his budget. After doing some research, Panait decided to build the lighting visualizations computer using some of the information he found on the Internet. Panait's homemade computer was used for several years, but when it came to having adequate support for the system, there were no reliable sources. Any virus or internal problem that arose, there was no customer service line to call or reliable source to consult since the computer was so unique.

An increase in budget enabled Panait to purchase a custom, ready-made computer with high-performance specifications. With the lighting design software similar to graphic-intensive gaming design software, Panait looked toward models and manufacturers that gamers preferred. With some further Web-consulting, he found that an Alienware system was exactly what the Royal Opera House needed.

Alienware ALX Desktop Shines Above the Rest

Panait went on the Alienware Web site to check outthe configurationsand features for the Alienware Area-51 ALX desktop computer. Since the virtual opera system renders in real-time and produces a lot of internal heat, he needed the customized ALX system to be outfitted with high-performance graphics solutions and more-than-adequate heat distribution. The Royal Opera House's first Alienware system exceeded most standard PCs at the time, so when he ordered the theatre's second Alienware desktop two years later, Panait knew he was getting the best graphics and cooling technology with the system.

Panait chose an Intel® Core™ 2 Extreme QX9770 3.2GHz processor overclocked to 4.0GHz 12MB cache 1,600MHz FSB with a high-performance liquid-cooling system; dual 1GB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 280 video cards; an NVIDIA nForce 790i Ultra SLI motherboard; and a 4GB Corsair Dominator overclocked dual-channel DDR3 SDRAM at 1,600MHz. And to top it all off, it was all backed by Alienware's quality and support.

"The Royal Opera House is operating one of the world's most advanced lighting visualization system, and out of the many computers out there, we chose Alienware," Panait said. "Alienware's quality and technical support were amazing. If we had a problem or glitch, we called the support team and had a solution on the spot. It's exactly what we needed."

'Virtual Opera' a Show-stopper

The virtual reality (VR) facility has become essential to the Royal Opera House's daily operations. With various opera and ballet companies performing at the theatre, the lighting technicians in the VR facility can play with 3-D models in real-time, experimenting with what can be achieved during a performance before the set is actually built. Set and lighting designers use the Alienware desktops to view the animated auditorium on a large 2.2 x 3.5-meter screen and discuss sightlines and viewing possibilities from different spectator perspectives around the theatre. Panait said the pre-visualization aspect also fuels creativity. Lighting designers have more time to experiment with different lighting concepts without having to adjust each rig manually.

As Harvey put it, "It would literally not be possible for the Royal Opera House to function as it does now without our VR facility." Panait said they are constantly pushing to achieve more fluid animations and more detailed models, and SLI plays an important part in the Maya animations. With real-time rendering, the overclocked graphics cards inside the Alienware system can heat up pretty fast. With Alienware's liquid-cooling system and increased air flow to the VR facility, the machines are able to run smoothly during peak usage.

"With the amount of real-time rendering we use, everything can get really hot," Panait said. "If there's no air flow in the VR facility, the room would be boiling – and it's a big studio. Alienware's liquid-cooling system helps save the internal components from heat damage and allows us to focus on the lighting design instead of worrying about the equipment."

Panait and the entire Royal Opera House crew remain the quiet heroes behind the scenes. When the world-class performers come out to take their bows after each performance, the world-class technicians congratulate one another on a job well-done. Most of their praise and recognition comes from industry peers. Panait said he often shares lighting insight with colleagues worldwide. When they ask him for preferred equipment, Panait knows just where to point them. "Around the world, more theatres and auditoriums are adopting virtual reality for pre-visualization and setup," Panait said. "When they ask about our setup, I tell them, 'we are using Alienware computers and are very pleased with them.' When they ask what specs they should include with their budget, I advise the individual to head to the Alienware Web site and customize the best setup within the budget. After seeing the process and what our system has been able to produce, the majority choose Alienware."

To check out the virtual opera in action, check out this video at:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOxqBlVsJro