This happened two weeks ago, and I still keep coming back to it. On March 8 the Cleveland Cavaliers retired the No. 11 of Zydrunas Ilgauskas at Quicken Loans Arena, and they turned the whole basketball court into a giant 3D screen for it.
Big Z Goes to the Rafters
Ilgauskas played 12 of his 13 NBA seasons in Cleveland. The 7-foot-3 center from Kaunas, Lithuania, nearly lost his career to serious foot injuries early on, came back after a radical reconstruction of his left foot, made two All-Star teams and started at center when the Cavs reached the NBA Finals in 2007. He is the franchise leader in blocked shots. Today he works for the Cavs as special assistant to the general manager.
The Pregame Show
Before tip-off against the Knicks, the floor started moving. Quince Imaging mapped the entire court and turned it into a video surface, together with the Cavs' own QTV team and Think Media. The court seems to break apart, fall away and rebuild itself. Watch it, it looks unreal.
Cleveland Cavaliers PreGame Court Projection from Quince Imaging on Vimeo.
The Halftime Ceremony
At halftime the same system told Big Z's story. Think Media built a court-projected tribute that mixed Cavalier greats of the past with the current team. Then former Cavs executive Wayne Embry and owner Dan Gilbert introduced Ilgauskas, who stood on the floor with his wife, his parents, his sister and his two sons. LeBron James came in from Miami because Z had asked him to be there. The players wore "Z 11" patches, and his banner went up next to Austin Carr, Nate Thurmond, Bingo Smith, Larry Nance, Brad Daugherty and Mark Price. He is only the seventh Cavs player with that honor.
How It Works
The tech behind it is impressive. Quince used 16 HD projectors and Pandoras Box software to create one huge pixel space of 3,600 by 1,878 pixels. They first translated the court and every painted line into pixels, then lined up the video content with the actual floor design. That is why the illusion works even from the front row.
The Cavs are not exactly a contender this season, but in terms of show they just set the bar for the whole league.
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