Member Article

Cité des Sciences et de l'Industrie chooses Sony PSE for its Planetarium

The Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie (city of science and industry) in Paris calls on Sony to equip its Planetarium with the most powerful technology available on the market: 4K. The objective: to take the immersive experience even further, ensuring its images reach the height of realism, precision and intensity.

A gigantic project and a first in Europe

For more than thirty years, the ‘Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie’ has allowed visitors to experience ‘intense realism’ thanks to its Planetarium which features immersive films and 360° shows.

Anxious to offer their 200,000 annual visitors an even richer experience, the Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie decided to trade in their current video projectors for a state-of-the-art projection system. At the start of 2017, the decision was made to choose Sony PSE’s 4K solutions due to the need for higher resolution, better contrast and optimal brightness.

“In order to offer our visitors even greater experiences, we have to regularly scrutinise our technological approach. By getting equipment capable of broadcasting 8K resolution, the Planetarium at the Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie has become the first place of its kind in the whole of Europe to push the bar this high. As well as choosing Sony for the technology, we also had to surround ourselves with strong partners to achieve our ambition. We therefore chose to team up with RSA Cosmos, a planetarium specialist, and Vidélio, a video integrator with a thorough understanding of issues specific to the world of shows” says Fodil Yazid, Technical Manager in charge of the project to update the Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie.

Ten 4K Z-Phosphor laser projectors to touch the stars

As well as the need for the Planetarium to continually modernise its facilities, high expectations were identified regarding the need to increase the uniformity of the light and colours.

Sony therefore suggested a device comprising ten VPL-GTZ280 4K video projectors which when combined, are able to produce a single image in 8K resolution to achieve unrivalled levels of resolution and image quality. These video projectors, assisted by twenty computers, are able to project an image made up of approximately 35,000,000 pixels, which is more than 17 times more detailed than the HD screens found in the vast majority of today’s televisions.

To carry out a project of such a scale, Sony collaborated with planetarium creator RSA Cosmos, who have already equipped more than 150 of these structures around the world. Along with video solutions supplier Vidélio, a long-standing partner who works with many brands, particularly at cultural and sporting events.

“We are particularly proud to be able to work with a place as iconic as the Planetarium of the Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie. In effect it will take the most powerful solution currently available on the market to push the realism of the images as far as possible and enrich visitors’ emotional experiences”, says Philippe Remion, Sales Manager at Sony PSE. The Planetarium at the Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie has become the first 8K planetarium in Europe and the second in the world. With its 600-m² dome, it is the largest in the world to feature such a high resolution.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Sony Professional Solutions .