New Cruise Ships To Feature Giant 57-Foot LED Walls Showing Live Video Of Surroundings

January 25, 2019 by Dave Haynes

The Scandinavian cruise line Hurtigruten is building a pair of ships that will feature 57-foot tall LED in a seven-storey atrium area, running live video of the surroundings, as well as pre-planned content triggered by the ship’s location.

Hurtigruten is most known for its operations along Norway’s western and northern coast between Bergen and Kirkenes,  but also offers expedition cruises in Antarctica, Greenland, Iceland, Spitsbergen, the Northwest Passage and more.

What’s being billed as the tallest LED screens at sea will span seven decks and 17.5 meters (57.4 feet). Hurtigruten, says a press release, is building two new hybrid ships that will revolutionize travel at sea with soundless sailings. To accompany these groundbreaking new ships they have chosen to welcome the passengers with a LED-screen that is beyond 4K ultra-HD with a seam-and borderless display.

“By introducing the tallest LED-screen at sea,” the company says, “we will bring—and magnify—the splendid beauty of the passing nature to the guests inside” and continued ‘We can use it to stream live lectures and presentations, to set the theme for the voyage, or just create a special atmosphere. But, most importantly, it will be utilized to broadcast the spectacular nature to our guests on board in a format never seen before.”

The featured content on the LED screen will include spectacular photos from “The World’s Most Beautiful Sea Voyage” as well as a live 360-degree feed from the ships mast and underwater drones.

The planned screen has a 2.6mm pixel pitch a resolution of 6,720 by 2,496 pixels. The installation is a joint effort by Norway’s ProntoTV (Installation, CMS, Content), Bravo AV (AV and infrastructure) and Expromo (LED supplier).

Sales director Paal Berg at ProntoTV says: “this is one of the most spectacular and technical difficult installations done at sea. Hurtigruten’s ships also operate in exotic waters that sometimes can be rough and without a stable internet connection (that can give shills down the spine to every millennial). Still the video wall will be amazing, by showing live content using the ship’s own equipment and pre-scheduled content triggered by the ship’s location and GPS.”

Hurtigruten has also installed interactive touch tables to inform and entertain the guests on board. The interactive touch tables will show where the ship is located, as well as Hurtigruten’s entire fleet. Coming features will include live coverage of whale locations on a map, letting passengers know when it is time to get up on deck.  

The ships are scheduled to be sailing by mid-May 2019.

  1. Wes Dixon says:

    Hi Dave,
    Hilarious! Thank you for sharing!

    This one ranks very high on my “Why would you do this?” list. To use this (otherwise excellent) technology to NOT go outside, ON A CRUISE SHIP, to look at the scenery you booked the cruise to look at in the first place, is really wrong.

    Ok, ok, I know they’ll use it for a lot more than ‘scenery’ shots, but to tout that as the reason they have the tech is just … just… no!

  2. I hope it doesn´t get hacked… now, that would be funny, but because of the size…

  3. It is really a wow thing.
    High pixel and 4K ultra-HD with a seam-and borderless display with a height of 57 feet will surely gonna be the point of attraction on that cruise ship.

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