Ground control: British Airways recreates flight using projection-mapping

London – British Airways has marked its inaugural commercial flight from London to Singapore with a video created using projection-mapping.

Celebrating the sense of wonder that the pioneers of air travel shared, the video, developed by digital experience agency Projection Artworks, depicts a British Airways A380 plane as it soars through the air between sunset skies and fluffy white clouds, before landing in Singapore among the country’s most famous landmarks.

In reality, the plane, a 1:20 scale model, is stuck firmly on the ground, but a sense of scale and movement is generated by seven HD projectors and a cleverly designed lightbox. 

The technology, made famous in last year’s short film Box, has been assimilated into British Airways’ advertising campaign, popular due to its ability to create experiences of wonder and illusion in a sector that is hard pushed into surprise.

‘Video-mapping uses bespoke animation to manipulate the look of a real-world object,’ said Tom Burch from Projection Artworks in an interview with Wire. ‘Usually content is created from a specific viewing angle – where the audience or camera is standing – but to map the plane model we needed to produce animations to work from five different camera angles.’

Read our article on the latest advertising campaign from Virgin America, a company approaching the proposition of long-haul travel from a different perspective.