What exactly is behind a gobo or a dynamic effect? One of Goboservice’s strengths is a team of graphic designers who take care to carefully transform every single idea into a brilliant project. In an operating sector with high technological and standardized content, such as that of image processing, the human component is the factor which makes the difference.
An immense amount of experience gained over time, subjective intuition, critical evaluation of solutions and attention to details are the “tools of the trade” that help individual operators to achieve the results customers expect. And it’s also the rigorous quality control that makes Goboservice a brand appreciated in the national market and abroad.
Cristina Delmare is the veteran of the group of five graphic designers called upon to elaborate an average of six hundred gobos a month with different priorities according to urgency, target markets, the complexity of the image to be generated, and also the context in which the architectural projection will be shown, be it a black and white gobo for a shopping centre, or a full colour image for an artistic composition.
“We receive high resolution images and we must make sure the colours on the gobos are the same as on the original artwork.” explains Cristina. “There is a special image processing technique, which is so different from what graphicians normally use. We start with numerical data and the unit measures for the realization of the final product. Illustrator, Photoshop and Casmate are our guides”.
In order to realise the customer’s idea we must take into account filters, the wavelength of the slabs, the size of gobos and the type of moving heads in which they will be mounted. Simona Roscitano, while measuring an ancient painting to be reproduced inside a French church through two different projectors, says: “Correct management of the colour temperatures of the lamps mounted on two different types of projectors used in the same context, is an extremely important element for the success of the projection”.
If you don’t take into consideration the properties of the lighting fixtures, there is a risk that the two parts of the image will be projected in different shades. We work meticulously to balance the primary colours so that they make the two parts of the painting blend seamlessly even if projected from different light sources.
The final perception of the image is the end result of a complex work of synthesis especially in the presence of nuances or articulated compositions in which the individual projectors must contribute to compose a unique and very wide image. As Demetrio Megalizzi explains: “In this case further collimation work is needed as if we were going to compose a large bright mosaic”.
Distortion factors, projection points and non-homogeneous surfaces are the main factors to be taken into account for gobo production. Each realisation becomes a common heritage within the company. Paola Principato explains: “Our work is empirical and has become scientific thanks to continuous collaboration within the group”.
But there is also space for pure creativity; Lorenza Ravasio, who has a real passion for artistic design as well as creating custom gobos requested by customers, deals with updating the standard set of images and dynamic effects. “I try to interpret the general trends of specific themes such as Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Easter or other specific holidays and to reproduce them in an original way so that the final effect is as engaging as possible”.
And of course, this all comes with the “Made in Italy” guarantee.