Real-time effects for The Voice of Ukraine super finale broadcast

Blck Box relied on Screenberry media server to drive stage visuals at the live broadcast of Holos Krainy (Voice Ukraine) reality TV show.

The Super Finale of the 10th season of the Holos Krainy singing contest was extraordinary. The super finale became the first live reality show on Ukrainian TV produced and held entirely during the national lockdown caused by Covid-19 pandemic. That’s why it required unconventional approaches.

For three weeks, everyone involved in the show’s production stayed in touch via Zoom. Under supervision of the 1+1 Production team, the competition participants shot all interviews, beauty shots and openings on their phones. Finalists performed on a high-tech cubic stage surrounded by LED screens. Celebrity coaches commented on performances of their individual trainees via an online video link. Overseas participants performed from their home countries online.

Kyiv-based design and media arts studio Blck Box was invited to produce real-time stage graphics for the show. The studio used one Screenberry media server + Notch VFX to output video signal to 7 x LED screens with total resolution 3840х2160 pixels + 1920х1080 video overlay. Screenberry’s native support for Notch playback in high resolution played a crucial role in the success of the project.

The innovative super finale of the singing competition scored a high TV rating attracting an audience of 4.4 million. The show caused a tsunami of positive reviews in social media and news outlets. Some observers said the broadcast would go down in the history of national television.

“I can assure you that what we did was more than just the most technologically advanced broadcast of Voice of the Country. We set the trend for the coming years for the whole of Ukrainian television. Moreover, this format of the super finale was introduced for the first time in the history of the global The Voice franchise,” says the show’s general producer Volodymyr Zavadiuk.