Las Vegas is not known as a place for the easily distracted. After all, this is the city that felt it necessary about a decade ago to put metal railings along the sidewalks so that hapless tourists wouldn’t wander into traffic. Driving through Las Vegas was certainly distracting when you had giant signs to read like these:
But honestly the competition for who could be the most distracting didn’t begin in earnest until about 1990, when animated signs started taking over. That competition never stopped. Drive down Las Vegas Boulevard today — if you dare — and you’ll be hit in the face with photorealistic gigantic images from all sides. But honestly, nothing compares to what MSG has unleashed upon an unwitting world.
The Sphere at the Venetian
Las Vegas never does anything small. So, they set out to create an indoor arena with room for 30,000 people and the most advanced audio and video system known to man. They started building it about 1/2 mile off the strip, between Las Vegas Boulevard and the convention center. I remember seeing its beginnings in 2020, a million years ago.
Building what’s arguably the most advanced indoor venue is apparently not enough if you’re in Las Vegas. It also has to literally stop traffic. So, they filled the outside with enough LEDs to create a 16K screen and animated it. The results, as shown from the video below, range from amazing to incredibly creepy.
I don’t know about you but in my opinion a gigantic eyeball is the stuff of nightmares. But even so I recognize the hard work it took to create a display like that.
Two generations ago, Gilmore Clarke created the largest globe in New York’s Flushing Meadows Park. The Sphere in Las Vegas not only can show a globe, it can animate it. That’s how much technology has changed since 1960.
Take a look for yourself.
Because you can look at everything from anywhere, that’s just life today, there’s a live webcam where you can see what the Sphere is doing at any given moment. I’m presuming that if it’s animated, it’s also causing traffic accidents. But at least those folks will get some entertainment while they wait for the cops to show up.
