The World Needs Slides

December 30, 2021 12:24 PM

Smart Business and Challenge of Change are just two examples of a nearly-forgotten media format collected by the AV Archaeology channel: computer-synchronized multi-projector slide shows (via).

You Can't Stop a Dove gives a glimpse into the industry behind these shows. Some videos include a programmer's view to get a sense of the production process. Others like Rockefeller Group 1985 just paint a picture of a world long gone using obsolete technology. All the videos in the channel are worth watching.

posted by OverlappingElvis (17 comments total)

The tour for Genesis's The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway was one giant multi-projector show that rarely worked correctly but was magical when it did.

Not finding footage of it right now online, but there's a "recreation" of the show included on the deluxe re-release from a while back. It's quite good, really. When it works.
posted by hippybear at 12:31 PM on December 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

The first one is like a mutant offspring of 80 clip art, Richard Marx, and Sesame Street.

“Smart business is a motivated workforce / Smart business is staying on a steady course”.
posted by migurski at 1:08 PM on December 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

When you are waiting in line for Captain EO, the Michael Jackson 3D movie at Epcot, they first throw you in a room with one of these. I thought it was quite entertaining, but it has this weird tinge of disappointment because it seems like you are getting to enter the actual show. Well no.
posted by bitslayer at 1:16 PM on December 30, 2021

I forgot to mention in the post, but "Smart Business" and "Challenge of Change" are both generic modules designed to let companies drop their own logo in.
posted by OverlappingElvis at 1:16 PM on December 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

Back in the 80’s, at Apple, we had this big, all employees event at a local junior college auditorium. A huge screen descends at the back of the stage, the room darkens, music starts, and these images start appearing, marching across the screen, appearing here and there, quasi animated, all in time to the music. What the hell is this? I turned around and above and behind us on the balcony is this huge array of slide projectors. Slide projectors?? Having never seen anything like this before, I was impressed. Slide projectors were always singular showing one image after another. There appeared to be a large crew of people up there managing the thing, swapping carousels. I can’t imagine how long it took to design, produce, setup, and run it took. And cost. There were computer to 35 mm slide printers back then…
posted by njohnson23 at 2:15 PM on December 30, 2021 [4 favorites]

The first one is like a mutant offspring of 80 clip art, Richard Marx, and Sesame Street.

It's chock full of Memphis Milano design elements!

Having run town hall type events with various slide and video components, I can say what I was missing all along was the mime content in the Challenge of Change slide show.

These are pretty great.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 2:30 PM on December 30, 2021 [2 favorites]

njohnson23 was it this Apple presentation?
posted by OverlappingElvis at 2:37 PM on December 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

To celebrate the Bicentennial, some person or entity commissioned Where's Boston?, an hour-long multi-media presentation celebrating the city, its history and people that used 40 projectors, 3,100 slides, and quadraphonic sound. The show was produced by Peter Chermayeff, best known for his work with aquariums, and created by Cambridge Seven Associates.

It was magical and greatly influenced my notions about presentations and, though being 16 I wouldn't have put it this way, interpretation (as the term is used in museum exhibit design and by other attractions that seek to engage audiences around history). The show ran for years at the Prudential Center and became the rare tourist attraction that crossed over, becoming beloved by local people too. I saw it many times and so I was delighted to find the full show on YouTube here. I'm looking forward to seeing if it holds up.
posted by carmicha at 5:12 PM on December 30, 2021 [3 favorites]

carmicha I came here to link that exact same Where's Boston? presentation. I was a summer intern in the graphic design department at WGBH-TV in 1978 and I must have watched that show six different times. I had never seen anything remotely like it, and like you, it really opened my eyes to the possibilities of what you might call "multi-media storytelling." And when I did get around to trying my hand at it, my God: coordinating multiple slide carousels with a taped soundtrack was a high-order industrial feat. Nothing but glitches. All of the examples in the AV Archeology channel are even more impressive than they look.

The biggest surprise rewatching Where's Boston? today is its length, almost 58 minutes! Hard to imagine proposing even something half as long for today's audiences.
posted by How the runs scored at 6:10 PM on December 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

This is not dissimilar (and I assume influenced by?) the Ford/PHILCO-designed Houston Mission Control displays. All the real-time plots and mission progress graphics were custom analog visualizations.
posted by migurski at 6:11 PM on December 30, 2021 [2 favorites]

OverLappingElvis - No, not that one. It was a wide screen thing, images side by side, etc. That one that you found, looks like a single 4:3 image. I was at Apple when the stock went public. But I missed that presentation.
posted by njohnson23 at 6:15 PM on December 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

Huh. This reminds me of some HIV-scare/anti-drug or something touring show that touched down at my high school in the mid 90s. Had totally forgotten about it but I now recall being impressed by the array of projectors being used.
posted by St. Oops at 10:02 PM on December 30, 2021

How was this cheaper than editing it to film?

I guess the expensive part is installing the multi projector system itself, then making the shows is quick and easy?

I think later video presentation style was probably somewhat influenced by these things, namely the flashes of still images it various positions around the screen along with the exciting muzak.
posted by thefool at 6:12 AM on December 31, 2021 [1 favorite]

carmicha and htrs: I did an exhibit that included Where’s Boston and have some of the slides from Peter (who is a delightful human). I also have some C7 slides of the install, which includes snaps taken during the blizzard when the pneumatics failed and they had to evacuate all of the artifacts they had in there. There’s a more expansive story about the bicentennial Boston ended up with that exhibit, but I’ll tell that later. The booklet for WB includes an image of the backstage setup, it used to be online, but can’t seem to find it at archive.org or LOC.
posted by grimley at 7:27 AM on December 31, 2021 [1 favorite]

When I was in college (Harvey Mudd College, early 90s), there was a Media Studio class taught by J’nan Morse Sellery that was just this — creating a multi-projector slide show. It was not easy or quick. There were some amazing shows (not mine), and I hope that someone archived them somewhere. I believe the control system actually ran on Apple (not Mac) computers.
posted by jimw at 10:12 AM on December 31, 2021

Ever since Ektachrome came back, I have dreamed of doing this for a work presentation instead of the usual ppt stuff. I knew there were multi-projector setups but always thought it was still someone clicking through by hand.

This blows my mind, and I cannot thank you enough for this post.

Are the carousels still the standard 140 slide decks? Does someone have to swap them out mid-show? It seems like these presentations would have WAY more than 140 slides.
posted by hwyengr at 1:01 PM on December 31, 2021

These make for some very satisfying gifs
posted by OverlappingElvis at 4:16 PM on December 31, 2021 [1 favorite]