The ball turned on its exterior lights for the first time on July 4th and opened its doors this Friday, September 29th.
Sphere, a gigantic sphere that promises to redefine the world of entertainment, was unveiled in Las Vegas over the weekend.
Located next to the famous stripes of Nevada City, it is the largest spherical structure in the world. It is 112 meters high – more than the Statue of Liberty or Big Ben – and 157 meters wide.
After a two-year construction delay due to the Covid pandemic, the sphere Opened its doors on September 26th with a U2 concert.
The Irish rock band will present their show “U2: UV Warning Baby Live at Sphere” – a tribute to their 1991 album – on 25 dates until mid-December.
U2, the iconic band that opened the sphere, has a history stretching back almost fifty years.
This Friday, October 6th, will also premiere “Sphere,” a film by the acclaimed New York director Darren Aronofsky (known among others for “The Black Swan” or “The Whale”), designed specifically for this audience and integrating all the technology available for creation an unprecedented immersive experience.
“It’s a science fiction journey into the depths of our future,” the director said of Postcard From Earth, the film that will be screened at the Sphere for at least a year and a half.
BBC Mundo tells you 4 facts that show the greatness of this new entertainment temple:
The inside screen has a resolution of 16K.
1. A 54,000 m² LED screen, the largest in the world
The outer shell of the sphere is entirely illuminated by an LED screen 54,000 m2an area equivalent to about 8 football fields.
It has 50 million LED lights that glow day and night. It was illuminated for the first time on the occasion of July 4th this year.
The interior screen that visitors can see inside the sphere is 15,000 m²
With 173 million pixels, it is the highest resolution display in the world. And it reaches from the ground to a height of 76 meters.
A company from Zaragoza led by architect Miguel Montgivel was behind the design and construction of the two screens.
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Image of the inside of the ball during the U2 concert.
2. Capacity for 17,500 participants
That’s the capacity of the auditorium, although it can hold up to 20,000 people if you include the standing audience.
10,000 of the seats are equipped with haptic technology, that is, they can vibrate so that the assistant can tactilely feel what is happening on the screen. They can also create wind, temperature and smell effects.
During the Covid-19 pandemic, work was completely stopped.
3. About 167,000 speakers
Sphere’s sound is based on a technology called Wave Field Synthesis, which uses a large number of electronically controlled speakers to create the interference of their waves a very similar acoustic experience from anywhere in the room.
Some attendees at the inauguration also reported that the soundproofing was surprising; This means that outside the room you hear little or nothing of what is happening inside.
Visitors to the U2 concert were able to experience an immersive experience.
4. Cost of $2.3 billion
In 2019, the total cost of the project was estimated at $1.2 billion.
However, there were some changes in the design, the supply chain crisis that occurred as a result of the pandemic and the increase in inflation in the last phase of construction In the end, they almost doubled the investment in Sphere.
It is the most expensive auditorium in Las Vegas, even surpassing Allegiant Stadium, quadrupling the Sphere’s capacity.
Las Vegas receives approximately 40 million visitors annually.
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