High Res

Lighting the Way

‘The Voice of Ireland’, ‘Dancing with the Stars’, Eurovision Song Contest, the XXII Olympic Winter Games, Sochi, RTE’s ‘Centenary’ and ‘Riverdance 25’ are just a few of the notable milestones on Peter Canning’s journey from being a freelance lighting programmer in the late 1990’s to employing a team of 7 at High Res’ state-of-the-art design practice in Ballymount, South Dublin. Along with long standing colleagues Kerrie-Ann Keogh and Linda Bushe, Peter and the High Res team regularly deliver projects for the likes of streaming giants Amazon Prime, Netflix and Apple TV+.

Creativity lies at the core of the company’s offering. The team consult and design lighting and video solutions for TV, film, theatre, special events and architecture clients. High Res have a vast network of experienced and trusted freelancers and subcontractors who they engage on a project by project basis to bring those concepts to life.

Their creative application of technology and their international profile were among the many reasons why High Res won the South Dublin Local Enterprise Awards in 2021. 

Always Evolving

Having worked closely with huge numbers of production teams over the years, the team knew all about the cost and complexity of shooting footage on location, especially outdoors, where light and weather conditions change all the time. For years, the answer to that challenge was shooting against greenscreen, but that yields a result which is far from perfect and easily spotted by most viewers. This proved to be the inspiration behind the development of High Res’ service line in Virtual Production.

Imagine shooting a film in a moving train, with the landscape and natural light changing constantly. It’s costly to have a whole crew and cast on the train; and the train can’t just switch into reverse if you need to shoot a second take! What if one simply shot the landscape alone, then used huge LED screens to play back that landscape footage in a controlled studio environment as a backdrop for shooting the movie action? This is exactly what High Res undertook for an episode entitled ‘Strangers on a Train’ for Series 2 of Amazon Prime’s acclaimed ‘Modern Love’. The nature of LED means the screens recreate effects like reflection and shadow much more faithfully than greenscreen. While perhaps met with an initial degree of scepticism from some in the industry, the quality and cost effectiveness that this technology offers have seen demand for High Res’ Virtual Production services grow exponentially. The Covid 19 pandemic and all the added complexity of filming on location arguably accelerated the industry’s adoption of virtual production technologies and nudged open the door for a plethora of opportunities which the company is now grasping. 

Growing Beyond These Shores

Peter Canning reflects on how the company has achieved such strong growth over the years: ‘We’re a small company in a very specialised industry on a small island, so we had no choice but to be adaptable and to embrace export opportunities. Our turnover has substantially increased year on year as Virtual Production as a tool has been adopted by industry.  The tax advantages of Section 481 also make it attractive for international production companies to choose to work with us as an Irish company and of late we have won a number of exciting inward production projects.’

Find out more about High Res at www.highres.one