The Vehicle That Came Out of the Ground

When a conventional curtain reveal was not different enough.

The challenge

A major truck manufacturer was preparing to launch a new heavy contracting vehicle at its test track, allowing customers to experience and drive the vehicle after the presentation. Previous launches had successfully used lighting, dry ice, dancers and curtain reveals. Other proposed concepts for the new event again centred on variations of a curtain, lighting and smoke. The client wanted something genuinely different.

The thinking

The test-track location already required semi-permanent event structures, generators, catering, guest transport and significant infrastructure. Looking around the site, Comtec noticed the excavators used to form test-track features and load the trucks. That physical environment suggested the reveal: rather than hiding the new truck behind something, hide it beneath the ground.

The solution

A large steel-sided excavation and long ramp were created deep enough to conceal the truck. A frame was constructed above the vehicle and covered with fresh turf so that, from the audience position, the centre of the presentation area appeared to contain nothing more than an innocent patch of grass.

A semi-permanent presentation structure incorporated two lecterns, a central large screen, PA, lighting and special effects, together with a substantial reception and hospitality area.

On cue, dry ice flooded the ground, mist filled the air and a specially produced soundtrack and lighting sequence began. The heavy truck emerged from beneath the turf, travelled up the concealed ramp and stopped approximately a metre from the audience.

Safety was engineered into the reveal. Substantial steel restraints were installed and the vehicle physically secured so that it could not reach the audience if the test driver overshot the intended stopping point.

The result

Construction, technical production, transport, generators, catering, hospitality and operational teams meant more than 100 people were involved in delivering the event. Decades later, people who experienced the reveal still remember and talk about it.

Comtec principle

Technology and production methods change, but live events are still about creating experiences people remember.