Dickies Arena Brings Versatility, Communal Feeling to Fort Worth Area WJHW and Diversified played major roles in the project By Kristian Hernandez, Associate Editor
Thursday, November 21, 2019 - 7:00 am
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Much like the oil booms that made Texas an ideal business destination, the state is going through an era of immense sports-venue expansion. Esports Stadium Arlington has taken over the gaming sphere, Globe Life Field across the street is getting baseball fans excited for the 2020 season, but, 25 minutes to the west, Fort Worth is home to the newest of these buildings. Dickies Arena, a 560,000-sq.-ft. multipurpose facility with up to 14,000 seats, handles a wide range of activity from concerts to college basketball and other sports, such as the Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo.
The new Dickies Arena will host a myriad of events, such as rodeo, basketball, concerts, and gymnastics.
CLICK HERE for an audio breakdown of Dickies Arena.
In our first month, we booked events with Twenty One Pilots, SuperM, The Black Keys, MercyMe, and Hot Wheels Monster Trucks Live, says Andrew Schmidt, technical services manager, Dickies Arena. We will have George Strait in here for two nights back-to-back, and we also have basketball. So we've tried to focus heavily on versatility, flexibility, and showing a whole range of different opportunities for people of Fort Worth to come and enjoy the facility.
Focus on Flexibility: Constructing a Multi-Event Venue
At the onset of this project, Schmidt and his team at Trail Drive Management Corp., the managing company of Dickies Arena, knew that putting this building together would require a chess-like mentality to anticipate the next move and accommodate any and all clients seeking to host an event there. The venue may be hosting a non-conference basketball game between local TCU and USC on Dec. 6, but the Fort Worth Stock Show and Rodeo is its main tenant and was consulted first. It has been operating on an annual basis in the adjacent Will Rogers Memorial Center, which was built in 1936.
About a year and a half ago, I came in to assist with the technology build-out and reviewed the specifications that WJHW laid out for the audio- and video-control spaces, Schmidt says. We also worked with Beck, who was the general contractor on the job, to make modifications because [specifications were made] in 2004 for the first time, mothballed during the recession in 2006, and then brought back to life in 2014. In the old Will Rogers, they did a temporary videoboard, and they've kind of been manipulating it over the years. That was a big reason I came in early, to work with them and say, What are you doing right now? What do you want to do?' We laid out some of the mock-ups of the stats and the video windows early, kind of talk to them about what they want to see and what stats information they want to show on the board, and then design the board around those needs.
The venue is accentuated by a 189- by 25.2-ft. Mitsubishi Black LED circular centerhung videoboard.
As the structure began to take shape, Dickies Arena wanted an in-venue experience that would catch the gaze of any attendee who walked through the front door. For the rodeo's 13th year using a videoboard, Schmidt contracted ANC Sports (which created the first-ever 4K kinetic scoreboard in the Wells Fargo Center) to install a 189- by 25.2-ft. Mitsubishi Black LED circular centerhung videoboard with 6-mm LED spacing and a 57-ft. diameter of seamless and uninterrupted video. On the centerhung's belly, 35- by 10-ft. displays with 4-mm spacing entertain those seated on the east and west sides.
We started on the install in March, and it turned out beautiful, says Schmidt. One of the big things we waited for was Analog Way's new Aquilon processor to drive it, so we were able to have all of the capability and scaling for the inputs off of SDI. Getting the programming right was the most lingering thing we dealt with as we got the videoboard installed.
In addition, the venue features a 1,074- by 2.5-ft. ribbon display with 16-mm spacing that wraps 360 degrees above club- and below top-level seating. Out in the concourse, four 1.8-mm curved DigiLED displays headline the complement of 520 displays and video walls. To round out the list of LED fixtures, each suite comes with LG OLED wallpaper displays with Crestron panels for TV, audio, lighting, and HVAC control.
When the surface allows, the venue gets another dose of LEDs with two 234- by 2.6-ft. sideline fascias and a 40- by 2.5-ft. courtside scorer's table.
In the Crow's Nest: Dickies Arena Deploys Streamlined Equipment Layout for Efficiency
With a calendar's worth of events, establishing an efficient control room was high up on the list of priorities. As the seating chart adapts to a day's event (a capacity of 14,000 for concerts, 13,300 for basketball, 12,000 for family shows and hockey, and 9,300 for the rodeo), the production strategy shifts as well. To handle the diversified schedule, Dickies recruited technology integrator Diversified to assemble a powerful control room.
Ross Video anchors the equipment inside a control room put together by Diversified.
We had a great vision [of the project[ given to us by Andy. He was able to put together his wants and needs for the project and communicate that to us effectively, says Lane Baird, project manager, Diversified. We went off and designed the system based on his 1080p/59.94 requirements.
As with the physical structure, Schmidt and company worked hand-in-hand with their main client to set up the quintessential camera complement for a night at the rodeo.
[Stock Show President/GM] Brad Barnes' comment over and over again was, he wanted cameras capable of seeing the snot in the bull's nose and nothing more, say
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Dickies Arena Brings Versatility, Communal Feeling to Fort Worth Area WJHW and Diversified played major roles in the project By Kristian Hernandez, Associate Editor 
