World’s First Shipboard Planetarium Sets Sail on Queen Mary 2!

Nashua, NH, USA – 12 January, 2004

The first planetarium installed on board a ship has set sail for the high seas as it left the port of Southampton UK on the luxury ocean liner Queen Mary 2 today, announced Sky-Skan President, Mr. Steven T. Savage.

The star attraction is the “Illuminations Theater” on Cunard’s new luxury liner, the Queen Mary 2. Even before departure on its maiden voyage, the planetarium has already hosted thousands of visitors including her Royal Highness the Queen of England. The planetarium has quickly become the “must see” element of the most luxurious ocean liner ever built.

“The theater is absolutely stunning!” Mr. Savage said. “Passengers and others aboard the world’s greatest ocean liner have been awe-struck when experiencing the world’s best fulldome projection system set against the backdrop of the breathtaking art deco interior of the theater.”

The planetarium features Sky-Skan’s SkyVision and DigitalSky systems coupled with the company’s new AVS video system to seamlessly integrate all visual components on the dome. Sky-Skan’s SPICE Automation control system keeps all functions effortlessly under synchronized control and a simple button click away. The entire planetarium system is controlled by a single laptop that plugs into a jack under one of the seats in the theater.

Sky-Skan engineered the system to use 6 Barco Sim4 DLP projectors to completely blanket the dome with a single seamless super high-resolution video image, resulting in spectacular color and brightness even in ambient lighting conditions. The projectors are housed in specially designed domed turrets discretely placed in the seating area of the theater.

Passengers will be able to enjoy several different immersive fulldome experiences, from Stars Over the Atlantic – a night-sky identification session – to the very best in SkyVision productions, Infinity Express and The Secret of the Dragon. The theater will also play a central role in Cunard's "Enrichment Program" operated by Oxford University where the ship takes on the role of a floating university.

The 2,620-passenger Queen Mary 2‘s maiden voyage sails to Fort Lauderdale, Florida. She'll winter in the Caribbean and visit Rio during Carnival. Currently under development is a roster of guest lecturers to provide a rotational “who's who” of top minds in the astronomy field to guide passengers through the skies.

For further information:

Steven Savage, President Sky-Skan, Inc., 51 Lake Street, Nashua, NH, USA e: office@skyskan.com p: +1 603 880 8500.
Glenn Smith, Director Sky-Skan Europe, Museumsinsel 1, D-80538 Munich, Germany e: smith@skyskan.com p: +49 89 6428 9231
Jack White, Director Sky-Skan Australia, 441 Spencer Street, West Melbourne, VIC, Australia e: white@skyskan.comp: +61 3 9329 5501

Information on SkyVision, DigitalSky and Sky-Skan, Inc. may be found on the Internet at www.skyskan.com.
More information on the Cunard Line and the QM2 may be found on the Internet at www.cunard.com.
More information on Barco may be found on the Internet at www.barco.com.

About Sky-Skan

For over 35 years, Sky-Skan has been the world's leading provider of media technologies and facility design for domed theaters. Sky-Skan's products and services include their trademark SPICE Automation Show Control System, SkyVision fulldome video projection and DigitalSky digital planetarium systems, as well as complete turn-key facility design and construction management services.

Sky-Skan has installed dozens of fulldome video and digital planetarium systems and over 250 SPICE Theater Automation systems to date in planetaria, large format film theaters, domed media theaters, museums and science centers around the world. Sky-Skan maintains sales, production facilities and technical support on 3 continents with its offices in Nashua, NH USA; Munich, Germany; and Melbourne, Australia.