For 31 years, Hernán Poblete has provided visual support to the main European mass attendance events, with their giant screens.
By Richard Santa
Undoubtedly, sporting events have helped to mark the development of the audiovisual industry, its scenarios have always witnessed the latest developments. In the last 30 years, a Latino is the one who has been in charge of amplifying the images of the most important sporting events in Europe, as well as in the football world cups and the Olympic games around the world.
Hernán Poblete is a Chilean who at the beginning of his professional life was dedicated to the production of sound for musical bands. In the 70s, a tour of Europe with the group Los Jaivas took him to France, a country where, by fate, the band ended and he took the opportunity to look for other options. In that exploration he ended up forming his own company, Supervision, being the protagonist of the main sporting and cultural events and the evolution that the industry has had in these years.
His first encounter with the image was as a child when his father taught him photography, something that he combined with the taste for projection. Therefore, among his group of friends in Santiago he was in charge of the projection of cinema in 8 and 16 millimeters. Then, as an adult, with Los Jaivas he started as a lighter before becoming an entrepreneur. Those were the first steps that would take him to the audiovisual world.
"In 1983 I attended a music festival in Los Angeles. When I arrived I saw three huge televisions that looked in full sun. I had never seen that in my life, I was totally blown away by technology. That's when I started to follow her, see who manufactured and that's almost how Supervision was born. Another anecdote of that festival is that it was organized by Steve Wozniak, the co-founder of Apple. Thanks to the fact that he made that festival, I was able to have my second profession in the audiovisual world, after having been an artistic producer," he said.
By 1984, Hernán Poblete got an English sports marketing company and Mitsubishi to give him the opportunity to represent the Diamond Vision equipment, the only mobile screens that worked during the day that existed at the time. At that time, Mitsubishi was the pioneer in this type of screens, so the opportunity was unique.
Making your own way
Starting in France was not easy, but our Professional of the Month assures that his constant work and conviction were combined with a product without competition for the time and as it became known, his company developed slowly but safely.
"I was fortunate to be in France, a country intermediate between the seriousness of northern Europe and the festiveness of the south. When I started there was a lot of activity and budget for events and culture. In 1989 we had the bicentenary of the French Revolution. That was my first event with five or six screens and it was something unique, which had not been done before in Europe."
Since then, Hernán Poblete puts his screens in the main sporting and cultural events in Europe, actively participating in the Olympic Games, for which, he recalls, he has had to transport his screens even in trineos and endure extreme temperature conditions that can affect both the teams and the people who must install them.
Not to mention the size. Remember that the screens of the 80's weighed 40 tons, the screen of 55 square meters was transported in three sea containers of 17 tons each and each pixel measured 90 millimeters, so you had to be 60 or 70 meters from the screen to see the image.
"An anecdote to get an idea of what the use of screens was like at that time. In 1992 I did my first Winter Olympics in France and used 11 screens in the middle of the day at the facility. Those were the existing screens all over Europe. At that time that technology was very expensive and only the big fanbricants had the ability to produce. That's why there were few existing products and few of us worked with them."
The situation did not change until the year 2000, when a second stage began with the appearance of LED technology that caused prices to fall, burdens were relieved and many more things could be done.
Trajectory of major events
Hernán Poblete has been in the European audiovisual industry for 31 years, supporting major events on this continent. "We are a recognized company within the sport, Sochi, in Russia, was my ninth Olympic Games. We are also very involved in the European football cups and the World Cups."
He stressed that sporting events in particular have contributed to the development of the industry. And he gave as an example how the football World Cups served as a stage to launch television in Chile and then color television, the same situation was in France with the Olympic Games. The same situation was presented with slow motion, HD in the 90s and now we are living it with 4K.
He added that in the 90s was when the use of giant screens in sports and all kinds of events, such as political campaigns, both indoors and outdoors, developed. Even Pope John Paul II had this type of screens on his visits to Austria and France in 1985, also put on by Supervision. "We have been giving solutions over the years, we started very early and we were making relationships, collecting references and giving proof that we can do things with seriousness and quality and today they have confidence in us and call us."
On the development and future of the industry, he mentioned that the arrival of LED was a great revolution and was the beginning of a new life for video broadcasting technology on giant screens and is what is being lived today.
"In the display part, the diffusion of the image, we are moving towards 4K, each time to a better resolution and fidelity of the image. The outdoor screens in full sun are very good and indoors we are reaching beautiful things. In meeting and conference rooms, more and more screens are used, although projection continues to play its role. But all of that depends on good image production."
Latino Experience
In 2000, Hernán Poblete opened a Supervision headquarters in Chile that opened with the junior athletics world championships. The company is still in the market with a small size. In this way, he has been able to know and compare how the industry works in Europe and Latin America.
"The audiovisual world in Chile I know well for my company and that of Brazil for having done the World Cup last year and next year I will be with the Olympics. The AV industry in these two countries is doing quite well. In Europe we have fairly high budgets and quality parameters that are a pleasure to work with. In Chile or Brazil we have the problem of the budget that are always tight and ask how to lower prices. The big events are exempt from financial crises, so it was with the Olympic Games in China in 2008, that while there was crisis around the world, the budget there was intact."
Hernán Poblete concluded his interview with AVI LATINOAMÉRICA indicating that "I have the door open to all Latin Americans who want to contact us, if they want to know something, if they want to talk, if they come to France and want to come to visit us or know some facility".
