Barco 🇧🇪

📍 Kortrijk, Belgium

🏢 Founded 1934

🌍 Massive Live Event Projection Mapping

Overview Innovations Products Applications FAQs Resources

Company Overview

Barco is an undisputed titan in the live event technology and projection mapping industry. Founded in Belgium in 1934 (originally assembling radios), the company has evolved into a global powerhouse for mission-critical visualization. When you see a breathtaking projection mapping display on the side of a massive skyscraper, or attend a massive EDM festival with immense visual backdrops, it is almost certainly being powered by a fleet of Barco projectors.

Barco completely dominates the top-tier ‘Large Venue’ category. They do not manufacture cheap consumer projectors for living rooms; their focus is entirely on blindingly bright, incredibly robust laser projectors capable of outputting 40,000 to 75,000 lumens. These machines are built like tanks, designed to be stacked, rigged in complex truss systems, and endure the brutal conditions of global rock tours.

Beyond projection hardware, Barco is equally famous for their image processing. Their Event Master screen management systems (like the E2) are the industry standard processors used to route complex 4K video signals to these massive projector arrays with zero latency.

Core Technologies

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Ultra-High Lumen Laser

Pioneering the shift from traditional xenon lamps to pure RGB laser light sources, Barco manufactures some of the brightest projectors on earth (exceeding 70,000 lumens), ensuring massive contrast even in ambient light.

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Advanced Edge Blending

Proprietary software and hardware integration that allows technicians to seamlessly overlap the beams of dozens of projectors, perfectly blending them into one massive, continuous image across complex architectural surfaces.

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Event Master Processing

The accompanying image processing ecosystem (E2/S3 processors) that takes in dozens of 4K camera and graphics feeds, scales them, and routes them to the projectors with virtually zero frames of delay.

Featured Solutions

UDM & UDX Series Projectors

The workhorses of the live event industry. Compact but incredibly powerful 3-chip DLP laser projectors (ranging from 22,000 to 40,000 lumens) designed specifically for rapid rigging in concert arenas.

XDL Series (Massive Venue)

The absolute pinnacle of brightness. The XDL line features 75,000-lumen RGB laser projectors used for massive outdoor projection mapping on stadiums, castles, and skyscrapers.

ClickShare Wireless Presentation

In the corporate boardroom space, Barco’s ClickShare system is the global standard for wireless presentation, allowing executives to seamlessly beam their laptop screens to the room’s display.

Ideal Industry Deployments

🎸 Global Rock Tours

🏰 Architectural Projection Mapping

🏢 Corporate Boardrooms (ClickShare)

🏥 Medical Diagnostic Imaging

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the difference between RGB Laser and Phosphor Laser?

RGB laser (used in Barco’s highest-end models) uses three separate red, green, and blue lasers to create the image, resulting in the absolute widest color gamut and highest brightness (Rec. 2020). Phosphor lasers are slightly less expensive and use a blue laser fired through a yellow phosphor wheel.

Can Barco projectors be rigged vertically for portrait mode?

Yes. Unlike older lamp-based projectors which would overheat if tilted, Barco’s modern laser projectors have 360-degree orientation capability, allowing them to be pointed straight down at a floor or sideways for portrait screens.

Do I need an E2 processor to run a Barco projector?

Not for a simple, single-screen setup. However, for massive wide-screens requiring multiple projectors blended together, an Event Master processor (like the E2) is heavily recommended to manage the complex pixel space.