The Ballet of Change is a series of four films (approximately 4 minutes), each one about a world famous landmark in London - London Bridge

London Bridge

London Bridge is a bridge over the River Thames, connecting the City of London and Southwark, in central London. Situated between Cannon Street Railway Bridge and Tower Bridge, it forms the western end of the Pool of London...

, Leicester Square

Leicester Square

Leicester Square is a pedestrianised square in the West End of London, England. The Square lies within an area bound by Lisle Street, to the north; Charing Cross Road, to the east; Orange Street, to the south; and Whitcomb Street, to the west...

, Trafalgar Square

Trafalgar Square

Trafalgar Square is a public space and tourist attraction in central London, England, United Kingdom. At its centre is Nelson's Column, which is guarded by four lion statues at its base. There are a number of statues and sculptures in the square, with one plinth displaying changing pieces of...

 and Piccadilly Circus

Piccadilly Circus

Piccadilly Circus is a road junction and public space of London's West End in the City of Westminster, built in 1819 to connect Regent Street with the major shopping street of Piccadilly...

. Each film tells the history of its location using imagery and music. Taking as its starting point the earliest image available from museum and other archives (usually a drawing circa 16th Century) and then dancing with the imagery (hence the title of the piece) from oil paintings, through photographs to High Definition

High-definition video

High-definition video or HD video refers to any video system of higher resolution than standard-definition video, and most commonly involves display resolutions of 1,280×720 pixels or 1,920×1,080 pixels...

 Video in Present day. The Ballet of Change: Piccadilly Circus, the final film in the progressive series, was the first film to be broadcast through the famous Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola is a carbonated soft drink sold in stores, restaurants, and vending machines in more than 200 countries. It is produced by The Coca-Cola Company of Atlanta, Georgia, and is often referred to simply as Coke...

 Billboard on Land Securities' Piccadilly Circus Lights in London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

. On 23 November 2007, as part of an event, that included screenings of films onto St. Martin in the Fields Church, Trafalgar Square and the façade of the Odeon Leicester Square

Odeon Leicester Square

The Odeon Leicester Square is a cinema which occupies the centre of the eastern side of Leicester Square, London, dominating the square with its huge black polished granite facade and high tower displaying its name. Blue neon outlines the exterior of the building at night. It was built to be the...

, The Ballet of Change: Piccadilly Circus aired at 19:30 on the Coca-Cola billboard. Coca-Cola have had a sign at Piccadilly Circus since 1955 with the current version from September 2003, when the previous digital projector board and the site formerly occupied by Nescafé was replaced with a state-of-the-art LED video display that curves round with the building.

The Ballet of Change: Piccadilly Circus

On the evening of the event, those wishing to watch the film with the accompanying music downloaded it from www.theballetofchange.co.uk and brought it to the respective film sites on MP3 players.

Archive material was sourced from the Museum of London

Museum of London

The Museum of London documents the history of London from the Prehistoric to the present day. The museum is located close to the Barbican Centre, as part of the striking Barbican complex of buildings created in the 1960s and 70s as an innovative approach to re-development within a bomb damaged...

, London’s Victoria & Albert Museum, Science Museum

Science museum

A science museum or a science centre is a museum devoted primarily to science. Older science museums tended to concentrate on static displays of objects related to natural history, paleontology, geology, industry and industrial machinery, etc. Modern trends in museology have broadened the range of...

, Transport Museum as well as the BBC archive.

The event and films were made by not-for-profit television production company Q&D Productions Limited and Produced and Directed by Paul Atherton

Paul Atherton

Paul Atherton is managing director of and its sister not-for-profit company, . He is the first producer/ director to have his work broadcast on the Coca-Cola billboard in Piccadilly Circus, London with his film The Ballet of Change....

 and funded by the Heritage Lottery Fund

Heritage Lottery Fund

The Heritage Lottery Fund is a fund established in the United Kingdom under the National Lottery etc. Act 1993. The Fund opened for applications in 1994. It uses money raised through the National Lottery to transform and sustain the UK’s heritage...

.

Credits

• Producer and Director: Paul Atherton
  Paul Atherton
  Paul Atherton is managing director of and its sister not-for-profit company, . He is the first producer/ director to have his work broadcast on the Coca-Cola billboard in Piccadilly Circus, London with his film The Ballet of Change....
  
  
• Editor: Ralston Humble
• Composer: Damian Coldwell
• Senior Researcher: Emily Thomas
• Stills Photographer: Chloé Flexman

Websites

1. http://www.theballetofchange.co.uk
2. http://www.simpletvproductions.co.uk/Q&D%20In%20Production.html
3. http://www.hlf.org.uk/grantsdatabasecrawl/crawl2?projectID=22131
4. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TvHXFB4K4No
5. http://www.pablopost.co.uk/Ballet_of_change.html

External links

1. http://www.bignewsday.com/story.asp?code=RN2144075l&news=historic_london_landmarks_to_screen_film
2. http://www.lifestyleextra.com/ShowStory.asp?story=Kl2144075C&news_headline=historic_london_landmarks_to_screen_films
3. http://www.pressbox.co.uk/detailed/Arts/Ballet_of_Change_An_Historical_Film_Event_156541.html
4. http://www.timeout.com/london/aroundtown/events/621671/ballet_of_change.html
5. http://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/opinion_and_blogs/letters/broadcast_letters__november_9.html