An exterior view of the magnificent new Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, TN.

The new Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville, TN. opened on May 17, 2001. Big3D was commissioned to provide an awesome 3D mural measuring 12 feet tall and 24 feet wide. The 3D photo image is a ranch background with a cowboy leaning against a fence, playing a guitar. The Big3D mural provides a backdrop for Ford's new F-150 truck. Ford is a corporate sponsor of the new Country Music Hall of Fame.

Tom Saville stands next to the 3D mural display during installation.

Big3D communicated file specifications to Ford's agency: J. Walter Thompson. To achieve the best 3D effects, the original photographic image was scanned into Photoshop. Different visual elements of the photo were selected for different visual depth layers

This view allows you to see the components of the fence, gate, cowboy, clouds, etc. and imagine the depth visible in person. The fence really appears to come out away from the mural and the sky goes into the background for days. The full 3D mural is breathtaking.		The magnitude of the room size dwarfs even a billboard size display.

The large fence and gate images were an obvious choice for extreme foreground imagery. These items were traced/masked and cut out, then placed on a separate transparent layer in Photoshop. Similarly, elements including the horse, cattle, trees, and clouds were cut out and placed on separate layers for 3D manipulation. Wherever an element was cut out from the original photograph, the background now had "holes" which required filling in with "cloning" techniques.

The background layer for the mural was built slightly oversize to allow for the movement necessary (left and right) to create the depth perception/parallax. A grid was created on one layer in Photoshop. This grid marked cut lines for the 12 different tiles which would be created.

The maximum physical size for any one tile is 48" x 96". (However, Big3D.com is now testing twelve-foot tall panels. Results available next month.) Processing the large mural in sections also provides manageable file sizes. Photoshop still restricts image sizes to 30,000 pixels in any given direction.

Production time for this project was less than two weeks. It was completed ahead of schedule.