A NEW production of The Tempest draws on an Oxford firm’s Hollywood-style motion-capture wizardry.

Botley-based Vicon helped create the Royal Shakespeare Company’s version of the stage classic, which opened earlier this month.

Vicon’s optical camera system, behind special effects in big-screen blockbusters such as The Avengers and Transformers, was used to track moving objects and actors in the RSC production.

Theatre goers see Ariel as an avatar, flying above the stage and exiled king and sorcerer Prospero shows-off his magic powers, thanks to Vicon’s tech.

The Botley firm worked with its client Imaginarium Studios, co-founded by Lord of the Rings actor Andy Serkis, who played Gollum, and chip-processor firm Intel.

During pre-production, which took a year, actors had to don motion-capture suits.

Vicon chief executive Imogen Moorhouse said: "As this is live action, it means taking the risk in front of an audience, so it was scary but exciting.

“But we said ‘Hey, we’ll just go for it’.”

She added: “It has been long in the making, with a lot of hours running through ‘what-if’ scenarios and trying to break it so that when it did go live, it would be as perfect as possible.”

Ms Moorhouse believes Shakespeare would be pleased to see his play given the motion-capture treatment.

She said: “He would probably embrace it and say this is the type of thing we should be trying.”

The play runs at the RSC’s home in Stratford Upon Avon from now until Jan 21.

It will be shown in cinemas on Jan 11 and will then go back on stage at the Barbican from the end of June.

Ben Lumsden, head of studio at The Imaginarium Studio, added: "This theatrical production of The Tempest sees never-before-used technology on stage.

“This live spectacle has been further enhanced by bringing in the expertise of Vicon and the use of their cameras, which adds greatly to the audiences' experience.”

A subsidiary of Oxford Metrics Group, Vicon has its head offices in Minns Business Park near Botley Road.

It employs 100 staff, 60 of them in Botley.

The firm has been developing commercial motion capture systems for 30 years.

It has won an Academy-Award, Emmy and Queen's Awards for Export and Innovation.

Other films its motion-capture systems have been used in include Pirates of the Caribbean and Iron Man.

Its motion-tracing systems and software is also used for video games, sports performance, robotics, medicine and the automotive industry.

Clients include NASA, the European Space Agency, BMW, Maserati, Sony and Dreamworks,