Drake’s CN Tower Stunt Required $15 Million In Equipment & 300 People
Drake's CN Tower ice projection required 300 crew members, $15 million in equipment, and a three week deadline.
Black News 
Drake pulled off one of the most technically complex promotional stunts in Hip-Hop history when he transformed Toronto’s CN Tower into a frozen monument for his Iceman album release, and the logistics behind it were absolutely insane.
Getting that icy blue wave to crawl up a 553-meter structure in real-time required three weeks of planning, 300 crew members, and equipment worth roughly $15 million, according to CBC News.
Anil Mohabir, founder of Studio AM, got the call from DreamCrew, Drake’s creative production arm, with barely enough time to breathe.
Three weeks to coordinate with the CN Tower’s internal and external lighting teams, Transport Canada, and the City of Toronto while sourcing 75 projectors from across Canada and internationally.
Each projector averaged around $ 200,000, and that’s not even counting the infrastructure, crew coordination, and technical setup across three separate sites.
“We took into account the 3D geometry of the tower and we showed it freezing real-time, with computer animation all the way to the top,” Mohabir explained.
The animation had to account for the tower’s exact dimensions and angles, then layer in lighting effects that made it look as if ice were reflecting light from different directions.
This wasn’t just pointing projectors at a building and hitting play.
The crew had to synchronize everything perfectly during Drake’s livestream event on May 15, and when they triggered the projection, the response was immediate chaos.
“Everyone was almost in a bit of shock,” Mohabir said with a laugh afterward.
Thousands of fans flooded the base of the tower, and the whole thing had to work flawlessly on the first try with no room for technical errors or reshoots.
This was just one piece of Drake’s larger Iceman campaign, which included massive ice block installations in downtown Toronto, a thunderous explosion at Downsview Park, and even sealing off his courtside seats at Scotiabank Arena in ice.
But the CN Tower projection was the centerpiece, the moment that tied everything together and announced the surprise triple-album drop: ICEMAN, Habibti, and Maid of Honour.
