Sound & Video Contractor - March 2020

MARCH 2020 // VOLUME 38 // ISSUE 3

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SOUND&VIDEO

CONTRACTOR

R E V I E W S | T E C H N O LO GY | A P P L I C AT I O N S PRODUCT-AT-WORK AV OVER IP

THE GRAMMYS OVER IP THE FLAGSHIP EVENT STARTS THE MOVE TO AOIP

Courtesy of the Recording Academy®/Getty Images ©2020

TECH SHOWCASES * CEILING SPEAKERS * DIGITAL SIGNAGE

contents

MARCH 2020 // VOLUME 38 // ISSUE 3

Courtesy of the Recording Academy®/Getty Images © 2020 Photo by Kevin Winter

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FEATURES

6 | O n the Circuit

Cover Story

14 | Ceiling Speakers 24 | Digital Signage

Tech Showcases

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40 | T he GRAMMYS over IP The flagship show makes a first

The SVC Interview

Close Up

34 | Buffalo Children’s Museum

Getty Images/Elsa

time move to audio over IP

50 | The Super Bowl over IP Audio over IP transforms workflow

58 AV Over IP at ISE 2020

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Interactivity is built into the entire experience

Supplement

50 4

By Chief Editor Cynthia Wisehart

38 | AV Over IP The GRAMMYs and the Super Bowl over IP plus AV Over IP at ISE 2020

on the circuit

Vol. 38 No. 3

March 2020

WWW.SVCONLINE.COM

A

By Cynthia Wisehart

Find me online cynthia.wisehart@ futurenet.com www.svconline.com/proavtoday and www.rebelmouse.com/ SVC_Online

s we go to press, stocks are dumping on coronavirus news (though there are analysts who think coronavirus was merely the trigger and the bullet was already in the chamber; i.e.more long-standing factors such as sliding bond yields).

Regardless, coronavirus has for the moment drawn attention in part to our industry. Along with the tariffs, there’s been pressure to consider diversifying away from China on the supply side (but obviously we wouldn’t want to do that on the market side). This could affect manufacturers in our industry who depend on parts or products from China. Panel production is disrupted, as reported by IHS. The market is expecting 30 percent shortage in labor with production numbers plummeting for Q1. Unit production of televisions used for signage is expected to decline over 2019 levels by 10.9 percent, interactive flat panels by 20.9 percent, signage and information display by 28.5 percent. The videowall segment is expected to fare the worst, with manufacturing of these products expected to drop by a full 46.5 percent, as reported by Electronics Purchasing News. For perspective, this is on the heels of six years of double-digit growth.

At the same time there’s been new life for virtual interaction. Zoom had its best trading day in 8 months, which is saying something when you consider the last 8 months. Videoconferencing is on people’s minds, as an alternative to the real and perceived risks of travel. This awareness could continue after the virus is contained—however long that will take—as people consider other factors including cost, the burden of mass travel on the planet, and the burden of travel on some employees.

I’ve seen news of worship services being conducted virtually and universities worldwide are already ramping up distance learning to cope in the short term. That can translate to the long term, because once the infrastructure leap is made in response to an emergency, other benefits become clear. I’ve even read that the Chinese concert industry has swiftly moved to online concerts for people who are not going anywhere by choice or quarantine.

At the moment, these options are driven by suffering and fear. I heard a radio interview with a group of Taiwanese citizens stuck in China and literally on lockdown in a building where some had already died. The woman who was interviewed could not go out for food and was afraid to open the door to social workers in case she would encounter the infection that was “everywhere outside”. It was heartbreaking to hear.

There is tragedy in this, and misinformation, and lives disrupted. So I’m definitely not selling it as a business opportunity. It is, however, a chance to participate in one of the big global challenges. There are a lot of us, and many more are on the way in the decades to come. Whether it is coronavirus or the fire next time, humans will need to strike a balance between virtual and physical lives and interaction. Both are important, but understanding when each is appropriate and valuable will require more conscious choice. We can help with that qualitative equation and must approach systems with that larger picture in mind.

FOLLOW US @SVC_Online https://www.facebook.com/svconline CONTENT VP/Content Creation Anthony Savona Content Director Cynthia Wisehart, cynthia.wisehart@futurenet.com Contributors Bennett Liles Managing Design Director Nicole Cobban Design Director Walter Makarucha, Jr. Production Managers Nicole Schilling, Heather Tatrow ADVERTISING SALES VP/Market Expert, AV/Consumer Electronics & Pro Audio Adam Goldstein, adam.goldstein@futurenet.com, 212-378-0465 Sales Prahlad Balasubramanian, prahlad.balasubramanian@futurenet.com, 307-222-6950 Janis Crowley, janis.crowley@futurenet.com, 845-414-6791 Debbie Rosenthal, debbie.rosenthal@futurenet.com, 212-378-0465 Zahra Majma, zahra.majma@futurenet.com, 845-678-3752 SUBSCRIBER CUSTOMER SERVICE To subscribe, change your address, or check on your current account status, go to www.mysvcmag. com and click on About Us, email futureplc@ computerfulfillment.com, call 888-266-5828, or write P.O. Box 8608, Lowell, MA 01853.

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the buzz CASE STUDY / THEATER

NEW ON THE WEST END The d&b audiotechnik KSL-Series line array more than fits the bill for the unique femaleled, pop music theater production of &Juliet.

Following a rousingly positive run in Manchester the musical is now having an impact on the West End. The show rewrites the story of Juliet; who instead of dying for Romeo, lives and goes on a number of adventures, educating the audience about current topics of identity and female empowerment along the way. Seamlessly woven into this revamped plot are pop songs of anthem status from legendary record producer Max Martin, including ‘Baby One More Time’

by Britney Spears, ‘Everybody’ by The Backstreet Boys, and ‘Roar’ by Katie Perry.

This is a show of such musical ferocity that transporting its power and from the wire emotion to the audience was left For more case studies, visit to Olivier Award winning sound svconline.com/the-wire.

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designer Gareth Owen.

“I have worked with d&b loudspeakers for long enough and know the company well, so I decided to spec’ KSL without having listened to it first,» said Owen. “To do justice to the works of super-prolific record producer Max Martin, KSL definitely delivered the tight, clean pop sound I was looking for.”

“We wanted to create a really unique sound for &Juliet in the West End, something that brought the worlds of musical theatre and pop together. Gareth Owen and d&b loudspeakers helped us to deliver that,” Max Martin adds.

Owen noted that this KSL System, supported

by SL-SUBs, is the first time the relatively new SL-Series has been used on a musical theater production.

“Inside a closed theater environment, KSL’s cardioid performance works extremely well,” explains Owen. “Its unique design prevents

reflections from the back of the array bouncing off the proscenium wall and muddying the sound – an issue very common in a theater setup because arrays are so often flown within touching distance of the proscenium walls. With a quieter environment for the actors, there’s room in the sound design process to actively steer and shape the sound onstage; time otherwise spent filtering out unwanted low-end reverberations.

“We were able to customize the stage sound to the artists’ exact requirements,” confirms Owen. “For the first time ever, we have been able to run the stage foldback for the cast without a CUT filter — a d&b specific high-pass filter that minimizes some of the low frequency reflection onstage. With KSL we actually had to add some low-end back into the foldback to give the performers a fuller sound onstage.

Although this might sound like extra effort it’s creative time, not corrective.”

the buzz CASE STUDY / EDUCATION

ROOM DIVIDER The Technion (Israel Institute of Technology) is the oldest university in the country. On the Tel Aviv campus, the university recently opened a 200-seat auditorium in the Azrieli Sarona Tower. Designed to host conferences, lectures, and presentations, this facility can be transformed into two auditoriums, enabling two events to take place simultaneously.

The multimedia, communications, and security systems for the new auditorium were designed by Erez Or, CEO at Or-Tech, an AV consultancy based in Tel Mond, Israel. Or fully based his design on audio, video, and USB over TCPIP technology, including the Atlona All-IP Meeting Space solution that incorporates a broad range of its from the wire OmniStream encoding, decoding and For more case studies, visit USB products. svconline.com/the-wire.

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Atlona’s OmniStream Pro encoders and decoders enable configuration via a web-based graphical user interface (GUI) for virtual AV routing over the IP network. They also provide automated monitoring and centralized firmware updating, and can be configured with many of the popular managed network switches.

Or selected OmniStream Pro encoders and decoders largely due to these reasons, as well its simple scalability for AV over IP systems.

The OmniStream USB over IP platform delivers the ability to utilize USB peripherals for applications such as videoconferencing and audio integration. This appealed to Or, who delivered Zoom videoconferencing functionality in this space. The configuration comprises AT-OMNI 311 USB to IP Adapter for host devices, and the AT-OMNI-324 IP to

USB Adapter for peripherals.

Audio distribution for the auditorium is based on the AES67 standard. The OmniStream encoders and decoders – both single- and dualchannel units are used for each application – integrate with a Symetrix Radius NX 12x8 digital signal processor. When the auditorium is divided into two rooms, Radius will zone the audio accordingly, with Stewart DSP100-2-LZ amplifiers powering JBL speakers. The 200W amplifiers are also Dante-supported, allowing them to take audio straight off the network.

Or adds that Atlona’s integration with Symetrix and other products helped them architect a fully functional AV over IP solution at a time when the product category was still maturing, adding that Atlona’s professional training programs for Israeli integrators were well-timed.

the buzz CASE STUDY / EDUCATION

SCHOOL SAFETY Fulton County Schools (FCS) is the fourth largest district in Georgia, spanning 106 schools and administrative and support buildings. For the safety of students and staff, the district’s Emergency Operations Department monitors weather and security alerts, school IP camera feeds, social media postings, and local and state events at its Emergency Operations Center (EOC) on the sixth floor of the main administrative building.

Until recently, this was accomplished using a video wall consisting of consumer displays in varying sizes and a standard HDMI 8x8 matrix switcher. The capabilities of the EOC were extremely limited so in early 2019, FCS made the decision to upgrade its technology to something modern, advanced, easy-to-operate, scalable and more future-proof. To meet these requirements, the district called on Lawrenceville-based integrator Nisewonger AV. from the wire At the EOC, Nisewonger replaced For more case studies, visit the consumer displays with (12) svconline.com/the-wire.

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55-inch LG commercial Ultra-thin bezel video wall displays in a 2x6 configuration. Beyond that, the video distribution system needed to be addressed. Not only did the EOC’s existing 8x8 matrix switcher lack any video wall features, but it was out of room, making future system expansion impossible. If FCS continued with a fixed-format approach to video distribution, the facility would need to upgrade to a much larger switcher, which would in turn reach its capacity in time. Furthermore, a traditional matrix requires the use of HDMI to CAT extenders, which would clutter the system with additional hardware and increase overall system costs. An AV over IP solution was the best fit, in this case Just Add Power’s 3G Ultra HD Over IP platform.

Each of the 12 displays in the EOC’s video wall is equipped with a J+P VBS-HDIP508PoE 3G receiver. Sources include multiple cable set-top boxes, an Apple TV, PCs, 10 Antrica SpotBox4K multi-viewers for IP camera footage, a Biamp Tesira digital signal proces-

sor, and a VoIP voice system. 12 sources are connected to three J+P VBS- HDIP-747PoE 4-in-1 3G rack-mount transmitters, and eight are outfitted with VBS-HDIP-707PoE transmitters. In addition, the system features J+P’s VBS-HDIP-759A 3G four-input tiling processor, which allows up to four sources to be viewed on a single display. The video distribution system is supported by two Cisco SG550X-48MP 52-port managed AV switches.

EOC staff control the video wall using Just Add Software’s MediaSwitcher platform on a standard PC or a web interface client that can be accessed from virtually any device. Developed in partnership with J+P and designed to work with the company’s entire HD over IP product line, MediaSwitcher allows users to send any video source to any display or group of displays — or send multiple sources to one display. By incorporating FCS’ Biamp DSP and VoIP phone system into the J+P system, staff can also send and receive VoIP calls via the MediaSwitcher interface.

TECH SHOWCASE

CEILING SPEAKERS

By Bennett Liles

AMK DS84-B

Many of the significant advances in speaker design and control technology in recent years have centered on the development of modern ceiling speaker systems. They remain one of the most effective and unobtrusive ways to distribute sound in a vast range of environments. Now their output can be physically steered and remotely controlled to perfectly match the system with the building in which they reside.

Representing several of the AtlasIED latest steps forward in ceiling FAP33T-W speakers, the AMK DS84-B is a self-amplified system that includes a PoE+ amplified speaker that can power a total of four speakers and three additional passive units with two speakers per audio zone. The AMK DS84-B is Dante audio network addressable to greatly simplify installation and control. Delivering a frequency response of 55 Hz to 20 kHz (± 3dB) with a maximum SPL of 105dB, the system uses a 13mm polyamide hard dome tweeter and a c woofer.

Ease of installation is also a prime feature of the FAP33T-W from AtlasIED with its Safety First Mounting System (SFMS) that prevents damage from over-torquing during the installation process. Power setting can be quickly made using the front-mounted 70V tap selector that features a transformer bypass setting for direct, coupled operation. Prewiring and daisychaining of more speakers and subwoofers is easy using the removable 4-pole Euro-style connector on each one.

The new Biamp Desono C-IC6 6in.

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Biamp Desono C-IC6

medium mat ceiling speaker has a transformer with a six-position, constant-voltage 70V/100V tap (1.8, 3.8, 7.5, 15, 30, and 60) with an 8-ohm bypass for installation flexibility. Also aiding techs is a reinforced bridge that allows the integrator to carry the speaker up a ladder and mount it with one hand, a blind mount design, and an easy-toinstall, removable magnetic grill. When this speaker is used with the AMP-450BP and its “audio locate” feature, the installer can

validate cabling and connections with just a simple click.

The Bogen HFCS1 and HFCS1B are designed to be installed in either suspended or hard-surfaced ceilings where the large heavy-gauge steel back can and computermatched dual venting system provide deep bass response. They feature a wide dispersion coaxial driver for good off-axis response. For installation in 16-ohm, 70V, & 100V systems, the speakers are available in an off-white or

TECH SHOWCASE

Bogen HFCS1(B) Crestron Saros

black finish and the power taps enable a wide range of level settings.

The Crestron Saros IC6T-W-T-EACH is a 6.5in. 2-way in-ceiling speaker includes a wide-dispersion, horn-loaded 1in. dome tweeter. The multi-tap transformer enables it to be used in 70 and 100V systems and its power handling capacity at 8 ohms is 125W. Producing a frequency response of 50Hz to 20kHz (±3 dB), the model features a “zerobezel” frameless grille. Simple grille installation relies on powerful magnets and there is a safety tether to prevent the unit from falling through the ceiling.

The EAW CIS300 is a compact 2-way flush mount that uses a modified HF waveguide for 90Hz to 22kHz response with 4in. LF driver.

The design includes a sealed, zinc-coated steel back can and cam-style installation clamps.

Concealed behind a hinged metal cover plate,

Extron CS 1226T Plus

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EAW CIS300

the audio signal connects to a recessed Euroblock terminal with a detachable mating plug.

Each unit includes two steel T-Bar support channels to assist installation and a steel split C-ring to disperse the clamping pressure of the mounting cams.

The Electro-Voice EVID C8.2 features a waveguidecoupled 1in. titanium-coated tweeter combined with an 8 in. polypropylene cone.

These cover a 110-degree pattern with a frequency response of 50Hz to 20kHz. The baffle is made of UL 94V-O rated ABS and the back can is zinc-plated steel.

The enclosure is capable of 75W continuous power handling and it offers a transformer with a wide range of

ElectroVoice EVID-C8.2

power taps. The grille is perforated powdercoated steel and it includes a safety tether.

Extron has an all-in-one mounting solution with their CS 1226T Plus 2-way 70-100V SpeedMount ceiling speaker system. The enclosure and speaker cartridge can be purchased as individual components and installed separately to save installation time. The 6.5in. long throw woofer with tuned bass reflex port works with a 3/4in. ferrofluid-cooled dome tweeter. These can use an 8-ohm connection or any of the six transformer power settings available on a selector behind the grille.

Featuring a sealed and tuned steel-reinforced enclosure, the KLH Audio Maxwell Series M-8602-C ceiling speaker also uses a concentric silk dome tweeter and a 6.5in. fiberglass/Kevlar laminate woofer. This combination enables a frequency response of

TECH SHOWCASE

Klipsch IC800-T

Suitable for conference rooms, restaurants and classrooms, the speakers are sold in pairs and include a ceiling mounting kit, template and user manual.

Lowell Manufacturing has a solution for bringing bass response to the ceiling with their ES-8TSUB self-contained, ready to install subwoofer. The 8in. unit puts out 120W and behind the press-fit grille is a tap with settings for 25V, 70V or Niles Audio 100V speaker systems along with an CM8HD 8-ohm transformer bypass position.

The painted 20 gauge steel back can has reversible mounting dogs and the ported enclosure is tuned for extended lowfrequency response.

With its 6.5in. LF cone and 0.8in. dome tweeter, the Martin Audio C6.8T features a very wide 150-degree conical coverage pattern up to 7kHz making it perfect for low ceiling environments. This model is capable of high and low impedance operation and it has Polyswitch and thermal fuse protection. For fixed installation in walls and ceilings, the OSD Audio ICE630LCR 10 0 -v ol t flush-mounted unit has a steel back can and is or low imped- UL2043 & UL1480 rated.

Lowell ES8TSUB The 8in. 2-way Niles Audio CM8HD ance operation 50Hz to 20kHz ± 3dB with selectable via a ceiling speaker features a 1in. nano-coated a recommended amp power of front baffle switch located IMPACT dome tweeter that can be pivoted 50-175W peak. Connections are prounder the grille. This model includes a up to 20 degrees and a Butyl rubber surround tected by a metal cover on the back can.

For high ceiling applications requiring a Tractrix port design for deep bass and smooth for the LF driver. There is also a 3-position tweeter level control for precise matching to tight coverage area projected from a distance, linear response.

The Kramer Electronics Galil 6-C 6.5in. room acoustics. The magnetically attached the Klipsch IC-800-T 2-way 8in. speaker with a focused 75-degree pattern and integrated 2-way closed-back ceiling speaker can handle rust-resistant grille aids in quick and easy back can. The 100 watt, 30W RMS, 80W continuous program power installation. The structure of the 8-ohm unit low insertion with a wide selection of taps at 70 and 100V. requires only 4 1/8in. clearance behind a wall loss, multitap Its polypropylene cone and 0.5in. Mylar dome or ceiling.

Capable of steering its sound within a wide transformer tweeter produce a frequency response of p r o v i d e s 95Hz to 20kHz (±3dB) at a continuous SPL area, the OSD Audio ICE630LCR 6.5in.

7 0 - v o l t , of 100.7dB with a 101-degree coverage angle. angled LCR Dolby Atmos ready ceiling

KLH M-8602-C

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Kramer Electronics Galil 6-C

TECH SHOWCASE

RBH Sound SI-615

QSC AD-C6TLP

speaker is fitted with a 1/2in. pivoting dome tweeter working in conjunction with its polypropylene cone woofer. That woofer is set a 15-degree angle allowing listeners to get the distinct effect of sound tracking from one side to the other. This model also works well as rear and side surrounds in a 5.1 or 7.1 system.

The Polk Audio V80 Vanishing V Series high-performance in-ceiling speaker is practically invisible when installed with the white paintable Polk Wafer-Thin Sheer Grille.

Requiring only a 4.125in. installation depth, the speaker teams an 8in. composite polymer cone with a 1in. swivel mount silk dome tweeter. These can be driven by an amplifier from 10W to 100W connected to the unit on gold plated push terminals. Options include a square sheer grille and a fire rated black box.

For quick and simple installations in tight places QSC has a problem solver with the AcousticDesign Series AD-C6T-LP 6.5in.

Polk Audio V80

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Revolution Acoustics Ubiqui-T360 RCF HS 1026

small format low profile ceiling speaker.

Designed for background sound reinforcement applications which utilize 70/100V or 16-ohm bypass configurations, the speaker has a 3x double-stepped, long travel dog-ear blind mount system. The DMT (Directivity Matched Transition) waveguide provides smooth coverage over a 130-degree area. The unit’s power rating is 60W and it handles a maximum continuous SPL of 106dB. The RBH Sound SI-615 Signature Series ceiling speakers are designed to be used as in-ceiling channels for object-based surround systems. However, this model can also be installed in pairs for high-end stereo listening. The 6.5in. aluminum cone woofer and ¾in. pivoting ring-radiator tweeter work together for a frequency response of

50Hz-20kHz (±3dB). The 8-ohm unit handles 15-120W and its magnetic white steel paintable grille is a perfect color fit anywhere.

The RCF HS 1026 spotlight paging and background music ceiling speaker has a high pass filter that can be used in conjunction with an optional subwoofer. The adaptable spring hooks and the standard size of the mounting hole allow it to be installed in false ceilings of varying thickness. It can be used in a low impedance configuration or the built-in multi-tapped transformer can be connected in 100/70V systems.

Suspended ceilings are the perfect place for the Revolution Acoustics Ubiqui-T360.

Its ceiling tile adaptor panel attaches to an existing ceiling tile and accommodates one SSP6 Multiducer and it installs with no tools required. Working with 8-ohm, 70V and 100V systems, the SSP6 produces a frequency response of 150Hz to 20kHz and it can handle up to 200W instantaneous peak power. Maximum continuous power is 24W unenclosed, 15W enclosed.

Installation is a breeze with a tile bridge

TECH SHOWCASE SoundTube IPD4-CM52BGM

SnapAV ECS-800ICSUB-8

Soundsphere SS-Q-6-WH

that ships right in the box with the Snap AV Episode 800 Commercial Series 70-Volt In-Ceiling Subwoofer. The oversized 1.5in. copper voice coil, mica-filled polypropylene woofer and a low-turbulence tube port bring out the bass. A swing-out dog mounting system, security wire tabs, and clamping mounting cover let the enclosure mount easily and

tool-free power tap settings get it set up right away.

The Soundsphere Q-6 is a small weatherproof speaker that provides omnidirectional full-range music and clear voice announcements. Designed for indoor and outdoor installations, the Q-6 generates a hemispherical coverage pattern and it is ready to mount

FB-3862CU

Ceiling Subwoofer • • • • •

Powerful low end Easy installation Plenum rated TOA quality Contact your local TOA dealer

with the hanging kit or mounting bracket.

Available in gloss black or textured white, it has a frequency range of 70Hz to 20kHz and handles a maximum RMS power of 30W with its polypropylene cone and .75in. Mylar dome tweeter.

Ready to install in a digital speaker system, the SoundTube IPD4-CM52-BGM IP

TECH SHOWCASE

addressable coaxial ceiling speaker can use its output terminal to connect and power up to three additional CM52-BGM speakers. There is one 5.25in. polypropylene woofer with rubber surround and one 0.75in. silk dome tweeter that together produce a frequency response of 67Hz to 20kHz (Âą 3dB). This model can also be powered via a 24VDC barrel connector for non-PoE installations.

TOA Speco Technologies designed their Electronics FB-3862CUSP6MATB 6.5in. speaker as part of AM the Multi-Application Series with a pre-assembled back can and mounted transformer that can easily switch-flip from 25V to 70V operation. The unit is constructed of flame-retardant ABS and the attached metal seismic safety loop and built-in easy mount tabs speed installation. The MA Series speakers are available in black or white and each color comes in either 5.35 or 6.5in enclosure size.

The Stealth Acoustics LRX-83 3-way expert grade invisible speaker is equipped with a rigid frame that attaches directly to standard structural framing and its paintable active diaphragm face attaches directly to the frame of the speaker panel. Sound is driven by an 8in. cone woofer, 30mm direct coupled neo-magnet mid-range driver and a direct-coupled 25 mm neo-magnet HF driver. Its power handling capacity is 160W RMS and 320W peak. Installable in walls or ceilings, the 8-ohm system exhibits a

Stealth Acoustics LRX-83

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Yamaha VXC5F/ VXC5FW

Tannoy CVS 401

170-degree vertical and horizontal coverage pattern.

Wide constant directivity dispersion along with EN 54-24 certification for fire detection and fire alarm systems are main features of the Tannoy CVS 401 4in. coaxial ceiling speaker. The steel cover and strain relief clamping mechanism assure durable performance while the 0.75in. ferrofluid cooled soft dome high-frequency driver delivers brilliant highs. There are power taps for 70V and 100V line systems and an 8-ohm direct input. The powdercoated aluminum mesh grille provides dust protection and a match with room dĂŠcor.

To enhance the lows on

Speco Technologies SP6MATB a ceiling speaker system, TOA Electronics made the FB-3862CU-AM flush mount subwoofer with a 60W 70/100V transformer and a bandpass design that eliminates the need for a bi-amplified system. The input terminals are Phoenix type with parallel outputs and when used in the low impedance mode the unit can handle 100W RMS power. Included are steel support rings, support rails and speaker hole templates.

The Yamaha VXC5F/VXC5FW is a 4.5in. full-range ceiling speaker with direct support for low-impedance or high-impedance connections. Capable of installation in shallow ceiling spaces, this model also features a built-in carrying band and anti-drop mechanism. Double-threaded speaker clamp screws allow for speed installation and there is a paintable grille. The VXC5F is the black version and the VXC5FW comes in a white finish. They are primarily designed for background music applications.

TECH SHOWCASE

DIGITAL SIGNAGE

By Cynthia Wisehart

AOPEN

The definition of digital signage Digital systems continues to evolve. As a Signage Players digital communication platform, it is increasingly driven by content, data, and interactivity. Zoom, for example, sees digital signage as an extension of video conferencing and imagines an enterprise-wide role distributing content and interaction to screens of all sizes. Obviously stadium and arena managers see digital signage as an extension of guest experience and advertising. With this whole value chain in mind, let’s take a look at some of the options available.

Last year, AOPEN debuted a lineup of Black Box Digital Engine media Radian Flex players for comVideo Wall mercial and enterPlatform prise solutions. The company says these Digital Engine media players are designed to deliver innovative three-, four- or six-screen solutions for QSR (quick-service restaurant) menu boards, video walls, digital advertisements and traffic/information displays. The DE6340 second-generation 4-port digital signage player is the successor to the DE6140. The newer player works with fourpanel video walls and UHD menu boards.

It’s AOPEN’s first AMD Ryzen embedded processor-based digital signage player with four 4K 60 Hz outputs and HDR support. This continues AOPEN’s use of AMD products to power their digital signage solutions with 4K, rich content and other new technologies.

AOPEN’s DE6200, featuring AMD RX-421 embedded SoC, steps up to solve the general lack of triple digital output solutions; it can deliver 4K promotional videos alongside static information like menus and service information. The DEV7610-X6 features an

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AMD E8860 GPU with six Mini DisplayPorts for multi-screen video wall solutions aimed at premium and corporate locations or critical operations such as control rooms. It features an aluminum front panel.

The Black Box Radian Flex Video Wall Platform supports today’s standard of 4K 60fps video displays up to more than one billion pixels for a claim of “limitless” resolution—meaning it will also be 8K ready and beyond. There is also no limit on the number of screens and end points that Radian Flex can display to. The solution also supports an unlimited number of inputs. The included SmartFrame technology ensures optimal use of the video wall display area. This feature pro-

Chief FCS1U Cable Mount System

vides calibration of quality and fit to screen with minimal setup time. Other key features include content manipulation, schedule and restore capabilities, real-time control over displayed content, slide show and more. Radian Flex is offered in two suites: The Radian Flex Suite and the Radian FlexPro Suite. The Flex Suite is best fit for economic video wall installations that are not reliant on fail-safe operation. The FlexPro Suite includes dual controllers to ensure fail-safe operation for mission-critical applications.

Last June, Chief launched a mounting system to create the illusion of a floating screen.

TECH SHOWCASE

The FCS1U Cable Mount System is positioned for retail applications; it allows integrators to discretely install displays into environments without the requirement of conventional load bearing walls, and enables stores to use displays in the middle of the store or window without blocking products. The system design supports displays size 40in – 80in diagonal and can be displayed in landscape and portrait orientation. Including post-installation display leveling feature, Chief further supports display realignment with the use of the PACFCL Lateral Shift Accessory, which allows for the caballing mount system to be moved left or right, as well as the PACFCB back-to-back accessory to retrofit a second back-to-back screen for increased visual impact.

When a digital signage application calls for distributed TVs--for example in a stadium-Contemporary Research has an AV Over IP ecosystem option. A longtime provider of TV

distribution over RF, the company started It can communicate with individual displays, bringing its expertise to IPTV products; the groups, zones, or all displays using either: result is three products—the budget-friendly onboard DX Lite web page, proprietary Dis1080p QIP-DVX IPTV Decoder/Controller play Express Software, or third-party control and QIP Encoder, and the IP-DXL Control systems.

Epson’s unique LightScene projector is an Center. The encoder accepts MPEG2/H.264 IPTV streams and can handle two sepa- option for digital signage, especially in retail rate sources; the decoder/controller accept environments; it combines classy MPEG2 or H.264 single program or multiple Epson program transport streams and are compatLightScene ible with unicast or multi-cast. The Control projector Center is the company’s newest product for display control over Ethernet, sending control commands as UDP broadcast data packets to all compatible devices on the network. Contemporary Research QIPDVX

One FLEX. Many faces.

Confidea FLEX is a delegate microphone system that instantly adapts to your meeting. Whether it’s small or large, simple or complex. Activate only what you need with licenses: discussion, voting, interpretation, and more. And switch easily between chairperson and delegate, or single and dual-use.

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TECH SHOWCASE

LG 55EW5F

LG XS4F

Matrox Maevex 6152

visuals with a robust content management that includes templates, effects, color filters, and customizable options—like the name suggests it’s somewhere between a projector and a lighting instrument. Users can daisychain multiple LightScene projectors and utilize edge blending technology for versatile, impactful displays.. A bright visual display system supports up to 2,000 lumens of color brightness and 2,000 lumens of white brightness.

LG has introduced a new series of 4000 nit high-brightness displays specifically designed for visibility in window-facing installations--bright and sun-lit environments such as shop windows. The LG XS4F series of 1080p displays (44- and 55-inch) have a thin profile (3.3- 3.4 inches), slim bezels (6.5mm/9mm and 9.9mm/12mm). Smart brightness control with ambient light detection and technology allows clear visibility through polarized sunglasses utilizing a quarter-wave plate technology. An accompanying webOS 3.0 smart signage platform, enables

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Matrox Q155

the use of the display without a separate media player. Both models are designed to operate in a wide range of temperatures and feature a conformal coating on the main board and power board to protect against degradation from dust, iron powder and humidity. Each XS4F display offers a variety of connectivity options, including RS-232 in/out, eight ohm audio out, two HDMI in, DP in/out, DVI-D in, USB in, audio in, LAN, IR & light sensor, and an SD card slot.

LG also features a transparent signage solution. The LG 55EW5F OLED digital signage display is an ultra-thin, see-through display is pitched in particular at retail and hospitality. The versatile 55-inch class display was designed to claim LG OLED’s premium picture quality while maintaining a high transparency at 38%, higher than can be achieved by alternative display technology. It’s full HD at 400 nits; the screen has a 7.9mm bezel.

Accepts HDMI, DisplayPort and USB inputs.

AT ISE, Matrox debuted the latest addi-

tion to the QuadHead2Go family -- the QuadHead2Go Q155 multi-monitor controllers. Featuring HDMI input support on both appliance and PCI Express card form factors, the units are purpose-built to drive four Full HD displays from a single 4K HDMI source, offering a simple, yet elegant approach to digital signage-based video wall designs. Use multiple QuadHead2Go Q155 multi-monitor controllers to deploy artistic and emerging video walls of any type and size. Just prior to ISE, Matrox also announced Matrox D-Series, a new family of next-generation, multi-display graphics cards. These new single-slot graphics cards drive up to four 4Kp60 displays and can be easily combined to output up to 16 x 4K monitors for high-density video walls. The cards work with the full Matrox video wall ecosystem; when used with QuadHead2Go multi-monitor controllers users can power up to 64 1920x1080p60 displays from one system. Also at ISE, Matrox announced the latest addition to the Maevex 6100 Series family: the Maevex 6152 Quad 4K decoder. Built on the same core technology as the Maevex 6100 encoders, Maevex 6152 decodes up to four 4K streams—or many more lower resolution streams—across up to four 4K displays from a single, standalone appliance.

The NEC LED-FA015i2-137 Direct View LED Display is a 137” Full HD display, built with NEC’s 1.58mm LED-FA015i2 module-

TECH SHOWCASE

NEC LEDFA015i2-137

Optoma FHDQ130

-ideal for viewing from 3 to 8 feet away. The FA Series is engineered with multicolor LEDs that NEC designed to improved contrast, uniformity and viewing angles. The FA015i2 provides full HD (1920x1080) resolution with a refresh rate of greater than or equal to 2880Hz. It includes built in data and power redundancy ensuring the display remains operational in the event of a single controller or power supply failure. No external cables required for installation. Its shallow depth (3.2� installed) and reduced weight allow for greater installation flexibility and also meet ADA requirements.

Neoti supplies a range of UHD direct-view indoor LED video wall options with a modular design that can be configured into standard of custom video wall shapes. The range of 600 nit options includes pixel pitches from .93mm to 4.6mm.

All are 5000:1 PeerlessAV Xtreme High Bright Outdoor Display Peerless-AV Smart City Kiosk

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Neoti UHD LED

contrast ratio with refresh rates +/- 2800 Hz in a range of power requirements between 40 and 60 W average and 120-185 maximum. All are 16-bit color.

The Optoma FHDQ130 1080p QUAD LED display is a new comprehensive large display solution with 130 inches (2.88 x 1.62 m) of visuals and 4K compatibility. Setup for the QUAD LED display has a simplified threestep installation process, thanks to an all-inone design that includes an image processor, centralized power cage, receiver cards and more. The all-in-one QUAD LED display also comes pre-calibrated out of the box, removing the need for additional software management

or separate devices. Uniquely, the QUAD LED display is cable-free. The LED diodes are set in clusters of four with a 1.55mm pixel pitch, which allows for a smoother screen surface, 170-degree horizontal and vertical wide viewing angle. The QUAD LED display also features integrated HQUltra 4K image processing technology for image switching and scaling and is compatible with Optoma’s Control Q application for content management and display from mobile devices.

Peerless-AV also continues to see success with its Smart City Kiosk, designed to be modern, approachable, practical, and endure the rigors of every-day use when unattended.

The new all weather-rated solution is ideal for sharing community information, travel, and weather details, as well as wayfinding, advertising, entertainment, and more. Also from Peerless-AV, the Xtreme High Bright Outdoor Display incorporates a patented Dynamic Thermal Transfer system that allows the display to operate in extreme temperatures ranging from -31 degrees to 140 degrees. With the highest environmental rating in its class and a high TNI panel, the Xtreme High Bright Outdoor Display works especially well in direct sunlight without compromising the life of the panel or its color accuracy. Available in 43in., 49in, 55in., and 65in., the display features remote and local monitoring, 2500 nits of brightness, updated input panel/compartment and cord cover, IK10 rated impact resistant safety cover glass for protection against dam-

TECH SHOWCASE

Planar LookThru Transparent OLED

Planar CarbonLight CLI Flex

age, completely sealed IP68 encasement to ward off any liquid or solid particle ingress, and IR control lockout and button board lockout for secure installations.

The Xtreme High Bright Outdoor Display is available now through Peerless-AV direct sales representatives and authorized distribution networks.

Planar brought two unique signage options to ISE 2020. The pliable LEDs of the Planar

CarbonLight CLI Flex let it bend into curves as tight as 25-inch or 637 millimeters--concave or convex, and can be column wrapped without color shift. The LED modules can also be combined with standard CarbonLight CLI Series cabinets to form unique video walls with both flat and curved surfaces; offered in 1.5, 1.9, 2.6 and 3.9 millimeter pixel pitches.

The next-generation Planar LookThru Transparent OLED makes it possible to create truly see-through installations with a virtually

frameless glass design by utilizing cutting-edge Organic Light Emitting Diode (OLED) technology, eliminating the need for a backlight or enclosure. With 38 percent light transmissivity, the glass delivers the benefits of interactive digital signage while allowing consumers to see the product or scenes behind the display. Available in 55-inch with full HD resolution. Also at ISE 2020, Planar presented a preview demo of an ultra-fine pitch 0.6mm 8K microLED wall. At 216 inches, and in combination with 4-in-1 pixel packaging technology, the new videowall clearly announced Planar’s intention to be competitive in the 8K future.

Premier Mounts’ Convergent LED Mount Series brings an easy bracket system to LED

UHD LED Video Displays

Seamless Designs Serving All Markets

April 19-22, 2020 Las Vegas, NV Booth #SL11805

U.S. Based Service neoti.com

TECH SHOWCASE

Samsung The Wall for Business

Samsung QPR-8K

mounts. Adjustability points across the mount tackle instances of extreme wall unevenness to ensure that no seams show throughout the video wall structure. Connector plates are easy to fasten both vertically and horiPremier zontally to build video walls of unlimMounts ited scalability. Mounts support an Convergent array of panel options; most recently LED Mount a mount was released for Barco XT. Series

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AT ISE, Samsung unveiled the latest edition of their QLED 8K SMART signage, what the company is calling “the world’s first 8K display capable of 24/7 operation.” Model QPR-8K features HDR10+ technology and 100% color volume, plus claims perfect color accuracy and 2000 nit peak brightness. The new signage is designed to be wall-mounted and available in 65-, 75-, 82-, and 98-inch versions. Samsung’s AI Quantum Processor 8K is described as a deep-learning upscaler that can automatically upscale non-8K content to 8K. New features for healthcare include DICOM simulation mode for grayscale, X-ray and MRI viewing (non-diagnostic). The display comes with Samsung’s Tizen 5.5 OS and supports connectivity with up to four different content sources all of which can be displayed simultaneous at 4K. The new signage is compatible with Samsung’s software MagicINFO 8. Available globally during first half of 2020.

Also at ISE, Samsung took The Wall up another 300 inches, creating the 583” 8K The Wall for Business; it actually comes in various configurable sizes and ratios from 219-292” 4K versions and 437-585” 8K versions. The modular microLED display known as The Wall has seen various versions, but this one—pegged at broadcast centers, lobbies, and design centers— is the largest yet. The Wall also features Sony’s Black Seal technology for inky blacks; AI upscaling, and what’s called Quantum HDR for optimum peak -brightness and contrast scene to scene. The bezel-less design supports the variety of sizes and ratios. Under the hood there are actually two models the IW008J and IW008R with the latter offering higher specs in thinness, peak brightness, and refresh rate. The IW008R also features smart functions such as entertainment and ambient modes, Netflix, YouTube, and Bixby voice control.

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SVC INTERVIEW

INTERACTIVITY AT EXPLORE & MORE With Bennett Liles

or children, an immersive technology is one they can operate themselves. At the new Ralph C. Wilson Children’s Museum, Explore & More in Buffalo, New York they’re free to touch and operate nearly everything.

Local integrator Southtown Audio Video handled the project design and engineering. Heather Sidorowicz tells us how they made it all happen.

F

SVC: First give us a little history and background on Southtown Audio Video.

Heather Sidorowiz: Sure. Southtown Audio Video has been around since 1984, so we’re actually celebrating our 35-year anniversary this year. In 1984 it was started by my father and it was a hi-fi shop. Then at one point he rented both Beta and VHS tapes.

This is long before Blockbuster. It was also a satellite company. He did six-foot satellite dishes for bars and homes down to the small dishes. I started with him in the early 2000s.

I always joke that my AV career is 18 years old now so it’s old enough to vote for itself.

When I started it became more of a home theater shop as well. And then, in about 2013, we could see the renaissance of Buffalo starting to happen. Buffalo is an old steel town.

We were, I believe, the second-richest city in 1901, but kind of downhill from there.

Now we’re on our way back up. So Buffalo is fantastic and it’s really growing through our medical corridor and many, many other

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things. We can see the need for commercial AV where you have a relationship where you take care of your clients, so we started pointing our ship in that direction. I bought the company in 2014, and today we are about 85 percent commercial and the rest of that is what I would call relationship residential. We play in the corporate AV world – of course education, healthcare. My current favorite is immersive technologies like the one I’m going to speak about today.

You’ve certainly got some immersive technology going at that unique museum.

What’s the idea behind Explore & More?

Explore & More was originally this little place in East Aurora, New York for many, many years. As Buffalo continued to grow they had an opportunity to open this stateof-the-art children’s museum--somewhere you could interact, somewhere that was

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autism-friendly, somewhere you could go back to over and over again. We worked with the exhibit company to help bring these concepts to life. This was actually a three-yearlong project so three summers ago this was in front of me from the exhibit company where it was just concepts.

You’re dealing with some short attention spans for the most part so you’ve got to get kids involved right away.

That is correct. And there are multiple different exhibits that do that. For example, there’s a great space on the second floor that pays tribute to Buffalo because we had the Erie Canal. So the space has a water table area you can actually create with the canal. You can separate the water and sail a boat through different locks. There is an exhibit that is built like a canal but with interactive doors where you open up a cupboard and it tells you a piece of history. There is a rudder in the back of the “boat”--if you push it one way it says “Starboard” and the other way it says “Port.” So these small interactions are interlaced really well with the AV and everything else that is in the space.

I believe you have a BrightSign server as well.

We do. The motion sensor was provided by the exhibit company, so let’s talk about that rudder for a second. When guests push or pull the rudder, it initiates through the motion sensor, which launches a command in the Bright-

Sign player to play the sound effect through a speaker. That same effect happens in many different areas. Also, underneath the boat there are these little cupboards and cabinets so the kids can dress up. But they don’t just dress up; when they open the cupboard or cabinet, the motion sensor says it’s open. The BrightSign Player launches the audio command, and then through a small hidden speaker you hear a bit of a story.

How do you keep the exhibits new and fresh when the kids have a return trip?

Well first of all, as I mentioned, it’s multiple floors so you’ll want to go back because you’ll want to play again. Also, the exhibit company has created ways of having new

exhibits. They have one exhibit that will continuously change throughout the years so that there’s always a reason to go back. They also have another area where there’s a place for cooking classes so guests can have a kind of farm-to-table experience. That’s through a local grocery store. On the top floor there’s a farm exhibit where the kids can pick a carrot – not a real carrot, but a plastic carrot. There are kids out there who don’t know the experience of where a carrot comes from or that tomatoes grow on a vine. There’s a rooster up there that crows every now and then—that’s a hidden speaker and again a BrightSign player.

And on the other side, there’s a whole hospital exhibit that will allow kids to get an MRI of their teddy bear. They actually wanted it to be loud and a little bit intrusive because MRIs are super scary for kids. So once kids have had that experience there at the museum, if they’re ever in a situation where they have to have an MRI they’ll know, and not be as afraid. That exhibit is really this great piece for helping kids long term.

I saw one of the exhibits that simulates ice skating wearing their socks.

They do, yeah.

And you have some 65-inch BrightSign monitors above that space and you can show the kids themselves on the display.

Yes. They wanted to create a small version of our Sabres arena. Buffalo is a big sports town. So we created a mini ice rink so the

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kids can be on their socks and skate around and above them is a “Jumbotron”. We created that with Sony 65-inch commercial displays.

We chose them because of their high brightness, high contrast ratio so there’s no issues, and of course RS232 for control. Those go

SVC_9x5.625.pdf 1 2019/10/17 下午 05:19:10

back to BrightSign players. A local company did the content. The content is interlaced with cameras throughout the floor. So, just like the with the kiss cam at the hockey game, if they’re dancing around they might be up on the Jumbotron themselves.

Probably their favorite thing to see on the monitors is themselves anyway.

Of course. Of course.

What type of cameras did you put in there?

We used cameras by Marshall because we

And keeping track of all the technical areas plus the labor all in the same project.

Yes. When you first got in there what was the first step in the installation process once you were onsite? Was there construction still happening?

Yeah. This was definitely a hard hat, highvis type area. For months I kept that gear in my car. We were in hard hats and safety vests for months and we were working with other subcontractors. My team’s great like that because they work with the other people. They talk to them. I think that’s a huge piece of the story. We just don’t go in and say “get out of our way”. There’s something to be said about humanism. The first step was to make sure that wires were run as promised. And then testing, of course. And then going through exhibit by exhibit creating a punch list and just working through it. It was definitely an eye-opening experience for us from a project management standpoint. We found, certainly, some holes that we have to tighten as we continue along this train of our business.

liked the very small format; we didn’t want something that was going to be an eyesore to take away from anything else. So these are very small cameras. They’re 2.5 megapixel, HD, 3G/HD-SDI Marshall cameras. Then, of course, we had to get specific lenses to make that work.

What did you use to keep track of all the elements on this project?

Huge with D-Tools, which we used from the very start of the project. The nice part about that is we could go per exhibit and talk about the scope. So job number one three years ago was putting in what the client requested and just being able to divide that down between

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me, who’s more sales-y, and the system engineer, so we could go back and forth in communication. Then as the scope would change we could continue to make those changes over time. Then the company itself actually had a CEO change, so that actually changed a lot of the exhibits right in the middle. And so again, with creative revision we relied on D-Tools.

In D-Tools we can get rid of things knowing it was still there if we needed to go back to it. Then we could build upon whatever the new scope was, or the new exhibit, or how it changed. We really couldn’t have done it without D-Tools. I really just don’t see another way that we could have done such a large, intricate project.

That building is a big place. You mentioned that it has four floors and lots of exhibits.

How are the AV systems, the lights, displays and everything, controlled?

They are all on an overall simple control system by Crestron. The system will turn the exhibits on and off daily at a scheduled time, but does also allow the exhibit to override that schedule so that they can reboot if they needed or keep an exhibit on longer than the scheduled day if they’re going to have any afterhours events.

Some of that Crestron programming is more advanced but it’s also much more flexible than you can do with some other systems.

We needed an open template and a very good Crestron programmer, which we luckily have to be able to do such things. And it just works forever.

Did you run into anything unexpected or have to change plans during the project?

Absolutely. In a project like this I don’t think you could ever expect we’d get beginning to end without revisions. For example, the Mar-

shall cameras that we talked about earlier. The original lens we ordered was not the lens that we ended up having to use because the client changed the location. In D-Tools you can easily create a revision to do that. And through great relationships with manufacturers we were able to send stuff back. So yeah, there were definitely revisions and it’s important being able to track that. Otherwise, that could be a fatal flaw, especially in a project so large and complicated. If you can’t track those revisions and pricing you’re going to lose money instead of make money and nobody wants to do that.

What was the experience like when it was finished?

We maintained the system for the first year so we got to see that. We also promised the client that we would be there for their first large event. So before the museum actually opened to the public they had a donor party. This was an after-hours for people who had committed funding to get the exhibit off the ground. To

be there that evening and to almost be “working the event” in conjunction with the client, and to hear the giggles, the laughter from the grownups, that was amazing. I mean, that was probably my favorite moment on the project because for me, I had seen this for three years at that point. To see it not just installed, but to see that grownups were having such an immersive, fun experience, I don’t think that that can be beat. Of course as the kids came in later on they also absolutely loved it. The client had a contractor day so they invited anyone that had worked on the building and their children. That was a great experience, for me and my kids, but also my staff and their children.

It was a team-building experience for sure but also for them to be so proud of something that they’d worked on, and for their families to see what they’d been up to.

You would think that the kids would want to get more involved with it after they see their parents being amused and they don’t want

to be left out of the action.

Yeah. And the day that we went, the youngest was a baby, like less than two, and the oldest was 13. I think there were six children the day that we went, just in our group, and there wasn’t one single child that wasn’t amused by one exhibit or the other. They all laughed enjoying themselves and wanting to go back.

And I think that that speaks volumes for the way that the whole system was put together.

Now that this one is on the books and you’ve got this experience behind you, what do you have coming up next at Southtown Audio Video?

Well, we continue to work on our different jobs, which involve corporate, education and healthcare. I have a quote in front of me right now that I have to send pricing over by next week for another museum. And we’ll just keep on keeping on, so we’ll continue to look for interesting projects, so we’re thrilled to continue in these markets.

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AV OVER IP IP TRANSFORMS THE GRAMMYS AND THE SUPER BOWL

Courtesy of The Recording Academy®/Getty Images ©2020 Photo by Emma McIntyre/Getty Images for The Recording Academy

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SV C ON L I N E.C OM | MA R C H 20 20 | S VC 39

Lizzo performs onstage during the 62nd Annual GRAMMY Awards at STAPLES Center on January 26, 2020 in Los Angeles, California.

THE GRAMMYS OVER IP The flagship event starts the move to AoIP

By Cynthia Wisehart

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very year, the awardwinning veteran audio production crew behind the annual GRAMMY Awards telecast strives to further raise the bar on the already unparalleled audio quality of “Music’s Biggest Night.” This year, in a first for the show, the audio team implemented a Dante Audio-over-IP network.

E

This year, the GRAMMY Awards show was broadcast live from the Staples Center in downtown Los Angeles on the CBS network on January 26. Performers included Best New Artist nominees Lizzo; Billie Eilish; and Lil Nas X, as well as Tyler, the Creator; H.E.R.; Gary Clark Jr. with the Roots; and Demi Lovato, among many others.

The new AoIP transport scheme was designed to eliminate the complex and cumbersome signal-splitting system that The Grammys have long been employed to feed signals from the show’s multiple stages to the two front-of-house and two stage monitor consoles, as well as the two music mixing consoles and the broadcast audio production desk in three remote trucks.

In addition to the efficiencies afforded by digitally transporting dozens of microphone signals over fiber and making them available everywhere simultaneously, the new system design delivered a noticeable improvement in audio quality.

“The performance mics sounded a lot clearer to me, because they weren’t going through a splitter,” says Eric Schilling, one of two broadcast music mixers stationed in a pair of M3 (Music Mix Mobile) trucks parked outside the Staples Center. “I didn’t feel like I had to ‘carve out’ as much as I do on a typical mic through a splitter, where it might be a little murky in the low end.” In fact, he says, “I found myself doing less processing on the vocals in terms of both low end and high end.”

“We knew we were going to get a better frequency response without all the spitting going on,” says longtime GRAMMY Awards audio coordinator Michael Abbott. “But it was subCourtesy of the Recording Academy®/Getty Images © 2020 Photo by Kevin Winter

SV C ON L I N E.C OM | MA R C H 20 20 | S VC 41

Courtesy of The Recording Academy®/Getty Images. © 2020 Photo by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images

Courtesy of The Recording Academy®/Getty Images. ©2020 Photo by Emma McIntyre/Getty Images for The Recording Academy

AV OVER IP

Demi Lovato performs onstage during the 62nd Annual GRAMMY Awards at STAPLES Center on January 26, 2020 in Los Angeles, California.

Alicia Keys (second from left) and Nathan Morris, Wanya Morris, and Shawn Stockman of Boyz II Men perform onstage during the 62nd Annual GRAMMY Awards at Staples Center on January 26, 2020 in Los Angeles, California.

A number of artists, including telecast show host stantially noticeable. Eric told me he wasn’t having Alicia Keys, preferred to use their Shure analog to carve out a lot of the 100 to 300 cycles that he wireless microphones when performing, Abbott normally would on the RF microphones because also reports. “They don’t support the Dante proof the degradation of the signal going through the tocol, so we added some Focusrite RedNet MP8R splitters and into all the different consoles.” preamps to gain them out for noise floor and introSchilling reports that he worked on a show with duce them as a source into the network.” Focusrite a digital audio transport scheme several years ago RedNet D16R AES-to-Dante interface units were and recommended that the GRAMMY Awards show also available to accept AES inputs from RF mic also adopt AoIP networking. Abbott, in collaboration systems with no networking connectivity. with other engineers on the show and with Audinate, Ron Reaves, FOH music mixer and another longdeveloper of the Dante protocol, designed a sysserving member of the GRAMMY Awards audio tem incorporating Focusrite RedNet D64R MADI team, also noticed a significant improvement in the bridges to transport signals from the Sennheiser response of the Dante-enabled wireless vocal mics Digital 6000 and Shure Axient RF microphones supthrough the P.A. “The mics sounded better right out plied to the show and coordinated by Soundtronics of the gate, so I had to do a lot less EQing. It was to the mix engineers. The eight RedNet D64R units just beautiful. The mics were very quiet with very delivered the primary and redundant Dante streams little handling noise, and there was a lot more top to the four mix locations via the respective DiGiCo, The network was powered by Focusrite RedNet end than we were used to having,” he says. “To the Lawo and Calrec console MADI interfaces.

D64R 64-channel MADI bridges, Focusrite point where there were a couple of performances on Abbott reports that Jeff Peterson, PA designer RedNet D16R AES-to-Dante interfaces and the satellite stage near our position where I had to for ATK Audiotek, which has long provided house RedNet MP8R eight-channel mic pres and A/D converters to deliver the vocal performance and apply a low-pass filter and take a little top-end off, sound production equipment and services to the production wireless microphones to the house because they were in front of the P.A.” GRAMMY Awards telecast, oversaw the prelimi- sound and broadcast audio mixing consoles.

Production budgets permitting, says Abbott, the nary Dante network buildout ahead of the show.

“Due to the tight production schedule – two days; 16 hours – that we plan for next year’s show is to also incorporate the approximately 400 have available to set these shows up, ATK did the build-out of the net- back-of-house channels, including audio tracks and video playback, into work off-site. This allowed for a minimal setup on-site in deploying the the AoIP network. The following year, he says, “The third phase would be to add all the musical instruments.”

Dante sources to the mix platforms.” Abbott explains.

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AV OVER IP Sennheiser Digital 6000 wireless microphone system

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Courtesy of The Recording Academy®/Getty Images. © 2020

In another first for the Grammys, Sennheiser’s Digital 6000 wireless microphone system helped deliver a completely digital signal path for wireless vocal mics. With performances by Lizzo, Brandi Carlile, Blake Shelton and others, more than 20 channels of Sennheiser Digital 6000 RF were deployed in both production and MC capacities at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.

Lizzo quickly set the tone for the show, opening the GRAMMY Awards by offering a heartfelt remembrance of Kobe Bryant and delivering a riveting medley of “Cuz I Love You” and “Truth Hurts”.

Singing through a Sennheiser SKM 6000 handheld transmitter coupled with an MD 9235 capsule, the 8-time GRAMMY nominee – who also won the evening’s first GRAMMY Award with “Best Pop Solo Performance” – showcased her amazing talent, versatility and charisma, supported by an orchestral ensemble and several ballerinas. Towards the end of the performance, Lizzo’s flute – adorned with a Sennheiser SK 6212 wireless mini-bodypack transmitter and an ME 104 lavalier microphone – was lowered by a trapeze as she careened into a breath-taking instrumental solo.

“The SKM 6000 and MD 9235 has been my go-to combination since the D6000 line debuted – the capsule is a perfect fit for Lizzo’s powerful vocal,” says Brandon Blackwell, FOH for Lizzo.

“She is a very strong vocalist and the frequency response does not seem to collapse, losing the warmth in the low mid frequencies and the high-end definition.” For her flute performances, Blackwell says that going wireless has been liberating: “When I first joined, Lizzo was playing her flute into her vocal microphone on a stand. Now, with the SK 6212 transmitter, she can play when and wherever she wants. The transmitter is so small and lightweight, that you can barely see it. Paired with the cardioid ME 104 lavalier microphone and some precise placement by our Monitor Engineer/Flute Tech Loreen Bohannon, we get a rich sound from her flute.”

In light of an ever-congested RF environment and an unrelenting demand for wireless frequencies, this year’s technical deployment was truly a milestone accomplishment. After receiving the microphone signal, each receiver channel of the Sennheiser Digital 6000 wireless was then relayed across a dual redundant Dante network, which carried multiple streams of identical multichannel audio all the way to various digital mixing consoles located throughout the venue.

“This is the first time the Grammy Awards has been able to deliver the vocal wireless mics on a completely digital path all the way to every mixing console,” observed Jeff Peterson, PA Designer of ATK Audiotek. According to GRAMMY Awards audio coordinator Michael Abbott, by combining a high-quality digital wireless microphone system and a Dante network as a transport protocol, the show has achieved a vastly improved frequency response.

Michael Abbott, who has been using Sennheiser systems on the GRAMMY Awards for more than 30 years, specified the Digital 6000 system for all the production and emcee microphones at this year’s show. “We appreciate the frequency agility of the Digital 6000 in such an RF-intense environment,” he says. “This allows us to deploy multiple transmitters and receivers with reliable performance.” “The RF on this show is complex to say the least,” adds Peterson. “Monitoring, control, and flexibility are the features that help us the most, and we benefit considerably by the Digital 6000’s resistance to interference, in addition to its efficient use of bandwidth.”

Stephen Vaughn, Coordinator for Soundtronics Wireless, ensures that all the wireless microphones and in-ear monitors work in harmony with each other for the duration of the program. “The Digital 6000 is impressive,” he states. “The amount of frequencies I can get in one TV channel is the part that really helps me out in today’s environment. Even if you don’t have a scope, you can just look at the quality meter on the front of the unit and tell whether or not you are taking on interference or not. Also, the fact that the Digital 6000 transmitters use rechargeable batteries is a key factor for me, since I am tired of dumping hundreds of batteries in the trash. With the 6000, you just recharge them and just reuse them. I am leaving a much greener footprint during these shows and I feel more comfortable using these over disposable batteries.”

AV OVER IP

FASHION STREAM

hile Tommy Hilfiger showcased a ‘70s-inspired collection for the upcoming season, the designer’s online multi-camera webcast was anything but retro. For New York Fashion Week, live event production company B Live developed an interactive, multi-camera live viewing experience; the designer’s global fan base could follow the show virtually from multiple angels in real time.

The supporting system relied on the Matrox Monarch EDGE encoder and its ability to receive multiple HD feeds and composite them into a quad-split stream. In combination with B Live’s user interface, this allowed for seamless switching among multiple camera views.

During the show, viewers visited the Tommy Hilfiger website to watch live webcasts from the Apollo Theater in Harlem. On the website, live event production company, B Live provided runway, overhead, and head-to-toe views of the models as isolated feeds, as well as a director’s cut that the company produced on-site.

In order to give fans a seamless viewing experience, B Live needed an encoder that could accept four discrete HD inputs and deliver a single 4K stream as a quad-split composition. Before the company purchased its Monarch EDGE H.264 encoder, its user interface did not allow viewers to watch multi-camera video with continuity. Instead, the player would

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need to buffer each new camera angle selected by the user before the video would become available for viewing.

“Before we got the Monarch EDGE, every time the viewer switched camera angles, it loaded a new independent stream, said Jay Kopelman, Director of Digital Engineering for B Live. “Because we can now do quad-HD streams with Monarch EDGE, we can feed a single 4K stream into the player – which is why the switching is so seamless.”

B Live’s camera crew captured each angle separately. Four 1080p30 video streams, including three isolated views and one director’s cut that B Live produced on-site, were sent back to the B Live office via satellite. There, Monarch EDGE received the feeds and encoded them into a single 4K, 20-Mbps stream that was then sent to the B Live platform.

On the B Live user interface (embedded in the Tommy Hilfiger website), fans were able to easily decide which part of the show to follow from the three isolated feeds available in addition to the director’s cut – all from their mobile devices, laptops, or desktop computers. These viewers – numbering over 500,000 – were also able to watch the show live on Tommy Hilfiger’s Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube channels.

AV OVER IP

MULTIPLEX OVER IP

wners of the new EVO Entertainment multiplex in Schertz, Texas wanted to create a 73,000-square-foot customer experience that would dazzle with screens, displays and video walls. Customer-experience creator Mood Texas relied on an Ultra HD over IP video distribution system from Just Add Power to costeffectively distribute video to 48 screens and 4K UHD laser projectors across the vast facility.

“The amount of displays and size of the multiplex really put the focus on video distribution in this project,” said Andrew Adams, senior account executive at Mood Texas. He says the team wanted fast switching, simple installation as well as offering easy expansion if EVO Entertainment wanted to add one of its other 40 multiplex displays to the system.

EVO Entertainment’s Ultra HD Over IP system offers ultra-low 16 ms of latency from source to screen and supports 4K Ultra HD resolutions and HDMI 2.0 devices with HDCP 2.2. The platform enables seamless switching between HDMI sources of any resolution as well as uncompressed lossless multichannel audio formats including Dolby Atmos support. Video wall functionality is built-in for displays installed in portrait and flipped configurations as well as image push, pull, and

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pop features. An integrated scaler on the receiver automatically adjusts the picture to fit the screen.

Each of the multiplex’s 12 rack sources — 10 DirecTV receivers and two Spectrio 10 Foot Wave digital signage players — is equipped with a J+P VBS-HDIP-707 PoE transmitter. J+P’s VBS-HDIP-508 PoE receivers are attached to the 20 panels of the bar’s wraparound video wall, eight projectors and displays in the bowling alley, six 43-inch portrait panels located outside the facility’s bathrooms, two 75-inch Sunbright screens on the patio, and a 65-inch display in the billiard room. In addition, the multiplex’s three private event rooms each feature a display with a J+P receiver, as well as a 3G+WP2 wall plate transmitter to allow guests to play video from their laptops. The Ultra HD Over IP platform is engineered to provide complete scalability, so expanding the system with an additional screen or source is as simple as adding another receiver or transmitter.

“EVO Entertainment also offers bowling lanes, an arcade, a restaurant and bar, and private event rooms, all under one roof,” said Taft Stricklin, sales team manager at J+P. “As demonstrated in this installation, video distribution is playing an increasingly important role for integrators in delivering the high-tech guest experience their clients’ want to create in these large spaces.”

AV OVER IP

SUPER BOWL OVER IP Photo by Chris Mayes-Wright

Getty Images/Elsa

How to wrangle a simultaneous broadcast and live spectacular with a Dante network

(Inset) One of the four racks of Focusrite RedNet interfaces in each corner of the field during Super Bowl LIV to provide input and output to the ATK Audiotek Dante networks, including the adjacent amplifier racks.

ot only is it the biggest game in the National Football League (NFL) calendar, the Super Bowl’s halftime show is one of the entertainment industry’s highlights of the year, with artists pulling out all the stops to deliver career-defining performances. Prince’s unforgettable ‘Purple Rain’ during a tropical downpour in 2007; Beyoncé’s jaw-dropping 2013 ‘Formation’ dance troupe and Michael Jackson’s 1993 medley in Pasadena were all spectacular and critically acclaimed halftime shows.

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But staging one of the world’s largest sporting events—simultaneously with a world-class stadium concert presents tremendous challenges. Responsible for all audio aspects of the Super Bowl is ATK Audiotek, a production company based in California, who also have the audio design contracts for other major events including the Academy Awards (the Oscars) and the GRAMMY Awards. Leading the Super Bowl operations for ATK is Kirk Powell, whose work on the six-month project begins in June of every year.

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The Super Bowl occupies a new location every season, and each hosting stadium presents its own set of challenges to the audio system design team, as ATK’s Alex Guessard remarks. “The obvious thing, audio-wise, is the acoustics in the stadium, which have a lot to do with whether it has a roof, no roof, or a partial roof.” They also take into consideration the in-house sound system.

“Some stadiums have a decent system, others are older and more barebone.” The Super Bowl being the spectacle it is, ATK brings in substantial sound reinforcement to bolster the existing rig, even when the house system is well appointed.

THE (ENORMOUS) SYSTEM

Powell provides an overview: “We have essentially two audio systems each year: the in-house system and the entertainment system. This year the in-house is a flown system. The entertainment system consists of a flown system and our field cart system. We have equipment up in the catwalks and down on the field. Then there are the mix positions, which vary year to year too, dependent upon where the equipment and our teams are located. Sometimes they’re far away and we have to run fiber to them, and the easiest way to do that is obviously through a network. This year we have a lot of things spread out around the stadium.

So we have more nodes than we normally do.”

The Hard Rock Stadium in Miami Gardens is one of the smallest in the League, so space is tight to meet the minimum 70,000 seat capac-

AV OVER IP ity required by NFL rules. “Because it’s a smaller stadium and they want less seat kills,” says Kirk, “our positions are not as convenient to get to, especially cablewise. And therefore we need longer cable runs to get to all our nodes. That’s where having the Dante network comes in to play.”

In addition to the two large-scale sound systems in the venue, ATK provide and operate the substantial backbone of routing equipment and input/output interfaces to patch all the systems together, and allow audio to flow from inputs to mix positions, to amplifiers and speakers, and also to external partners such as broadcasters and recording trucks.

Kirk summarises, “one way to think about it is that, if you’re sitting inside the bowl, what you’re hearing is us. If you’re sitting at home, you’re hearing somebody else’s mix, but that doesn’t mean the feeds are not coming through us to them — a good amount of the sound you hear will be either originating from us or just passing through our audio network. We do some transport, but we also originate a lot of feeds. For instance, the referee mic is our microphone. Literally our microphone. If you hear the referee mic anywhere, it’s coming from us. We’re the only ones that create it. But we give it to the world.”

FIRST STEPS

Once the structure of the system is plotted out, the time comes to configure the equipment, a task done by Alex Guessard in the ATK shop, utilizing a 50’x50’ space in California. “First, we reset the devices and put the new configuration in them.” Updating firmware, naming channels and making subscriptions on RedNet devices is a straightforward task, thanks to Dante Controller and RedNet Control. But with 70+ units, it’s still a task that needs a methodical approach. “It’s just so much easier to do it in the 50’ by 50’ than try to do that inside the stadium, where it takes you half an hour to go from one area to the other.”

Kirk adds, “In the shop, you can verify the patch is working by just running a 10-foot cable. It’s so much easier than having to walk to the catwalk and back down again, just to check a cable or connection.” Once the whole stadium-worth of equipment is configured and operational in one place, the deployment process is as simple as positioning the racks and connecting the fiber or network cables.

By the time the system is deployed throughout the venue, the ATK team is still working on educated assumptions based on best guesses and years of experience. They don’t get the final channel breakdown from the per-

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formers or broadcasters until a week before the show (often with changes being made even later). When designing the system, Kirk and Alex generally overestimate, to provide valuable wiggle room if and when lastminute requests come in. Kirk explains, “we have a general idea upfront of what each person needs. But just because that person has requested eight channels, I don’t want to give up just eight channels. I want to have the flexibility to give them more. If they say, ‘you know what, I need two more channels,’ we need to be able to make it work, quickly.”

Before switching the Super Bowl to a 100% networked audio system using Dante in 2019, the ATK team were reliant on systems like CobraNet, which was one of the first networked audio platforms, but which lacked the ability to patch audio around, once addressed. Kirk recalls, “getting into RedNet and Dante really opened up a world to us and allowed a huge amount of flexibility to come out.”

In their cutting-edge setup, ATK racks are positioned in nearly every corner of the stadium. Columns of input and output interfaces, amplifiers and network switches activate all over the stadium. In each position, RedNet units are performing various operations. Nodes at grass-level, at each corner of the field, comprise RedNet MP8R, RedNet A16R and RedNet D16R units, giving Kirk and the ATK team a generous compliment of analogue and digital I/O, plus mic preamps, all a short cable run away.

EXTERNAL HAND-OFFS

Also within the ATK remit is interfacing with the various broadcast

AV OVER IP trucks and mobile production facilities on site. Using RedNet D64R 64x64 Dante to MADI interfaces, Kirk and Alex have devised a standardized way of interfacing with all of these external partners. Super Bowl 2020’s broadcast network is Fox, whose truck is parked adjacent to the stadium. Then there are other mobile production facilities, each responsible for aspects of the event, and each requiring a different profile of audio inputs and outputs. Not all of these external players are Dante enabled, and even if they were, patching them into the already vast ATK network would not necessarily be the most effective way of sending them audio. So these trucks rely on MADI, fed to them via RedNet D64Rs, to transport the audio channels they need into and out of their isolated production environments.

The benefits of keeping external components isolated go beyond keeping the central Dante network simple. With this ‘island’ topology,

each external island provides peace of mind and ultimate flexibility to the ATK team and all the broadcast partners.

THE PATCHMASTER

Photo by Chris Mayes-Wright

Possibly the most important human aspect to the audio system is the role of Patchmaster, which is a task handled by Luis Montes. Tucked away in a nook usually used for storage in the underbelly of the Hard Rock Stadium, Patchmaster Luis oversees every subscription, flow and multicast on the Dante network. If the broadcast truck wants the feed from a microphone on the field, they ask Luis to patch it. If the embedded audio from a camera in the audience needs to be broadcast, Kirk makes a call down to Luis, and that audio channel is patched through to a spare channel on the network, for the sound mixers to pick up. The configuration of each MADI link to the external truck islands is managed and administered by the Patchmaster. Luis’ patching world is also where the central hub of ATK’s network lives, and hence it’s a highly secure location (which for obvious reasons we couldn’t photograph for this piece). Put simply, every home run from the nodes’ network switches comes here, via an overhead bundle of cables as wide as a water main.

Luis uses a RedNet AM2 two-channel D-A converter with line-level connections and a headphone output to audibly monitor signals on the network. At his monitoring station, he can quickly diagnose technical problems, for example if there is distortion or interference on an audio channel.

The system is so large that looking at it on one screen in the Dante Controller software can be overwhelming. Alex says, “there are no monitors big enough to view everything at once.

So the way I like to manage devices in Dante Controller is to open the Device, go into the Receive page, and click on the Transmits tab. You can look at one device’s inputs and outputs Focusrite RedNet D64R 64 x 64 MADI/Dante I/O interfaces connect the ATK Dante network with offand you have the whole world to pick from.” network production and broadcast trucks, including resolving the audio to external clocks and sample rate conversion.

all parties can be responsible for the clocking of their respective digital audio systems. Alex Guessard explains, “The RedNet D64Rs are really good because they allow us to create different islands.” Kirk adds, “under normal circumstances, it would make sense for the entertainment truck [the NEP Denali] to be the clock master for the entertainment portion. But they’re done after halftime; they’re literally powering down and shutting the doors. So I can’t rely upon them for clock for the rest of the event. So at that point we need to be floating.”

The ‘floating’ solution to this is for each island (or truck) to supply clock via BNC — at whatever sample rate they choose — to the RedNet D64R responsible for transporting their respective MADI signals.

On-board sample-rate conversion in each D64R allows for the MADI channels to be transported at a different sample rate and clock source from the Dante Grand Master. Using the D64Rs as the buffer between

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MIXING DUTIES

Alex Guessard also wears another hat in the ATK Super Bowl team: he mixes the entertainment portion of the show for the feed inside the stadium. This includes the pre-show, the national anthem and the halftime performance. Another mixer, Jack Bowling oversees the game on the house system, including all the music cues that play in the stadium, the referee mic and other sources on and off the field. The switchover between the two is remarkably simple: the two operators work next to each other in the same room, so they verbally communicate to take one mixer out of the system and activate the other.

But while Jack and Alex switch over with just a few button clicks and a nod of the head in their skybox, there’s a frenzy of activity beneath them. Hundreds of tech hands run on the field with staging pieces, and cast members and dancers amass. “You’ve got players running off the

AV OVER IP field,” says Kirk, “at the same time as you’re bringing on these heavy stage pieces and speaker carts — it’s total chaos.”

“It’s a very adrenalin-filled show,” says Alex. “From the moment the halftime whistle is blown, we have six minutes to deploy and connect everything — the stage gets set up, the speaker carts get wheeled on, and all the artists have to be set up on the stage. It’s the same for lighting, and the same for video. The stage has so much technology everywhere.”

When programming returns from the commercial break, the entertainment commences. After the 12-minute performance — this year featuring the quintessentially Miami performance by Jennifer Lopez, Shakira and surprise guests Bad Bunny and J Balvin — another commercial break covers the stage strike and, as Kirk says, “the stadium has to look like nothing happened.”

FINAL THOUGHTS: SUPER BOWL AUDIO

Alex summarizes the Super Bowl audio system by saying: “there’s no way we could do what we do today without a networked system like Dante. With the channel counts that we have and the mass distribution, it’s not feasible. I think having a Dante system is like a cloud. You put everything on it and you pick it up at any location.”

Kirk puts this year’s Super Bowl in context with the previous 17 years working on the same event. “What is interesting to me is that they don’t just want to do the same cookie cutter show year after year. If you go back and watch the different halftime shows, you’ll see they’re all different, and it’s amazing how much they change. Everybody wants bigger and better every year, and what I enjoy the most is the creativity of making it work. It’s not just an engineering challenge, it’s much more creative than that. It’s designing a system that’s flexible, that will allow me that ability to move fast, and change things, and be able to react when somebody says ‘jump.’”

Super Bowl Audio: Focusrite Equipment List: The Focusrite components for the Super Bow audio system include: • Focusrite RedNet MP8R.Eight-channel remote-controlled mic preamp • Focusrite RedNet A16R.16x16 analogue I/O • Focusrite RedNet D16R.16x16 AES I/O • Focusrite RedNet D64R.64x64 MADI I/O (pictured) • Focusrite RedNet AM2.Stereo headphone and line output

Simplify your signage • Switching and distribution over the network • Use existing infrastructure when upgrading • PoE for centrally managed end-point powering • Add Atlona’s VelocityTM network-based control for advanced video wall management

See our Lucas Oil Stadium Case Study to learn more

atlona.com/lucas

AV OVER IP

IP SPEAKER AT WORK

esigned by multi-award-winning architects, Henning Larsen AS, Moesgaard Museum (MOMU) is one of Denmark’s leading attractions. Ingeniously designed as an integrated landscape feature, built into and rising up from the rolling hills overlooking Aarhus Bay, MOMU is a vibrant house of culture and knowledge that blends ancient artifacts with modern technology to bring the past alive.

The latest exhibition, “Bound for disaster – Pompeii and Herculaneum,” brings to life the events that unfolded around the devastating eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79, killing an estimated 2,500 people. The exhibition unites over 250 objects on loan from seven different Italian museums and cultural institutions, many of which have never been shown outside Italy.

The exhibition also includes exhibits demonstrating the terrible consequences of the volcanic eruption, including casts of corpses from Pompeii and skeletons of the dead from Herculaneum. The sound design was created by composer, Søren Bendixen of Audiotech who specialize in creating soundscapes for exhibitions. Combined with the scenography, video mapping and lighting, the soundscape immerses visitors in the pre-disaster atmosphere of the lively city of Pompeii, before leading them into the post-apocalyptic scenes that followed.

“We are using a total of 51 Genelec 4430 loudspeakers, all fed by discrete channels over a Dante network with Ubiquiti EdgeSwitches,” explains Johan Ahrenfeldt who is responsible for exhibition technology at MOMU. “We’re using QLab software for the playback and a Dante-

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compatible RME Digiface interface to run a total of 54 discrete channels flawlessly. Various audio formats are used in the sound design, including Ambisonics and Quadrophonic sound, to provide a fully immersive experience.” “Many of the loudspeakers are concealed by the scenography,” he continues, “but in other places they are mounted directly on the walls. However, they blend in very well thanks to the harmonious design of the Genelec enclosures and a new feature implemented in the Smart IP Manager software which allows us to dim the brightness of the on/off LED indicator in the front.”

Ahrenfeldt has experience with Genelec, having used many 4000 Series and 8330A loudspeakers on previous exhibitions, but he says that the new 4430s introduce a new paradigm to the world of installed sound solutions. “I’m not talking about sound quality – the 4430s meet the same exacting standards as the rest of the Genelec range – but in terms of installation, the Smart IP concept opens up a world of possibilities. The most significant benefit is the flexibility and the functionality added by the network-based infrastructure and the use of PoE+ for powering the speakers. This means lower installation costs, easier, tidier and more flexible cabling, the possibility to add or move speakers late in the exhibition building process, and the ability to monitor and control the speakers remotely. All of these factors made a big difference to us when installing our newest exhibition.”

Ahrenfeldt recalls that “Bound for disaster” was not without its challenges in terms of audio, in particular due to the very open exhibition areas, which were delineated by virtue of their sound designs. “One

AV OVER IP of the main obstacles was to minimize the sonic overlap between the different areas. We achieved this by using many sound sources (loudspeakers) so we could benefit from their sound directivity and cover the required areas with a low SPL per speaker. Despite the openness of the space, the transitions between the different areas work very well.”

“Our approach is to consider the sound design as a holistic entity where the different sound designs relating to specific areas of the exhibition are edited, mixed and synchronized on site into the main sound design covering the whole exhibition,” he continues. “The danger, of course, is ending up with ‘audio soup’ but careful design and Genelec’s clarity and definition have helped to create a truly memorable visitor experience.

“The new 4430 fits perfectly into the market of exhibition technology due to the use of flexible infrastructure, on-board amplification, and the minimal need for cabling – but still delivering class leading sound reproduction,” notes Ahrenfeldt in conclusion. “The reduced cable requirement is often of greatest value in relation to implementing exhibition technology, particularly in old buildings which often are classified as protected cultural heritage. This isn’t the case at Moesgaard, which is a new building, but it still makes life a whole lot easier!”

AV OVER IP

PRODUCTS

AVOIP AT ISE 2020

AV and audio over IP have long been with us without the “Over IP” slogans. But like all technical transitions, reality trails innovation. The inflection point seems much closer now. As an editor, “over IP” installations are noticeably more prevalent. End users are taking the options much more seriously and trusting large and mission critical installations to IP-based products and networks. ISE 2020 saw many new product introductions. Many of these products came from companies that have been leading in what we now call AV Over IP for many years.

They are now seeing their development converging with market demand. Here are some headlines from the show. –Cynthia Wisehart At ISE 2020, Atlona, a Panduit company, introduced the AT-OMEMS52W 5x2 matrix switcher, aimed at simplifying BYOD. The device Atlona combines flexible wired and wireless AV input supAT-OMEport with USB extension and user convenience feaMS52W tures such as automatic input selection and display control; it supports workflows from multi-participant presentations to video conferencing. Wired connections include HDMI, DisplayPort, and USB-C inputs alongside mirrored or matrixed HDBaseT and HDMI outputs. The USB-C port provides adapter-free AV input from tablets and laptops, as well as device charging. The USB-C interface also combines with the switcher’s integrated USB 2.0 hub to provide data connectivity for two peripheral devices, plus simultaneous AV and USB switching for up to three host computers, and USB extension to a compatible Atlona HDBaseT receiver. For wireless interfacing, the switcher has native screen mirroring for iOS, Android, Mac, Chromebook, and Windows devices without the need for a separate app. The switcher supports HDBaseT transport of video up to 4K/60 at 4:2:0 alongside embedded audio, control, Ethernet, and USB data (when paired with a USB-capable receiver). Wired AV inputs and the local HDMI output support 4K/60 4:4:4 at HDMI data rates up to 18 Gbps. Up to 16 devices can be previewed. The OME-MS52W can be remotely managed through the Atlona Management System (AMS 2.0) software or Atlona’s recently enhanced Velocity IP-enabled AV control platform; TCP/IP and RS-232 support enable integration with thirdparty control systems.

Just before ISE, Aurora Multimedia’s Paul Harris previewed the important developments he sees in underlying signal infrastructure for AV over IP. He noted that SDVoE Aurora was introducing the ReAX 10G technology in an ASIC IC, citing it’s

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potential reduced power consumption and pricing. Additionally, HDBaseT is demonstrating its third-generation HDBaseT, which can now do uncompressed 4K60 4:4:4, 1G Ethernet, and full 480Mbps over Cat cable. In this same category of infrastructure innovation, Harris puts ReAX by Aurora, which is an open-architecture IP control system that operates independent of Aurora, allowing other manufacturers to utilize it, creating interoperability of source code, macros, IR libraries, etc. At the show, the company showed four new ReAX control units for its webbased IP control system. For these units, custom programming and GUIs created with the free ReAX Core Studio software are loaded in to the built-in web server, allowing virtually any device with a web browser to display the GUI and control the system. Aurora describes the PoEenabled units as flexible enough to work as a full standalone controller, an expansion controller, or a hybrid. Aurora also introduced the new HT Pro Series HDBaseT transceiver wall plate for uncompressed 4K60 4:4:4 and also ReAX wall and desktop touchpanels at the show.

At ISE 2020, Black Box teamed up with NETGEAR and the SDVoE alliance to sponsor a series of Design Partner Certification Live Events.

This partnership will continue with events throughout 2020 in cities worldwide. Shown at ISE 2020, the Black Box MCX multimedia distribution and management system takes advantage of SDVoE and modern 10 GbE infrastructure to allow AV and data payloads Black Box to exist on the same IT networks. Through advanced MCX chipset technology, common control APIs and interoperability, SDVoE technology claims zero latency and uncompromised video while offering significant cost savings along with enhanced system flexibility and scalability. While enabling truly converged network AV, Black Box MCX ensures supports instantaneous switching, bandwidth efficiency and high-quality video and audio. MCX simplifies and accelerates the process of consolidating AV and data on a single network, enabling organizations in virtually any industry to reduce network management time and costs, as well as total cost of ownership. Rather than deploy an entirely new network, users

AV OVER IP can take advantage of the software-defined solution to leverage existing infrastructure for delivery of better-quality audio and video.

DVIGear brought back it’s popular Formula IP showcase to ISE 2020; show participants drive a simulated HyperCar using DisplayNet for AV and USB extension and win prizes for their speed. The showcase serves as a demonstration of DisplayNet’s support for full 4K/60 resolution, with full USB 2.0 extension, zero-frame latency, and zero-artifact image quality. Also at the show, the company brought a new addition to the DN-200 Series of DisplayNet SDVoE products. The DN-200 Series offers an array of powerful features such as Fast Switching, Advanced Video Wall processing, and a customizable MultiViewer engine, replacing a myriad of dedicated units. New for this year, are the DN-225 transmitters and receivers, which offer both fiber and copper connectivity in the same compact, DVIGear DN-225

fanless form-factor as previous DN-200 Series devices. DN-225 transmitters and receivers are available now for immediate delivery. DVIGear also showed the affordable DN-150 Series and the DN-150-TX-Quad HDMI Input Module for the NETGEAR M4300-96X network switch.

The team rolled out the latest improvements to DisplayNet Manager, a web-based User Interface for system set up and installation, as well as a simple and easy-to-use set of API commands that enable third party controllers to manage all aspects of the system.

The Hall Research VERSA-4K is the latest addition to the company’s AV-over-IP product line. The VERSA4K system extends Hall and switches multiple Research 4K HDMI video and Versa 4K USB data sources to virtually an unlimited number of receivers using simple Gigabit network switches. The Sender/Encoder accepts any HDMI resolution including 4K, 60 Hz 4:4:4 with HDCP 2.2. The Receiver/Decoder includes an HDMI output with extracted HDMI audio, bidirectional IR, RS-232, and 4 USB ports. In a 1-1 setup, just connect a Cat6 cable up to 120 meters (400 ft) between the two ends. In a many-to-many setup, a dedicated Gigabit network switch (with IGMP and Jumbo-frame support) is required. Free PC GUI is available for setup, configuration, and control of the system.

With its long-standing involvement in AV/IT, Matrox used ISE 2020 to showcase its full portfolio for capture, streaming, recording, extension, switching, decoding, display, and control for media-over-IP applications. Maevex and Monarch appliances showcased recording, webcast-

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PRODUCTS ing, and lecture capture features. The new Maevex Matrox 6152 Quad 4K Decoder Maevex 6152 (coming in Q2) decodes up to four 4K streams—or many more lower resolution streams—across up to four 4K displays from a single, standalone appliance; the Maevex 6152 also includes HDCP support. In an application demonstration, Matrox paired up Maevex multi-4K encoders, Extio 3 IP KVM extenders, and Mura IPX capture and IP encode/decode cards to create a complete control room ecosystem to share information between operators and a video wall, and between local and remote video walls over LAN and Internet.

Matrox also demonstrated an industry-unique KVM multi-system control feature: The new Aggregator Mode for Extio 3 enables the remote monitoring and control of a number of systems from a multi-display workspace with a single keyboard and mouse. In addition to announcing a major expansion to its video wall portfolio including QuadHead2Go multi-monitor controllers, Matrox presented an AVIXA AV/IT FlashTrack session titled “The Next Phase of AV over IP.” MSolutions unveiled several built-in and modular features to its MS-TestPro portable test device at ISE 2020. Like many other companies in AV Over IP, MSolutions has been active in HDBaseT development since the standard was introduced in 2010, and the MSolutions MS-Test Pro device was introduced in 2017 to simMS-TestPro plify the adoption and installation of HDBaseT media networks. The company has continued to add new features and modules that enable installers to test for other AV requirements using the same devices, including its specialized HDMI Cable Tester module, added last year, which allows integrators to efficiently perform bandwidth and physical layer quality tests. The HDMI Cable Tester drills down to each cable’s conductors and shielding, and provides instant feedback on missing or defective wiring. The module easily attaches to both ends of an HDMI cable, and delivers detailed information on HDMI bandwidth requirements, the presence of HDMIstandard conductors, and compatibility tests for signals up to 4K@60Hz 4:4:4 in the HDMI 2.0 specification. Now, and new at ISE 2020, the MSTestPro is the first device of its kind to integrate AV over IP test capabilities into an HDBaseT device, eliminating the need for an expensive standalone IP tester. The software-driven capabilities, available to existing users via a simple software update, are activated upon connecting the device to a network switch. Once connected, the software provides immediate, detailed feedback on network switch information and settings, and a general overview of IP network conditions and connections.

The information received allows integrators to quickly confirm if the network settings fit the AV over IP requirements. This includes identi-

AV OVER IP

PRODUCTS fying network configuration faults, the status of network ports (open or blocked), and whether pertinent multicast settings are correctly enabled.

At ISE 2020, Opticis held several demonstrations including both HDMI 2.0 and DisplayPort 1.2 extension over fiber and IP Video Wall Controller with PoE feature. Opticis is known for the Opticis IPVDS-700-ED 4K HDMI IPVDSIP Video Wall Controller, an integrated control solu700ED tion that plays multi-source audio/video (such as PC, Media Player, DVD and Blu-ray) on the video wall system and multiple individual displays simultaneously. This solution provides advanced audio/video matrix feature as well as control. Multiple high-quality video sources (4K 30Hz or 1080p 60Hz) can be divided into multiple video walls with using IPVDS-700-E (Encoder) and IPVDS-700-D (Decoder). The controller enables convenient system configuration and control, and is positioned as a cost-efficient option for systems of all sizes. Interface is provided for system control offer-

ing preview function for source video as well as various display configurations such as merging and overlaying of displays, while allocating audio/video sources with simple drag and drop operation of mouse.

At press time, RGB Spectrum announced what the company describes as “the first full-function video wall processor fully integrated with an enterprise-class AV-over-IP video distribution platform.” The W4000 video wall processor is integrated into RGB Spectrum’s Zio AV-overIP platform. The W4000 video wall processor fully supports both baseband video sources (HDMI, DisplayPort, SDI) and AV-over-IP video sources (H.264) to RGB deliver the best of both worlds for in-room and enterSpectrum prise-wide video distribution. The W4000 simplifies W4000 complex visualization by simultaneously displaying multiple high-quality video sources onto any size video wall with up to 64 displays. The processor is the latest addition to the Zio AV-over-IP platform, a suite of hardware and software prod-

FUTURE PROOF VIDEO DISTRIBUTION AND CONTROL w i t h

A V o I P

f r o m

HDMI & USB over IP

H a l l

R e s e a r c h

Versa-4K

Extend & Switch multiple HDMI Video and USB to unlimited displays Low latency video and audio on 1Gig network switch Versa-4K Sender

Input resolutions up to 4K 60 HZ 4:4:4 Supports USB touchscreen and KVM peripherals Bidirectional IR, RS232, and auxiliary stereo Create video walls of up to 16x16 panels

Versa-4K Receiver

Smart Controller for AVoIP

Polaris-1

Supports 32 simultaneous user connections Perfect for control of large venue AVoIP Create zones or rooms each with multiple displays Upload zone maps or photos showing location of displays Speciic users can be allowed access to certain zones Programmable names for Zones, Inputs (encoders), and outputs (decoders)

SERVING YOU SINCE 1984 A New Wave in Connectivity

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AV OVER IP

PRODUCTS

ucts optimized for Enterprise-Class video distribution. It is designed to accelerate collaboration by sharing information-rich visual displays across the enterprise and between organizations. Zio distributes video from baseband and IP sources across LANs, WANs, and to mobile devices. Integration with Zio enables the new W4000 processor and other video sources across the enterprise to be easily managed through a common browser-based interface.

At ISE 2020, Tascam showed its range of devices for professional video playback, recording, and streaming without a computer, including the VS-R264 and VS-R265. These AV-over-IP streaming encoders/decoders offer simultaneous encoding, streaming, recording and decoding of audio/video material in 4K/UHD or Full HD resolution using H.265/HEVC or H.264 video codecs. The devices can be used for transmissions over corporate networks and WANs, or for live streaming into the Internet while simultaneously offering FTP upload of recorded files to network storage. Both models support Content Delivery Networks and online live platforms like YouTube, Wowza, Ustream, AWS Elemental MediaLive, CloudFront and others. Both are PoE or 12V, with audio embedding and de-embedding. Control is via a RESTful API allowing for integration into automation and control systems. The

Tascam VSR265

Tascam BDdevices support fully balanced audio I/O via Euroblock MP1 connectors, with configurable reference levels for compatibility with professional audio systems. Unbalanced 3.5-mm stereo mini jacks are also provided for compatibility with consumer devices. Compact at 1U, half-rack size they have attractive industrial design and can be mounted side by side. The newest addition to this line is the BD-MP1 Blu-ray player which plays a wide range of file formats from discs or SD cards and is suitable for touring or fixed installations.

Thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Nothing Like It ÂŽ

AV over IP

Codecs, multiviewers, video walls and mobile apps for a complete networked AV solution on LANs, WANs and wireless networks.

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rgb.com/zio

AV OVER IP

PRODUCTS QSR VIDEO WALL BUNDLES FROM SYNNEX CORPORATION QSR Video Wall Bundles from SYNNEX take the guesswork out of creating a total customized solution, making the sale of video walls easier and installation seamless. Combining leading offerings from NEC Displays; C2G, a brand of Legrand; and AOPEN, the kitted solutions are available in three display size options – 43”, 50” and 55” – and include a 3X1 wall mount, all cables, a media player, wireless keyboard and mouse. Elevate the appeal of your QSR customers’ content and bring their menus alive quickly and easily with this exclusive offering from SYNNEX Corporation’s VISUALSolv group.

ZIGEN IP-LOGIC Zigen announced IP-Logic last year as “the first plug and play AV over IP platform to include its own proprietary audio matrix.” IP-Logic transmitter/ receiver units support streaming of any 4K/60Hz 4:4:4 source to any display with autonomous EDID management, scaling, and bezel compensation.

Zigen’s patent pending IP-Logic platform optionally offers line level audio breakouts that can pull audio from any source with 5-band EQ, volume attenuation, up to 650-ms Audio Delay per zone, AES-67 and ST-2110 audio distribution. Ethernet AVB networking and the IP-Logic technology spectrum enables integrators a single product investment to perform across markets. The platform enables products to play in multiple audio networking environments, including AES67 and ST2110, with complete control from Dante/SAP, RAVENNA, Livewire+, NMOS, and DashBoard. Virtually backwards compatible with all SDVoE partner products.

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Ad Index

Advertiser...........................Page...................................................... Website

Advertising Sales Office

AC Promedia ............................................33.................................................................... www.luminex.com

VP/Market Expert, AV/Consumer

A-NeuVideo...............................................29.............................................................www.a-neuvideo.com

Electronics & Pro Audio

Aurora ..........................................................49...............................................................www.auroramm.com Atlona.......................................................23,57................................................................... www.atlona.com AVIXA ..........................................................42...................................................... www.infocommshow.org Best of Nab................................................33.......................www.futurebestofshow.com/nab2020 Biamp............................................................ 5..........................................................................www.biamp.com

Adam Goldstein 11 West 42nd Street, 15th Floor New York, NY 10036

Black Box....................................................55..................................................................www.blackbox.com

(212) 378-0465

Bose............................................................... 7.......... www.pro.bose.com/installedSoundExpansion

adam.goldstein@futurenet.com

Digital Projection...................................13.................................................www.digitalprojection.com d&b audiotechnik...................................37....................................................................www.dbaudio.com DVI Gear......................................................47............................................ www.dvigear.com/displaynet Focusrite...................................................... 9................................................................... www.focusrite.com Lynx Technik.............................................41.....................................................www.green-machine.com Matrox.........................................................51..................................................................... www.matrox.com Mipro............................................................35........................................................................ www.mipro.com NAB...............................................................62....................................................................www.nabshow.org Neoti ............................................................37..........................................................................www.neoti.com Radial............................................................11.........................................................................www.radial.com

Advertising Sales Prahlad Balasubramanian 307-222-6950 prahlad.balasubramanian@ futurenet.com, Janis Crowley

Rose..............................................................67............................................................................www.rose.com

845-414-6791

SecurityTronix.........................................17.......................................................................www.nacetv.com

janis.crowley@futurenet.com

Shure ............................................................. 5...........................................................................www.shure.com Sound Productions ...............................39.................................................................www.soundpro.com Stampede...................................................25..................................................www.stampedeglobal.com Synnex.........................................................53......................................................................www.synnex.com Tascam.........................................................61............................................................www.tascam.com/us/

Debbie Rosenthal 212-378-0465 debbie.rosenthal@futurenet.com

Televic................................................................. 27...................www.televic-conference.com/confidea-flex TOA ...............................................................21..................................................... www.toaelectronics.com TvOne............................................................59.........................................................................www.tvone.com

Classified Advertising

Vanguard.................................................... 2,3.......................................................... www.vanguardled.com

Zahra Majma

Vaddio..........................................................13.......................................................................www.vaddio.com

845-678-3752

Whirlwind...................................................41.........................................................www.whirlwindusa.com Zenith media.............................................19.......................................................... www.zenithmedia.com

zahra.majma@futurenet.com

Sound & Video Contractor, Volume 38 Issue 3, (ISSN 0741-1715) is published monthly by Future US, Inc., 11 West 42nd Street, 15th floor, New York, NY 10036.

Periodical Postage Paid at New York, NY, and at additional mailing offices. Postmaster: Send address changes to Sound & Video Contractor, PO Box 8608, Lowell, MA 01853. One year subscription (12 issues) is $39. Outside U.S. is $79. Canada Post International Publications Mail (Canadian Distribution) Sales Agreement No. 40612608. Canada return address: Pitney Bowes International, P.O. Box 25542, London, ON N6C 6B2. Š2020 Future US, Inc.

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OPEN MIC

THE NEXT WAVE

By Matt Allard, Product Marketing Manager for the Vizrt Group

raditional broadcasting no longer owns the reins on visual storytelling, and corporate entities of all types are taking notice. From traditional corporate office spaces to education, worship, sports, medical and government clients, there is an increased demand to add live and pre-recorded video as a communications and informational tool.

This translates to a greater need for efficient AV integration of capture, production, and distribution technology.

T

Even if a client isn’t aware of how accessible video production and delivery has become, it is likely they are seeking new capabilities for their communications, messaging, training, information, or marketing departments.

If AV pros can integrate a greater level of production-quality video as part of their toolkit, they are setting themselves up for success by rapidly responding to the shifting needs of their customers and their expanding media requirements.

THE GREAT ENABLER

In parallel with this rising demand for media of all kinds, infrastructure is evolving at an accelerating rate. In the past year, the AV and broadcast industries have each seen an inflection point in the adoption of a great democratizer in live video: the shift of the media infrastructure to IT networks.

There are many reasons why this move is beneficial. It lowers costs by reducing – or eliminating – traditional audio and SDI video cabling. It decreases complexity by leveraging established IT and IP standards. It even increases creativity by allowing for atypical video sources and camera placements, and production locations.

But the greatest benefit for facilities of all types is that nearly every structure is already wired for at least 1Gb Ethernet.

Consider that fact for a moment. The days of costly studio builds are gone as nearly every facility has the infrastructure for live video built-in. And this is the same infrastructure being adopted by video-first companies and broadcasters

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today! Because of this, the on-ramp to live and produced video is greatly reduced for both the integrator and the end-user.

HOW TO LEVERAGE YOUR EXISTING INFRASTRUCTURE

With the right IP approach, media devices can freely interoperate with one another. The goal is to seek out suppliers of media components that are utilizing these industry standards to build out an end-to-end, all-IP video system.

If AV pros can integrate a greater level of production-quality video as part of their toolkit, they are setting themselves up for success.

KEY COMPONENTS OF IP MEDIA SYSTEMS:

yy Cameras: The most common capture point will be cameras. These can be both IP-native cameras from major brands – such as Sony and Panasonic – or traditional SDI and HDMI cameras that utilize an IP convertor. yy “Atypical” video sources: This is an encompassing idea to account for uncommon inputs that are challenging in traditional workflows, but work easily with IP workflows.

Computer interfaces, for example, aren’t traditionally thought of as common video sources – but for training or human resources this can be a game-changer. Ensure the IP standard being used has software applications to support such capabilities. yy Live production systems: Today, the “production system in-a-box” model is truly plug-and-play! A live production system provides video switching, effects, graphics overlay, audio mixing, PTZ camera control, and – if desired – live streaming to websites and social media platforms.

There is no doubt the demand for video production and distribution integration is on the rise. Thus, the ability to provide these capabilities are swiftly becoming a need (and opportunity) too critical to ignore.

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