And… one more quick one post-InfoComm post. For the second consecutive year, family obligations kept me away from the big show. Last year it was my lovely bride’s recovery from major back surgery; this year was a more joyous occasion as my son graduated pre-school (and yes, this is important; another tradeshow will always come, […]

While I’m not attending InfoComm in meatspace this year, I’ve managed to flitter in and out of the show via Twitter, Periscope, Snapchat, etc. I’ll talk more about the experience of the trade show from afar, but today I’d like to discuss the keynote speech, a recent visit I made to my locksmith and what […]

On the fiction side of my blog (I still do write fiction when I’m not here) I wrote a recent vignette about a shopper purchasing some pre-peeled oranges in a grocery store. If you’re on social media you’ll likely have seen the photo of said oranges making the rounds as an example of our wasteful […]

Yesterday, I had the opportunity to attend a demo of the new Microflex Advanced microphones from Shure. These are digital beam-steering microphone arrays designed for tabletop (the MXA310) and ceiling (MXA920) placement. They are high-end, solidly built products which fit very well into some design philosophies and perhaps not as well with others. Both are […]

“Include Kodak in this room.” That’s the line in the client’s system review memo which confused me, and one with which I eventually opened an internal training seminar at SMW. What were they talking about? And what was the bigger message? Read on! The memo in question came in a fairly late design phase of […]

This is not a switcher wars post. I have no interest in discussing the various claims made by one manufacturer or another, the counter claims, counter-counter claims or any other such back-and-forth between competitors. The issue to which some of the ongoing discussion about switching technology HAS brought more attention is that of chroma subsampling, […]

The AV industry received some unsettling news last week regarding a potential security vulnerability in Harman’s control processors. It was a rare moment when we as a group were all in the news, though not in a good way. For those who’ve not seen it by now, Ars Technica reported that AMX (now Harman) Netlinx […]

The new year is upon us. In our personal lives, many will be looking to lose weight, exercise more, curb some of our vices. What of the AV industry? Is there anything within the world of technology we should be looking to change as the calendar shifts? Perhaps as the year shifts we can all […]

AV people used to have the coolest toys. Look back not that many years to the first AV touchpanels you saw; people oohed a bit, they ah-ed a bit and — if the installer soldered the nine-pin D-sub correctly — were impressed when the touch of one (soft) button not only turned on a room’s […]

There’s been some chatter around here lately on the CTS certification. Mark Coxon used his skepticism on renewal rates as a vehicle to question the value of the certification. Gary Kayye told us what CTS means to him. This lead me to contemplate what I thought of the certification, about renewal, and about where we […]

Last summer, I discussed the tension between selecting “best in breed” components from a single manufacturer and locking oneself into a single ecosystem. As time passes, the industry is certainly moving in a direction in which a single ecosystem is not only increasingly possible, but increasingly desirable as well. We’ve all heard horror stories about […]

AV Distributor SYMCO rolled into town today for its annual roadshow. Various other commitments kept me from the various days’ events — including an end-users’ roundtable featuring not only one of our clients from SMW, but also one with whom I’d worked personally. However, I did have the opportunity for a quick stop to chat […]

Post-InfoComm, the good folks at WolfVision brought their new Cynap collaboration appliance to the office for a demo and a chat. Cynap is the latest entry into the increasingly crowded wireless collaboration space, competing with not only the WePresent and its OEM cousins (Barco Clickshare CSM, Crestron Air Media, Extron Sharepoint, etc.), but also with […]

Gary Kayye recently wrote about the death of TV, which could be going the way of the AV system. The question this brings to me is that of, ‘What do we lose in both experience and community?’ As a professional, of course, I also think of what this means in the commercial world. Can we […]

Last week my fellow consultants and I were invited to an event at conferencing stalwart Polycom’s New York City experience center. It’s a pretty and shiny new spot at One Penn Plaza, with a nice river view outside and their technological toys inside. For me the more interesting part isn’t the specifics of a single […]

Earlier this year I had a client ask the specifications of the “PC – OFE” (Personal Computer – Owner Furnished Equipment) in one of their conference rooms. This was a series of near-identical videoconferencing rooms designed quite a few years ago and now approaching the completion of installation. What followed was a discussion both frustrating […]

I seem to have acquired a spool of glowing glass. OK, it’s an architectural sample of Corning’s Fibrance light diffusing fiber, and it landed on my desk as an architectural sample of something which intrigued one of the members of the design team on a project I’m working on. What to do with it? That […]

I’m not doing much in terms of post-InfoComm wrap-up this year; like some of you, I watched from afar. There might be something to say about that process and how it developed over the years, especially with new tools like Periscope available for live-streaming of booth-tours and even parties. Today I’d like to revisit the […]

The is an AV post but also a feminist post; it seems that this is the time of year for me to discuss such things. Last year, if we’ll recall, I wrote about the use of female models to attract attention at trade-shows — so called “booth babes.” What got my attention this year? I […]

Control and automation can be the most fun part of AV design — from the blank canvas of a user interface, one can create anything. Preview windows? Live tiles? A photo of the room which reacts as conditions change? Imagination is the limit, but there are many pitfalls. Today we’ll talk about why some users […]

I’ll open with a personal note: This marks the 200th published post on this blog! Over the past years we’ve talked about commercial AV, speculative fiction, and even enjoyed some original writing. I’d like to thank all of you for joining me on this journey, and hope to continue to share my words with you […]

Those of you who follow my musings on the world of professional AV know that I can be skeptical at times. I’m skeptical about AVB. I was skeptical about video over IP. I’m skeptical about the continued value of HDBaseT. What I try not to be is cynical; it’s good to start off questioning new […]

This will be one of two upcoming Flash Fiction Fridays dealing with the moon, and more science-fictional than my usual fare. As readers of this blog know, I not only work in the audiovisual field, but also have a somewhat active presence in the AV online community, including occasional appearance on AV-related podcasts, this blog, […]

Editor’s note: This blog was written as an introduction to display technologies for non-industry insiders. Everyone can use a refresher though, so we’re reprinting here anyway. OLED! LED!  Plasma(RIP)!  There are, today, quite a few technologies for video displays. What does it mean? What’s best? Today we’ll talk about video displays. This is an AV […]

Today’s post is seems to be about disparate topics, but at its heart regards something quite important to me as a writer and, perhaps surprisingly, as an AV designer. Today we’re talking about metaphor. Last week, I came across this drawing by British artist Alice Hershel, drawing under the name Glytxh (the drawings are quire […]

Last week I appeared on the AV Powerup podcast to discuss, amongst other things, HDBaseT. Taking the time to listen to myself (this is a sign of responsibility to monitor messaging and personal branding, not at all vanity. Honestly) it seemed that I was quite negative on HDBaseT as a technology — I described it […]

As InfoComm time grows nearer (for my non-professional connections, InfoComm is the annual trade show for professional audiovisual industry) I think back towards a conversation I had at the Women in AV dinner with Kristin Rector of ListenTech. We’d been talking about family and, at the moment, about my then-seven year old daughter (in a […]

How is instant replay like a gooseneck microphone? As some of you might know, I’m a dedicated baseball fan – specifically of the New York Mets. In recent years, Major League Baseball has added an  instant replay system in which a dedicated team in a remote location are available to review close plays if a […]

Show, don’t tell. It is THE quintessential writing advice for good reason. Don’t tell us that a character is brave – show them facing a fear. While you’re at it, don’t tell us they are afraid — show us the quickening pulse, the sweaty palms, the tightness in the belly. Paint a word picture. Avoid […]

Now that I own a home out in suburbia, I have cause to sample the residential side of the tech market. As winter approaches, I’m making a two-pronged attack on the elements — low tech (weatherstripping and better attic insulation) and high (a new fancy thermostat). As this is a half-technology blog we’ll focus on […]

HDBaseT has been described as a bridge technology between traditional video transport and IP-based systems, the time for which is rapidly arriving. It’s a technology about which I’ve not been excited for some time; every manufacturer not only uses the same chipset (produced by Valens), but appears to have settled on the same form-factor and […]

I’ve been away from AV writing this month while doing my annual Nightmare Fuel project, but a few weeks ago I was able to take a few minutes of my lunchbreak to attend the NEC Partners’ Showcase. This is one of those neat little events at which one can meet up with friends in the […]