Take a deep dive into providing showstopping AV at your event.
Whether you’re looking for a grand spectacle or simply a cohesive audio and visual experience, good AV suppliers are key. And more importantly, bad AV can significantly disrupt your event experience and stick in your delegates’ minds far longer than any of the positives.
So, what makes a good AV supplier? Experience and knowledge are a huge factor in providing any service, and AV is no different. When searching out an AV supplier, look into which events your potentials have worked on previously and what the outcome was. Many suppliers will have this information available on their website. You can also reach out to colleagues for recommendations of AV suppliers who have come through for them in the past. A shining review from someone whose opinion you value is high value.
A great way to ensure that any potential AV suppliers are both reputable and knowledge is to look out for any accreditations. The Electrotechnical Certification Scheme (ECS) accredits the qualifications and experience of electrotechnical operatives, highlighting health and safety awareness in the field. Membership to a trade association such as AVIXA – the international trade association representing the audio-visual industry – is also a good indication, these groups often provide good practise and training to their members.
Finding AV that augments a delegate experience can be gargantuan task. As seen most notably on recent royal occasions, projection mapping can light up the entire front of your venue with any design, blended with or mapped onto a physical object. Using the latest projection technology, the object appears to change around the designed projection, becoming part of the display.
By virtue of it being big and bright, it can be easy to get caught up in the visual aspect of AV and to leave the A as an afterthought. Sound design can fade into the background and only become intrusive when it goes wrong. Static, a faulty microphone, or media that won’t play are all recipes for disaster that will stick in delegates’ minds.
Keeping up with technology is key, a decent supplier will be. Most Industry events are utilising wireless headsets allowing talks to be given without having to worry about creating noise pollution, or delegates being unable to hear in busy surroundings. This technology allows speakers to talk into a microphone which connects to wireless headsets worn by delegates, allowing for increased engagement and for multiple sessions to be run in the same place.