BACKGROUND
In December 2008, Snelling Business Systems were awarded the contract to design, supply, install and maintain the audio visual requirements for a new Study Centre at The University of East Anglia, incorporating a number of seminar rooms and study areas, varying in size from a capacity of 20 up to 90 students.
Following an initial appointment as audio visual consultants and a successful second stage tender submission Snelling Business Systems were awarded the contract to design, supply and install the audio visual facilities for the Study Centre, as well as to provide user training and ongoing support.
AIMS OF THE PROJECT
The Study Centre was designed to provide systems that would facilitate simple, flexible high quality interactive presentations to take place, employing equipment suited to the size of the room, with the use of interactive whiteboards or monitors.
All audio visual equipment was required it to exploit the advances in technology to improve the user experience and increase accessibility to material via live streaming, recording and delivering rich media content via VLE and internet. Furthermore, the study centre was required to be centrally managed and bookable via a network helpdesk.
TECHNICAL SOLUTION
The technical resolution for the multiple seminar rooms required manifold solutions, incorporating display, audio and rich media systems, signal processing and distribution and a central control system.
To meet the visual requirements of the project, three display designs have been employed. These include a manual pull down projection screen with a traditional ceiling mounted networked projector and interactive LCD monitor, an interactive whiteboard, ultra short throw projector and additional flat panel relay screens, and an interactive whiteboard with an ultra short throw projector. Each of the displays feature XGA resolution.
The seminar rooms also feature two central audio system designs; a passive loudspeaker, power amplifier, wireless microphone system, audio mixing, switching and level control via Kramer presentation switcher and an active loudspeaker, audio switching and level control via Kramer presentation switcher.
The rich media system includes a Sonic Foundry RL Rich Media recorder receiving camera feeds from installed Panasonic PTZ camera, microphone and program sound via the installed audio system and content feed from the Kramer Switcher. The recorder is activated via software record / stop control or via scheduled recording. This enables seminars to be live streamed with the RL recorder sending the content to the UEA Mediasite EX server software / hardware which then provides enterprise scale delivery of the content to the intranet and external internet as required. The captured rich media presentation is archived appropriately within the EX server platform which provides a full content management platform and provides links into the UEA VLE.
Signal processing and distribution is managed and processed within the AV desk / cabinet and sent to the display device(s) via CATx or dedicated AV copper cables. Additional flat panel relay screens employing scaler switchers provide a common format to all displays.
All of the seminar rooms employ a standardised user interface which provide the same function in all rooms regardless of minor differences in equipment specification, offering simplicity and ease for the end user. Each interface comprises of eight buttons which interface with an AMX NetLinx Integrated Controller installed in the AV desk / cabinet, which, via a combination of LAN and inbuilt ports, interfaces with and controls the display equipment, audio system, signal switching and processing. In addition the processors monitor room occupancy and switch off all AV equipment after a preset period of inactivity. Central network control and monitoring is provided using AMX RMS management software.
Depending upon room configuration each seminar room contains a purpose built AV cabinet or desk and the largest seminar room is equipped with a TeamMate tutor AV desk. These units contain installed PC, Denon DVD, Amplifier and signal processing equipment. Mounted on the cabinet or desk are, AMX controls, VGA input for laptop, Elmo XGA resolution visualiser and PC monitor.