Tag Archives: Small Meetings

AV Stuff

12 Meeting Rooms, No Waiting

Last month, with a little hole in my schedule, an old work contact brought me in to oversee the set up and running of a small series of technical symposium breakout rooms for a scientific conference in New Orleans.

This Sign points the way to Hall B and 12 constructed rooms for specific topics in science.

Fortunately the scenic company completed the rooms earlier than scheduled so I set to work setting them up. And rather than having to do it in one day we had 2 full days to work on it.

The rooms were all the same. 2 wireless mics, a Allen & Heath digital audio console with a digital stagebox, 4 powered speakers, 16 x 9 Fastfold Screen and Panasonic projector with a very short throw lens.

I split the teams up based on their strengths and we tackled the rooms systematically. 2 people on speaker set up and taping, 2 audio techs working on the wireless and console at the tech table.. 2 video techs working on laptops and projection.

These 12 rooms were handled by a crew of 5, 4 other techs and me. It was fairly simple to keep the presenters happy.

There were a couple challenges as presenters wanted to present from their own laptops for various reasons (mostly having to do with the IT security of their devices) and we faced resolution mismatches on the projectors but once we identified this it was easy enough to correct.

At the end of the event we started to strike the systems as the rooms finished up and by the end we completed the strike 4 hours early freeing up my strike crew for other duties with the larger conference crew.

I don’t usually handle breakout room crews but this gig was a good reminder I could still do it.

Audio

Playing for the Other Team at Superbowl 58

Since 2002 I’ve been working with the audio team, most years, at the Superbowl Experience. I started out balancing sound over a decentralized house PA system over the entire event, which in 2002 meant keeping the appropriate levels for 2 or 3 Halls of the New Orleans Convention Center and a village of Tents and structures outside on a grassy field across the street. At the time that meant walking from location to location and adjusting the volume on 4 channel mic mixers as the crowds grew and ebbed at the end of the day.

Now, fast forward a couple of decades and I’m now running the PA system from a centralized location that allows me to have control over all the zones at the event from one audio console but I’m also making the announcements.

This started casually in the Miami Superbowl of 2007 when the intern who was supposed to make the announcements was continually missing in action and management was desperate to get people to leave at the end of the night. I solidified the PA Announcer/Operator role in at the Tampa Superbowl in 2009.

Over the years in this position I’ve developed a script and am often called on to choose the background music. My joke about the position is “I get locked in a room with a sound board, a microphone, a script I’ve developed over years, 6 ways to get at me (in case of emergency or a marketing ad I have to read), and all the Top 40 I can tolerate, and while I can’t play anything I want I can spike anything I hate and that’s enough control to keep it from being too painful.”

Being responsible for possible emergency announcements means that I can’t stray too far from my console.

I’ve been in the deepest recesses of Convention Center amp and patch rooms where none of the crew could find me, awaiting the next call or for the time to reach 9:30 pm to get there so I can tell people that we are closing in 30 minutes. Most of the staff doesn’t know what I look like but if I say “Your attention please, the Superbowl Experience will be closing in 30 minutes” I will usually get “Oh, that’s YOU!!” People like it when you play the hits, particularly when it means they get to go home soon.

Its not like I’m unfamiliar with how most audio works. I’ve run audio for hundreds of smaller meetings in hotel ballrooms. I’m comfortable with smaller stick PA systems and the usual compliment of Podium mic, wireless lavs and handhelds and the computer sound interfaces. But in the past couple years I’ve concentrated more on my lighting skills.

Still, it’s fun, at least a couple weeks a year to play on Team Audio.