Category: Lighting

Using Equipment To It's Fullest

5/6/2019

One of the biggest things we like to push at Lambda Audio Visual is using your equipment to its fullest. Almost every piece of equipment we work with and sell is positioned not only fill your needs but to grow with you. Our tech tip this week is non-other than the equipment user Manual!
We affectionately speak of this amazing tool on our crews as our most important and knowledgeable crew member ‘El Manuel’ (of course we say it with an accent). “Have you checked with Manuel”, is a common day to day saying for us. This is because while our training's do a great job of getting teams started and helping to solve problems, it’s only when you dig in to what the manufacturer has designed the equipment for that you can fully understand it.

Every day at Lambda we are reading manuals on new pieces of equipment, learning about each of them to their fullest and we recommend you do the same! It may not be the most interesting piece of reading material, but it sure can help you out in a pinch.

So, you’re interested now, and you want to try our idea, but you threw away the box your equipment came in along with that precious little book of knowledge. Never fear, the internet is a treasure trove of manuals and information. Some of our favorites are
Black Magic Support with a constantly updated user manuals for all their products. We also love the Youtube resources for Obsidian control systems, formerly known as Martin Lighting. They have an expansive tutorial set online showing step by step how to become an expert with their products Obsidian Control Systems - YouTube. Yet another incredible catalog of resources is from Boxcast. The have a library of support and tutorials to help you troubleshoot in minutes.
Join us in educating yourselves on the products you own so you can use it to its fullest capability!

Lambda Design Services

2/19/2019

Here at Lambda Audio Visual we, like many of you, love to dream and try ideas with our company. One of the tips that we love to pass along is for you to visualize what it is you really would like to do and how you would like to communicate in your space. It's not just about what products you want to use, it's about creating the atmosphere to accomplish your goals and to create new dreams. That's why we are announcing a service we have been providing over the last year now as a tech tip available to all our customers!
Introducing Lambda Design Services. We know that it’s hard to make decisions based on a list of items, or even based on pictures of other rooms, buildings, and auditoriums.

With that said, we want to help you see what your room can look like based on your dreams and ideas. Take a look at some of the ideas we have put together over the last year. There are so many wonderful ways to show content with one regular size screen, two screens, an ultra-wide screen or even with a combination of screens and LED walls. Try us out, ask us to put together some views of your space, all we need is some measurements. Usually there is an additional cost involved, but because we want you to use the service and get benefit from it, any payed cost for Design is a 100% discount from services, installation, or products ordered based on the Design drawn up for you by Lambda. Try this out and try some fun new ideas, colored lighting, interesting screen sizes and shapes, or LED wall. Let us help you design your dreams and make them come true!

Creating Modern Meeting Places

2/5/2019

AAFCU Case Study

Meeting rooms in recent years have made a major transition in space needs. Gone are the days of a central computer at a podium or lectern in the corner or a large rack of automation equipment. The purpose is no longer for a single executive to speak to a room of employees. Meeting rooms today are dynamic environments with a number of people presenting in a live and cooperative environment.
This is where we began with AAFCU a local credit union in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Their IT staff came to us with the challenge of cleaning up an aging mess of wires and updating technology to turn an often-used board room space into an environment for creativity and corporate inspiration.
The first goals set were to clean up the existing hardware that had been ad hoc over the years for conferencing. Next they wanted to update viewability around the conference table for better engagement of all employees. The staff at Lambda Audio Visual set out to understand the problems of the conference room and it's designated uses and put together a solution to make the room usable for a new generation of meetings.

Meetings in the proposed room contain anywhere from 5 to 25 people and with the configuration of chairs around an circular table, clear visibility of the screen was not always possible. The projection at the front was underpowered and the screen small, so that those at the front of the room were unable to see the screen at all. We were able to solve this in two ways: first by improving quality of projection at the front of the room with a new 1080P resolution, 5000 lumen Sony laser projector. This easily doubled the brightness and clarity at the front of the room. Second, coupled with a new IDEEA screen from Da-Lite it also allowed the space to be used as a white board. This white board has a matte finish creating a surface that minimizes projection hot spots and creates a great writing surface all at the same time. At the back of the room we added a 75” Television from Samsung mirroring the projection feed and allowing for everyone around the table to get a great view of the presentation without putting a kink in their necks.

Conference calling, important in many conference rooms was not left out in this space. The staff at AAFCU had a high need for this capability to be easy to use and clean. With board members across the country and goals of working with other businesses across the community, conference calling is a capability they used often and hoped to make simple for quick use.

We chose to implement a ceiling-based system for cleanliness. Adding boundary microphones from Shure into the ceiling created even coverage of the room to pick up quiet voices and adding inset speakers from SoundTube to present clear call audio back to the room. To tie it all together we brought in a top of the line audio processor from Symetrix. Symetrix allowed us to do several fun things simplifying the calling experience for the staff. The audio processor includes auto mixing functionalities to balance the audio coming from the room microphones without needing to adjust anything manually. It also includes an auto echo canceling to filter audio coming from the speakers so that it will not echo back in the call. The Symetrix processor also included the ability to add a VOIP card compatible with AAFCU’s Cisco phone calling system and an easy sheet to help the IT staff in tying it into their systems.

With all of this great technology in the room we then needed a system to make it easy to use for the average staff member and to allow ease of use with a variety of different laptops, phones, and tablets. Enter the Atlona Velocity system! We have talked about Atlona before and we loved how it turned out here! Our team couldn’t be more impressed with how easy to configure and affordable this “Automation” system is. In previous years, meeting room automation technology was bulky, expensive, and required expensive programmers to make modifications. It was not easy to explain or use. The Velocity system is web based, extremely affordable and scalable! It was easy for our team to add each device and have workflows automatically created on a touchscreen for easily turning the room technology on and off and dialing a call.

Something particularly nice about Atlona is the ability to mirror an on the wall mounted touch screen with a table accessible iPad. AAFCU loved the wall mounted touch screen, but it was not as accessible sitting at the board room table. So in just a few minutes an iPad they already owned was added to the system with a simple app download. The touch screen manages all input switching with HDMI and USB C ports we mounted at the ends of the table. Also a WiFi based connection through KlikBoks allowing android, iPhone, Mac and windows laptop users all to wirelessly share a connection. Our “rack” of equipment was small, and out of the way where nobody needed to touch or move it. Ease of connection, ease of engagement, cleanliness, and ease of usability was created all in one package with a few simple components.

If you have meeting space with issues, outdated technology, or one that you are looking to increase usability in, give us a call or drop us a line on social media and let us make your meeting space a space of engagement and collaboration with people and technology. We want to help you to feel inspired and productive every time you sit down to meet.

Superlux Communication System

2/5/2019

Here’s something new for you to check out! The Superlux IS-103 is a complete wired intercom system that provides clean, clear communication for video, film, broadcasts, house of worship and schools! This Superlux is a great low cost solution for auditorium and church staff communication between positions. It uses simple XLR mic cable and can support up to ten belt packs so you can keep everyone in the loop!

Comfortable, lightweight and easy to use, this could make communication seamless for everyone involved in your project. We love finding and providing affordable options for our clients for all your needs. If you are looking for something in particular, don’t hesitate to ask!

Merry Christmas!

1/3/2019

I have taken it upon myself this Christmas to bring you a Christmas card! After all, seeing as I’m the one who proudly bares and displays the sheep, I mean lamb-(duh!)-it seemed appropriate for me to be in charge of the Christmas letter! Let me introduce myself: My name is Kirby, the immaculate Trailer. That is, I was, until Ryan recently decided to give me a piercing with a 2x4. It hurt just a little.

Some jobs are harder than others...

We started out the year on the run as we finished a 21 room upgrade with Center for Creative Leadership. Ryan, my proud owner, was more than busy. Training new staff, managing Trevor, bidding jobs, managing Trevor, traveling for installs and conferences, managing Trevor…you get the idea! It’s true, there is no rest for a small business owner. Ryan and Trevor have also have added many more audio, video and lighting trainings to help churches get the most from their equipment. It’s exciting to get new equipment and information into your hands! We love to see you succeed. We also added several more corporate jobs this year. We all loved the work and fun install at Air Academy Federal Credit Union and the video install we did at Air Academy High School

Encouraging Tych before the big Florida trip!

Elizabeth, our Accounting Manager and HR, had a busy year as well. Let’s be real, working with a certain new employee has brought an increased work load to her plate. But she’s a Boss and handled it like a pro! She even planned for the team to make it to Florida for Gather Church’s new building install and back without dying! It was a miracle! Trust me, Trevor almost pulled out the Batman mask one too many times! I had the privilege to carry her well organized snacks and meals for our two week job and even got a security upgrade to help guard the fruit snacks.

Trevor, our Shop Manager and Sound expert, is becoming my new best friend. He takes care of me the best and is in charge of loading up my friends Inigo Montoya, Fezik and Vizzini. Those guys are quite impressive to the clients. They carry all the tools and Lambda tech tip secrets! That is, unless Ryan borrowed something and forgets to put it back… Did you hear? Trevor got SMAART trained this summer! I’m not sure what it did for him, but they say it’s good for the company. We’ve had fun doing audio jobs and SMAART tunes for Lander Church, Clayhouse Church, Austin Bluffs Evangelical Free church and Summit church! Great sound always makes you look more professional. We even created a traveling audio system for Front Range Alliance Church East who rents a gym on Sundays.

The batman mask on it's way to Florida...it made the drive go so quickly!

Colosseo era magnifico! Grateful for such flexibility in this job!

Jewell, our Admin Assistant, is enjoying working with the company. Usually I just see her run by on her way to morning meeting, but I hear she keeps things a little better organized in the office now days. Somehow, she even managed to do ordering and communication for our biggest job this year all the way from Italy. Good thing our blog and News Letter didn’t get sent out in Italian. She also has lots of fun working with our vendors and updating the blog and newsletters. I hear the Fun Gear and Tech Tips posted on Social media is an easy way to learn about AV the simple way.

Darcy the Ridiculous Dog chases Hank the squirrel every day. She should just give up. Hank will live on forever! Her other main job is to attend staff meetings and make sure Ryan gets his exercise opening the door for her to go in and out. Yeah, it’s fun to watch

We’ve done a lot of exciting things at Lambda this year! We expanded a lot! Trevor, Jewell, Tych, Anigo, Fezik, Vizzini and myself all joined Lambda this year! And we couldn’t be happier! We have a lot of fun here at Lambda and we hope you've had fun working with us too! We are excited to keep working together and we are excited to work with each one of you in the coming year!

May God bless you richly and may your Christmas filled with much Joy!
From our Family to Yours!
Kirby, and Everyone at Lambda!
PS Could someone stop Darcy from chewing on my tires?

Training With Lambda

12/7/2018

Equipping You To Be the Best!

Have you ever wondered how some of those special features work on your AV equipment? Here at Lambda AV we are dedicated to making your AV experience the best it can be! In our efforts to do this, did you know that Lambda offers classes and training sessions at your convenience? Yes! We do! We would love to help you and your volunteers better understand any AV equipment you have. From lighting and video to sound systems we've got you covered!
Training sessions are created for your specific needs. Lambda offers training for a few hours on any system. We also offer half day training and full day training with a free lunch provided! If a full day of training and a tasty meal isn't enough we also offer training with a checkup beforehand. This includes updating your system and fixing any connection issues you might have. Sound specific training can include your band or we can come set up multi-track recording, if your system is compatible, and practice using those tracks. The opportunities and options are limitless! There is no point in having new gear if you don't know how to use it to it's best ability. Let us show you all the tips and tricks we know!
If you are interested in knowing more about our classes and training, give us a call for a free consult.

M-Touch

12/7/2018

M-Touch was a Martin Brand but was recently bought out and now belongs to Elation product lines. It’s still the same great product it was with a new name! We recently used this at Gather church for an easy, affordable way to incorporate a fader into the lighting control.

M-Touch is a powerful but simple control surface. It is made for affordable, professional lighting solutions. The software for M-Touch is completely free to download for your system. This piece of equipment is a plug-and-play solution with an innovative control surface like no other

lighting console.It has 14 touch faders that allow control of playback and fixture parameters. 20 velocity-controlled pads allow for new types of effects. Additional programming buttons such as Record, Edit, Update, Load and Clear are accessible directly from the M-Touch control panel.

It’s simple, easy to use and gets the job done with less hassle. If you’re interested we would be happy to demo this product for you. Just contact us and let us know you want to check it out! We know you’ll like what you see.

Making Useful Checklists

11/27/2018

In the audio/visual world one of our biggest fears is that something might go wrong or not work at the worst possible time. One of the ways we have found to minimize the chances of this happening is through a pre-event checklist. Whether producing or directing an event, mixing audio, or even just operating a camera, having a checklist to confirm everything is working properly can save headaches during the event.
If you are using volunteers, who may not work with that piece of equipment regularly, this can also help you empower them to learn that area or piece of equipment. Keep the checklists simple and make sure if the operator doesn’t use that specific equipment regularly that they can still understand it and use it as a guide to help them. Use your checklists as markers of what should be working and what someone should be seeing regularly.
Spending a few minutes to create a checklist for different pieces of your systems can save you lots of time before and during your events!

Timing Your New Building

11/5/2018

When to Involve AV Teams in Your Planning

We wanted to put together a few articles based on a new building installation we recently did. We hope that these might help your organization as you plan for the future. In this first article we want to talk about when to get an AV integrator involved and why timing is so important.
We started working on Gather Church in Florida almost a year before we installed any equipment in the building. This was an important timing decision! It helped us to define much of the budgeting and needs in the new space. Many times we are asked to become involved either too late or too early in the process. There are several things to consider before getting an AV team involved and if you are still in doubt, you can always ask the AV company what you need to have in place to begin a tech design, quote, and plan.

When is too late? Too late is pretty easy to quantify with new buildings. If construction has already started on the building before the involvement of the AV team, it is too late. It's hard for an AV team to get involved at this stage of the process. At this point, for the most part, we are playing catch up to the rest of those involved and have to work around other's plans. It can be hard to add instructions to contractors and to check for potential pitfalls in AV design when walls are already going up and money has already been spent.
Just like being too late, it's important to realized that being too early can be an issue as well. We have also worked on a few projects where a client comes to us looking for a bid when there are no current plans to build a space or it's years out. Worse still, are the times when there is no funding in place. This usually causes us to design and re-design the space every 6 months causing wild variations in needed budget because nothing can properly be decided upon.

Gather came to us with preliminary building plans, a selected general contractor, a timeline, a budget, and most importantly a list of needs and a list of dreams. The needs for the space were: a great sound system with a digital console, stage lighting, and video presentation equipment. The dreams were LED house lighting, and a projector with a possibility of an LED wall instead. This allowed us to focus on a budget around what the church felt was most important and then try and add in as many dreams as possible from there. We worked to produce preliminary plans from an AV design and a list of equipment. Once that was pulled together a discussion was started. That discussion mostly involved a mix of Gather Church communicating their needs, and Lambda linking those

needs with the experience we have about what works well and what does not. We were then able to problem solve each piece to come to a satisfactory result.
Here at Lambda discussion with our clients is very important to us. Whether it's a personal meetings or talking over the phone, our goal is always to make sure that our clients feel their goals and desires are heard. We work hard not to just build a system, but to problem solve, and give you the best possible system you could have. We don't want to just give you equipment we want to give you everything you need to succeed!

More to Come!