AXA Insurance Awards

With prize giving for their best achieving salesperson to their tongue in cheek take on the X-Factor, aptly named The AXA Factor, the AXA Awards was a fun and light hearted review of the year – a chance for the team at AXA to let their hair down and enjoy themselves for the evening.

However, this approach was certainly not taken from our perspective. Providing the full production, from set to sound it was imperative every detail was taken care of for such an esteemed client.

Production:av was pleased to continue our great relationship with marketing communications agency Dair* to achieve this event.

Our high definition projection provided an excellent backdrop for the presentations and our d&b Audiotechnik system with digital control was employed ensuring the audio was discreet, tidy and to the highest standard. The set design was carried out in house. White PVC was chosen in order for pixel lines and moving heads to be used to colour the set, which gave fantastic results.

The Live Events co-ordinator at Dair* commented:

Both the AXA events team and the key event stakeholders mentioned what a great team we had on site, polite, helpful, professional, ready to help being just a few of the words used.

The event was a success from start to finish with everybody being exceptionally pleased with all aspects of the show. We look forward to operating on future events with this client.

Production:av Together again at Butlins

For the second year running Production:av have provided high quality AV services to the Newfrontiers group of churches. The London and Home Counties church groups met again at the Butlins Holiday Park in Bognor Regis over the weekend of 22nd to 24th of January.

Production:av provided experienced crew and technicians to deliver a switching system for the main venue bringing the Camera images, songwords and powerpoint together and feeding them to the house installed screens, and also to other venues across the site.

There were also several youth venues which required additional equipment over the installed house systems that Butlins provided. Production:av provided Video Systems comprising of Seamless Switchers for Kramer, Extron and Barco, sending signals to projection equipment from Christie and Plasma screens from Panasonic and NEC, as well as sound equipment from D&B Audiotechnik and Allen and Heath.

Production:av also provided a site wide radio system to enable the Executive Management Team and youth teams to communicate effectively.

The event was a success, with the technical systems performing as required delivering clean signals across the site. Our thanks go to the Organising team for involving Production:av for the second year of the event, and look forward to being involved next year.

Production:av provide widescreen for Amsterdam 400 Event

2009 sees the 400th anniversary of the Baptist Church, having start from a group of people who fled England and settled in Amsterdam. With this in mind the European Baptist Federation held a celebration in Amsterdam to mark the 400th Anniversary.

Held at the Theatre in heart of the Rai Complex on the edge of Amsterdam, Production;av supplied a camera, switching and projection package to the event, working through the production management company Affinity Events.

The solution was based around a 10′x25′ truss framed rear projection screen flown at the rear of the stage, and filed with a pair of full HD Barco CLM HD8 projectors giving a 16,000 lumen image on the screen. The signal was fed to the projectors as a DVI signal over a Fibre Optic system to ensure that the signal being projected suffered no loss on the journey from the control position at FOH to the projection position at the rear of stage.

Switching was undertaken at Full HD level (1920×1080 pixels) by the Barco Screen Pro II switcher and Screen Pro II controller. The SPII was feed by a range of sources such as Laptops for on-site video edits, Powerpoint, and camera images. Cameras provided a full HD image to the Panasonic AV-HS400 vision mixer, enabling  full HD work flow through out, from lens to lens with no scaling in between.

The event ran for three days with no hitches, and was a success. The client was very happy with the solution provided commenting that it was the best video system and screen look that they have had to date. This was due to both the high quality of equipment we supplied, and the experienced and competent team operating it. Our thanks also go to Tim Perrett for providing fantastic lighting for the event and Mark Heaps and Ben Warlow from Affinity Events for getting us involved in the job.

Keswick Convention 2009

2009 saw the Keswick Convention, running since 1875, held at the heart of the lake district within the convention centre in Keswick Cumbria. Working directly for the convention, Production:av was tasked with lifting the standards of the main screens and switching systems that are utilised for the three duration of the event.

Previous the convention has employed a system that has grown with the convention as AV technology has emerged. This had served it’s purpose well, but it was felt that to keep with the expectations of a modern conference go-ers, improvements could be made.

The key aim was to ensure that the main screens flanking the side of the stage could be seen in all light conditions. The convention utilise their own large marquee that is erected on site every year. Being manufactured from a white material, it lets high levels of ambient light into the venue during the day time sessions.

To combat this Production:av approached the problem from two angles – the projection, secondly the signal aspects.

Firstly high brightness 10,000 lumen projectors were supplied in the form of Barco CLM R10+ projectors, flown from the lighting truss firing onto 8′x6′ front projection screens.

Secondliy a digital signal path was employed from many of the sources through the supplied Barco Screen Pro II switcher and fed via fibre onto the projectors as a DVI signal. This meant that there were no losses within the signal path, and a minimum of processing. A mix of the cameras was provided by Cutting Edge Uk as an SD SDI feed, which was then keyed over with song words from a PC, at the native DVI Resolution. Production:av also supplied a technician to provide support and operation during the event as well as crew to rig and de-rig.

The event was a success, with the only complaints being that the screens were too bright!

Production:av provide complete solution for Axa Winterthur.

Production:av are proud to provide a full av solution for Axa Winterthur’s recent Manchester conference, and further upcoming events.

The solution centred on a full HD centre screen with 8500 lumens for full impact, driven by Barco switching and a DVI over fibre system to ensure that the quality of the signal from source to screen. This was support by an EAW speaker system and Shure radio microphones to ensure that the audio was crisp, clean and consistent through out the conference.

Lighting took advantage of a mix of generic lanterns and Moving heads to give various looks through out the day and in to the evening awards ceremony.

Production:av also designed and provided the simple widescreen set to the clients requirements. This set has been designed to enable use at multiple venues through out the UK as required.

However equipment on it’s own doesn’t make an event. Production:av supplied experienced and knowledgeable crew to supplement our in house staff on the event to ensure it’s success. Working from start to finish through a single point of contact with our Project Manager ensured that the client had nothing to worry about and a quick response to any issues that might have arisen. Production:av were proud to be working for Dair*, and look forward to working together on further events in the future.

LED for Creative Capital

Production:av are proud to have been involved with the University of Wales’ Creative Capital Event held at the East Winter Gardens in Canary Wharf London. The event brought together a diverse mix of people from across the UK and Europe to showcase the talent and creativity that the University has within it’s Newport campus. The centre peice of the event were three LED screens – one at the rear of the stage 2.5m high by 14m wide and then a screen on either side of stage at 2.5m by 5m.

Production:av were brought in by Tarren Production to manage and provide the interface between the various content providers and the display in the form of an ultra wide LED screen at the rear of the stage and a smaller screen on each side of the stage.

Content was provided from the University and external sources, as well as a Catalyst Media Server System supplied by Production:av for the three day event. The sources were fed into a Barco Screen Pro II system to enable the multiple layers and looks that the event required to be programmed quickly and recalled on the fly as the show evolved. Cameras were operated by students from the University, which were fed into the vision mixer, whilst feeds from the stage for Powerpoint and computer sources were also ingested and processed as required.

The Screen Pro II control system fed the screens with a DVI signal via a Fibre Optic to enable the control to be positioned at the front of house position. It also meant that a one to one pixel map was possible on the Hibino 6mm LED screens- several ‘Sandpit’ sessions required high resolution text which looked absolutely fantastic, whilst a series of fashion shows pushed the creative abilities of the system.

Production:av Ltd would like to thank Tarren Production and Pugh Associates for involving us in the event.

New Frontiers with Production:av

We have recently been at the Butlins resort on the south coast with New Frontiers International.  Production:av installed over 500 metres of SDI cabling to carry live video feeds from the main venue to a number of overflow venues.  We also provided video switching and on-stage monitoring within the main conference session.  With a brief to provide a high quality solution for delegates in the overflow venues, we installed Barco CLM 10,000 lumen projectors alongside D&B audio systems within the cinema venues to relay the conference sessions.

The Identity Youth venue also used 5000 lumen projection and video switching whilst the Jaks children’s venue had a number of large plasma screens with switching to show DVD or laptop sources.

Our thanks go to the management team at New Frontiers for getting us involved and we look forward to next year’s event – check out what our clients say about us in our testimonials section of the website.

Hewitt ‘The Gathering’ Conference 2008

Production:av had the pleasure of providing camera and switching equipment and personnel for Hewitt’s ‘The Gathering’ conference held in Barcelona in October 2008. Hewitt are one of the leading consultancies providing support to multinational business such as John Lewis, and pulling in speakers such as Matthew Barrett, former CEO of Barclays.

The show featured a pair of screens fed with images from cameras from a Portable Production Unit (PPU), computers and VT play-ins, mixed through the Screen PROII. Content from the keynotes was captured  for editing back in England. The talks were edited down to provide DVD’s of each session, as well as packages for internet distribution by the inhouse editing team at production:av using the cutting edge Final Cut Studio package, enabling custom DVD menus and high quality compressed packages.

Working for DB Systems in turn for Mayridge, Production:av worked alongside existing contractors to seamlessly integrate into the team, liaising with Logistics and making the job a pleasure.

Lambeth Conference 2008

The Church of England bring all the Bishops together once every 10 years for it’s conference. Production:av were proud to be the suppliers for the Visual systems in the two venues- The Big Top and the The Spouses Venue.

The Big Top

The big top was the main venue for the 3 week long conference. Production:av supplied three projection screens backed by Barco CLM projectors, controlled via the Projector Toolset software to enable remote management. The two side screens with 10,000 lumen CLM R10+ projectors were driven by a Barco Screen Pro II switcher using a DVI over fibre system, taking in a mixed broadcast camera feed provided by Production:av, along with graphics from Apple Hardware running Keynote and visiting speakers laptops. 

The central screen was fed from a second Screen Pro II via the Enhanced Output with an HD-SDI signal to the Barco CLM HD8 projector, giving stunning true HD imagery from the various feeds.

A team of 5 oversaw the events through out, ensuring that we wre able to respond to the clients wishes with a minimum of trouble.

The Spouses Venue.

The Spouses venue hosted a varied program of events aimed more at allowing the wives of the bishops to build community. Again Production:av supplied a full system based around the Barco Presentation ProII Digital and the CLM R10+. Powerpoint and songwords were mixed with the camera images from the operated camera system installed for the duration.

The event was a success for the Church of England, and Production:av, and Production:av are grateful to Affinity events and Reelife for choosing to use us. Thanks also to the guys that were on site and made it run so smoothly.

Pony Club AGM 2007

Production:av had the pleasure of supplying technical support to the 2007 Pony Club AGM held at ‘The Centaur’ at Cheltenham Racecourse.

Based around a flown screen with a 10,000 lumen projector providing the images. The show consisted of Powerpoint and embedded video clips operated by a competent Video Engineer and PowerPoint technician. A data switcher was employed to allow the change over from the ‘Show PC’ to ‘Back up PC’ if it was required, however there were no issues that required this facility, due to implementation of properly prepared show PC’s. Stage Monitors allowed for the Top Table to get a good view of the presented material.

This was a yet another show where the Production:av staff were recognised as ‘Professional and Businesslike’, and having played a key part in the ’smooth running’ of the days proceedings. Many thanks must go to Clare Boardman, Senior Administrative Secretary for the Pony Club, for her praise, but also for being a great client to work for.

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