Blog - Synapse Audio Visual Designs
27
Jul
Multiples
There are dirty spoons everywhere…which is to say that the four spoons I own that are specifically for baking are all laying in a heap in my sink asking me to wash them. I don’t bake often, but the holidays are the only time of year I get to recall what it was like growing up in my parent’s bakery just outside Princeton, NJ. Whereas I’m baking two pies, around this time of year my mother and father would be churning out baking sheets for days, often scaling recipes to ten and twelve times their usual ingredient amount.
This had me thinking about scaling some of our standard fair of technical solutions. Nearly every household in America has figured out how to connect one cable box to one TV, but what happens when you have ten cable boxes and fifty TVs? Or when you’re not just amplifying one pair of speakers, but a stadium’s worth of speakers broken into over sixty zones of control. The logic that dictates scaling a recipe no longer applies; you can’t just multiply.
You have to start thinking outside the box to be sure your infrastructure can handle the size of what you’re building. We see it all the time; a client’s technical provider takes the method that worked so well for a room’s worth of technology and tries to scale it to a building’s worth, and often reliability and ease of use go out the window. Before you end up with a sink full of spoons, be sure you are baking with the right recipe.
14
May
AV Craftsmanship
After building some cabinets this weekend (and subsequently getting dust on a nearby rack I had staged), I started thinking about why the word “craftsmanship” seams to conjure up images of my grandfather in overalls sanding a wooden railing, or a mason methodically laying bricks. When I started my career in technology I fancied myself a craftsman, honing the skills necessary to bring systems to life though the use of arcane skills that had been taught to me by other technicians, books, and good old on the job experience. Why shouldn’t AV installation be a craft? The way a technician persuades eight tiny conductors into a CAT5 connector, being sure to crimp the jacket in place. The way you can tell a connector is just tight enough, the way a system programmer lays out his program file so it reads like a novel of digital signal flow.
This job is incredibly difficult and requires years to master. I have no problem calling my team craftsmen. They work hard and we all learn from each other, working to make the systems we build just a little better every time. You know when you’re looking at a system that has the this-guy-knew-what-he-was-doing feel to it. The way the wires all cascade cleanly into place or the attention to detail it took to be sure not a millimeter of copper is poking out of a connector. It’s those things that we strive for, and if your AV company isn’t, then maybe they’re just a bunch of techs, but here we’re craftsmen…minus the overalls.
31
Jul
Design vs. Layout
When I think of layout, images of Excel spread sheets and line diagrams come to mind, which by themselves aren’t baseless tools in the aid of a design, but they do not in themselves constitute a design. A design is the process of (for lack of a better phrase) thinking outside of the box, and taking into account the little burrs and imperfections that mar the edges of the perfect 8.5X11 that contain your layout. When I sit down to contemplate what techniques and systems I will employ to solve a problem, it is never the layout that is of concern, but the design that births the map I follow on my way to an end product.
Too often firms that represent themselves as design entities are little more than armies of technicians fitting the products they sell into holes in a predetermined layout. When taking on a design challenge here at Synapse, I and every member of our team start with the client and their set of criteria to be addressed, first thinking of how our solutions will be integrated into the lives of our end-user and only then considering the viability of each and every technical aspect we intend to integrate.
Lately, technology has been getting a bad rap because it “doesn’t work” or is too clumsy. But the real problem is that the people behind that technology only laid it out and didn’t design it, missing out on an opportunity to craft it into a perfect blending of circuit boards and the human experience. At Synapse we design, and we hope it shows in every solution we bring to our clientele. The next time you are in the market for a technology solution, ask yourself; what are you getting for your money, design or layout?
27
Jan
LEDs – Always The Right Tool For The Job?
- By Kym Formisano
- No Comments
It’s nearly impossible to go anywhere these days without running into LED lighting. From wedding dance floors to the Empire State Building, those efficient and dynamic little diodes have become a part of our everyday lives. But are LEDs always the best choice?
Turns out, the answer is no. You may wonder why we would hold that opinion here at Synapse, especially considering our affinity for integrating LED technology into so many of our designs. Allow me to explain. We take no small amount of pride in our desire to connect each of our clients with the best lighting solutions for their particular project, and sometimes there is no denying that a more effective or creative answer can be found through other means.
For example, say that you’ve just refurbished your company’s main lobby. You’ve created a new logo and want to wash the walls in your firm’s new company colors. Although it may be tempting to choose LEDs as your light source, due to what you’ve heard about their energy efficient properties and long life, they could end up costing you nearly twice as much in programming and installation costs to create just that one color you are looking for. LED systems often require their own control infrastructure and need to be programmed to output the desired effect. Because of these added expenses and your desire for just one static color, you may be better served with, for example, a white fluorescent light filtered through a theatrical gel or a colored neon solution.
On the other hand, there are times when LEDs are simply the best, and often the only, choice for the job. If you will be changing your colors on a regular basis, integrating pixel mapped video elements, or if you require dynamic theatrical effects, there is no better solution. Also, if you are affixing lights to a hard-to-reach or delicate area, the long life of the LED can save thousands in maintenance and replacement costs.
Whichever lighting method you prefer for your new system, be sure to keep these ideas in mind when working with your designer to ensure that your final product is as effective, user-friendly and visually stunning as possible.
03
Mar
Synapse and NXT Health
When Synapse was in its infancy, we created the business around making a difference in people’s lives through the seamless integration of technology. Earlier this week we were honored to be welcomed into the NXT Health family to work on their groundbreaking new design titled Patient Room 2020.
NXT is a nonprofit whose vision is to create actionable change in healthcare through collaborative efforts that address work flow concepts, architecture and design, advanced technological platforms, and enhanced patient/physician communications. NXT’s vigorous efforts in this field of research have led to the securing of grants totaling over 4 million dollars to advance their cause, including this most recent project.
PR2020 takes an in-depth look at how the layout and design of our current medical facilities can be improved by eliminating waste, clutter, and technological overhead, leading to a more streamlined and efficient method for providing care.
Enter Synapse. Through our long acquaintance with Traxon Technologies and E:Cue Lighting Control, we were introduced to the amazingly talented team at NXT and their diverse collaborators, all donating our time and resources to this amazing cause. We were originally brought in to program the E:Cue LED control system for Rachel Calemmo’s inspired lighting design, but after some short discussions we realized we had more to offer. Synapse has agreed to donate time, resources and products to realize architect David Ruthven’s vision for a streamlined master control system that could offer a plethora of information and control in one easy to navigate intuitive user interface.
We feel truly privileged to be counted among the incredibly talented team that has been tasked with bringing this vision to life and we will be sure to keep you posted on this project as it takes shape in the months to come.
21
Dec
Welcome
Thank you for visiting the Synapse Audio Visual blog. On occasion, we have time to share our opinions on technology and lifestyle topics relevant to our industry. Reading through the following we hope you will get to know more about our firm and the ideas that shape our design process. If you would like to speak further on a topic herein, please contact us anytime and we would be happy to start a dialogue.
Very Sincerely Yours,
Stephen Cannella
Managing Partner
Chief Design Consultant