Several Alford Media employees attended this year’s InfoComm and saw the latest technology hitting the AV industry. Below are the main trends we noticed throughout the event.
Laser Projectors
Laser Projectors continued to gain momentum this year at InfoComm with almost every projection vendor rolling out a laser option. Replacing lamps with lasers provides many benefits to projection, including lower power usage and an enhanced color spectrum for better saturation and color matching. Laser projectors maintain their brightness over thousands of hours which guarantees a longer lifespan, continued vivid images and no flicker. There is a reduction in heat and noise in comparison to lamp projectors for a faster startup time, extended runtime, and overall better reliability.
Immersive Technology – VR and AR
VR and AR, as we’ve discussed before, continue to gain traction in the events space, driven by improving technology and an array of new devices. Not only do these technologies have the cool factor of immersing attendees in a new environment, the potential for training and simulation brings a whole new element to education practices. Add to that the option of exhibiting new products with a VR experience, allowing potential clients to interact with the design and see the real-life scale.
Interactive Collaboration
Collaboration was a huge theme, with vendors across the Expo Hall showcasing their visions of our working future. There were cloud-based and on-premises software options, as well as custom hardware options, offering various feature packages including video conferencing, content sharing and collaboration spaces. Emerging are more vivid and optimized touch-screen displays, remote control and content sharing from your phone, tablet, and laptop, and continued cloud-based options. There is still no standard in the technology of interactive collaboration as each vendor had their own approach and are working fast to tackle the market, but what we saw at InfoComm shows interactivity and collab spaces are trending upwards in work and meeting environments.
AV-over-IP
AV-over-IP was a frequent topic at this year’s InfoComm. We saw several vendors showcasing demo hardware to transport uncompressed video and audio over IP networks. While the technology is still being developed to handle lag time and bandwidth limitations in a streaming environment, it shows the trend is moving towards uncompressed data for higher quality output on the virtual end.
Several Alford Media employees attended this year’s InfoComm and saw the latest technology hitting the AV industry. Below are the main trends we noticed throughout the event.
Laser Projectors
Laser Projectors continued to gain momentum this year at InfoComm with almost every projection vendor rolling out a laser option. Replacing lamps with lasers provides many benefits to projection, including lower power usage and an enhanced color spectrum for better saturation and color matching. Laser projectors maintain their brightness over thousands of hours which guarantees a longer lifespan, continued vivid images and no flicker. There is a reduction in heat and noise in comparison to lamp projectors for a faster startup time, extended runtime, and overall better reliability.
Immersive Technology – VR and AR
VR and AR, as we’ve discussed before, continue to gain traction in the events space, driven by improving technology and an array of new devices. Not only do these technologies have the cool factor of immersing attendees in a new environment, the potential for training and simulation brings a whole new element to education practices. Add to that the option of exhibiting new products with a VR experience, allowing potential clients to interact with the design and see the real-life scale.
Interactive Collaboration
Collaboration was a huge theme, with vendors across the Expo Hall showcasing their visions of our working future. There were cloud-based and on-premises software options, as well as custom hardware options, offering various feature packages including video conferencing, content sharing and collaboration spaces. Emerging are more vivid and optimized touch-screen displays, remote control and content sharing from your phone, tablet, and laptop, and continued cloud-based options. There is still no standard in the technology of interactive collaboration as each vendor had their own approach and are working fast to tackle the market, but what we saw at InfoComm shows interactivity and collab spaces are trending upwards in work and meeting environments.
AV-over-IP
AV-over-IP was a frequent topic at this year’s InfoComm. We saw several vendors showcasing demo hardware to transport uncompressed video and audio over IP networks. While the technology is still being developed to handle lag time and bandwidth limitations in a streaming environment, it shows the trend is moving towards uncompressed data for higher quality output on the virtual end.