Designed by APA Kury?owicz & Associates, it is also believed to boast one of the biggest and most advanced technical implementations in Poland, with signal distribution and routing over Optocore.
The Optocore system, which provides 768 inputs, was approved by the consultants, Artec and supplied by the German manufacturer's dealer, M. Ostrowski. Installation and commissioning were handled by ESS Audio, who oversaw the audio, video and intercom. The company formed part of a two-way consortium with PS Teatr, who were responsible for the mechanical staging and lighting - with both parties contracted by general contractor for the venue, Inter-System.
ESS were working with Optocore for the first time, and their project manager Adam Pieron, admits, "I was positively surprised as installation and configuration went extremely smoothly." In designing the routing system he consulted Optocore's applications engineering manager, Maciek Janiszewski.
Optocore has provided the mic preamp front end in the form of eight multiple X6R-FX interfaces (all DualMic) and 22 X6R-TP DualMic devices, connected to the X6R-FX via their SANE protocol. Two sets of four X6R-FX and 11 X6R-TP DualMmic modules are in use in the main hall and five DD2FR-FX MADI interfaces handle the FOH, Monitor mixer, OB vans, ProTools HDX recording and MADI-Analogue-AES converter.
Four separate gain controls are provided to 120 mic inputs - and up to four mixing desks, including the Soundcraft Vi6 and Vi1 delivered with the system, could control gain individually.
In addition, two further DD2FR-FX Optocore devices distribute MADI between the different auditoriums. "Two DD2FR-FX are used to connect all the halls (Red, Black and Chamber) on a single Optocore MADI network," says Pieron. Soundcraft Vi consoles, with additional MADI cards for Optocore, reside in both In Red and Black halls while in Chamber Hall a Soundcraft Performer 2 is also fitted with an additional MADI card. "So with all halls connected to Optocore, you can for instance record a concert in the Red Hall, or transmit a concert from main hall to all recital halls.
"The DD2FR-FX enables very flexible control of the Optocore preamps from the portable Soundcraft consoles - the operator just needs to connect to one DD2FR-FX and adjust Emulation Mode mapping - which can be done with a single macro button."
Pieron confirms that the Artec spec contained several key requirements - notably the four independent analogue gains for each channel - and this is why the Optocore devices, with their DualMic pre modules, proved to be the best choice. "There were more expensive options we could have considered but Optocore is very flexible and capable of handling complicated MADI routing - and DD2FR-FX modules are compatible with both Soundcraft and Studer mixers. It met all the requirements and was the easiest system to implement; it all went in very smoothly."
As for sound reinforcement, while one Optocore DD32R-FX interface feeds the Meyer Sound Galileo and Galileo Calisto processors, the second feeds the large ClearCom intercoms system and BSS Soundweb BLU network, which controls Crown amps and 70 JBL speaker zones.
(Jim Evans)
