Presented by deputy general manager Karl Christmas and installation manager Scott Fraser, the first of these seminars took place at London's Central School of Speech and Drama in late November.
"As a company, we have extremely broad knowledge of audio networking technology," says Christmas. "The half-day course is intended to be a thought-provoking introduction to the subject, covering a range of digital protocols and examining which is best for any given situation."
Although using Yamaha equipment for demonstration purposes, the course is designed to be as 'non-partisan' as possible, focusing on the technology rather than recommending any particular product over any other.
"The theme of the seminar is 'from air to air'," continues Christmas. "In other words, examining signal flow from microphone to speaker via the most commonly used digital audio protocols - primarily CobraNet, EtherSound, optical and MADI. Things such as digital radio microphone technology, stage box solutions, digital mixing, audio networking, matrixing and monitoring are covered, including Aviom personal mixing systems."
As well as examining the expected areas like audio quality and the wide range of digital mixing options, the course looks at less obvious issues. For example the reasons for choosing Cat 5, copper or fibre optic for cabling, the pros and cons of using radio mics with different stage box solutions, the potential cost savings between different digital systems and so on.
"This is something that is currently right at the forefront of the live and installed sound industry," says Christmas. "Audience expectations are rising fast and, with the technology available to large productions now filtering cost-effectively down to the smaller-scale market, this technology is being used more and more.
"20 years ago someone could go and learn the basics of analogue audio, then go into any situation and apply that knowledge. Nowadays that's not the case, because there are different systems which are much more suited to different situations."
(Jim Evans)
