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WFX is Informa's Worship Facilities Expo. Our tech reporter explored the expo and reports on new AV products to note.
I spent the day on Wednesday, Nov. 14, 2018, in Orlando at the WFX conference, with most of my time spent on the expo show floor. I compared what I saw with the products and happenings of previous conferences before the show was bought by Penton/Informa.
wfxevents.com
A number of the normal companies exhibited there, but there were some that were new to the WFX expo, or new to me, and they were promoting some interesting products. Here are just a few that caught my attention.
1-Avante
A loudspeaker company that I had never heard of before was present: Avante Audio. Sporting both point-source cabinets, subwoofers, and line array/column cabinets, they have a product line that would handle almost any house of worship situation. Their line array cabinets can be configured as both a splayed line array or a column configuration and can be flown or attached above a floor positioned subwoofer cabinet. The cabinets were surprisingly small.
The point source cabinets are available in multiple sizes and could either be flown or mounted above a sub as well. All models are available in both black and white finishes. They demoed all the different configurations for me and I was impressed with the sound, and even more impressed with the pricing.
Avante is a member of the ADJ group of companies (along side companies like Elation Lighting), and has the goal of creating quality audio loudspeaker and monitor products and a reasonable price. All their products are self-powered.
2-Brompton Technology
Brompton’s specialty is creating video processing systems for driving LED video walls. They are the default processing system for Thor LED video walls (also exhibiting at WFX), but also work with other name brands such as Aeson, Absen, and others. Rob Fowler of Brompton explained that their feature set systems go beyond the typical processing functionality that comes with most LED video walls and adds extra features such as advanced color correction and replacement, redundancy in processing and in video signal routing, and providing signal path redundancy by feeding the video signals from both ends of the cabling runs between the panels. Should one inter-panel cable go bad, no panels will go out as the panels downstream of the fault will pick up the redundant signal from the opposite end of the cabling run. While LED video wall signal processing isn’t something that would normally be dealt with at the church staff level, if your venue might benefit from more advanced video signal handling it could be worth asking your integrator about them.
3-Audio Fusion
A new entry into the personal monitoring system space is Audio Fusion. Having just released their first product in Fall of 2018, they are clearly targeting the house of worship market with a very cost-effective personal monitoring solution. At least one of their designers participates in the worship band at his church, and so the company understands both the needs and the budget of your typical church.
Their system has two basic pieces to it. The first is a computer-based application that acts as the primary control system for selecting and transmitting audio channels to the personal monitoring system. The second is your band member’s smart phone running their app. The computer lets you select audio sources from the computer (A Dante Virtual Sound Card, or hardware audio interface, are two examples) to be used for audio input to their system. Up to 16 channels can be configured. The software lets you set master audio levels being fed from each channel into their monitor system.
This software then transmits the 16 channels of audio to apps on smartphones over Wi-Fi. Each musician uses their phone to create their mix, and the audio jack on the phone to connect headphones.
I played with it briefly at their booth and was impressed. One concern would be the battery life on each musician’s phone—if a musician doesn’t come with a fully charged phone they could run into problems. And if you run several services, they need to be prepared to recharge their phones between services. Or, simply leave them plugged into a charger while using them for their monitor mix.
Latency seems low, and they said they are constantly working to improve the software. The nice thing about it is you can download the software from their website and try it before you buy—it’ll just cut the audio out once every ~15 minutes or so until you purchase it. I love products that let you try it risk free before you commit. And I appreciate it when a company truly understand the house of worship market’s needs because they are personally involved in a church.
4-Triad-Orbit
JAMES RHODES
And the last company I’m going to mention is Triad-Orbit. This company makes super high quality modular mic stands for stage and studio use. The stands have a very heavy base, making them extremely stable and secure. Mic clips attach to small adapters which then plug into mic stands and boom arms; attaching a mic to a stand takes a fraction of a second. The system also has a variety of boom arms and adapters that lets you, for example, set up an “in” and “out” mic on a kick drum using one compact mic stand. And the low center of gravity means that should someone back into a mic stand, it’s not likely to fall over and smash into an instrument. The flexibility is very impressive. It does, as you might expect, come with an impressive price tag as well, so not every church would have the resources to invest in a stand system like this.
