Video conferencing is crucial in business for several reasons. The practice enables cost-effective, face-to-face interaction without travel, improving communication and reducing misunderstandings compared to emails or phone calls alone. With teams often spread across different locations, video conferencing enables real-time global collaboration, making it easier to work together on projects regardless of geographic barriers.
To enable more advanced video conferencing, commercial audiovisual (AV) equipment has dramatically improved in resolution, quality, integration, and connectivity. However, there is still a desire in offices and boardrooms to hide the AV equipment until it is needed. This often requires utilizing sophisticated mechanized mounts as well as pan-tilt-zoom (PTZ) capable cameras that can quickly adapt to the specific business videoconferencing environment.
Concealing the equipment not only increases the aesthetic appeal and maintains a clean, professional image but also reduces clutter and distraction. The arrangement can also free up space, improve acoustics, and protect the equipment from damage and dust, according to Art Walker, CEO of Auton Motorized Systems, a leading designer and manufacturer of custom audio-visual concealment systems since 1978.
Walker points out how custom lifts and mounts can keep advanced cameras and audiovisual equipment concealed until use while optimizing aesthetics and functionality:
• AV equipment can be hidden in the ceiling, under the floor, behind a panel, painting, acoustic tiles, or inside a cabinet or conference table. Business professionals often prefer not to see the equipment until it’s used and appreciate the high-end ‘wow factor’ when it’s revealed.
• For business offices, meeting rooms, and conferences, concealable commercial lifts and AV mounts have also been developed in a plethora of configurations to accommodate even 100” TVs and multiple monitors for the widest possible range of settings.
• In the case of Auton, the OEM’s lift mechanisms can lower a PTZ camera out of the ceiling up to 12 feet. These motorized lift mechanisms can conceal a PTZ camera in a wall, conference table, cabinet or credenza.
• Regardless of how the PTZ cameras are concealed, the units need to be precisely positioned for optimal use. “Ideally, the PTZ cameras should be positioned about 48 inches off of the floor since that is approximately eye level for people sitting at a conference table.
• Auton also offers customized mounts that can accommodate the wide range of sizes and capabilities required. The OEM can even conceal increasingly popular 100” video conference TV/monitors in a variety of ways. For example, under-floor lifts can raise the TV into position. The TV can also emerge from a wall at the push of a button. Alternatively, a sliding panel or painting can open to reveal the TV when it needs to be used but conceal it at other times.
• For a state-of-the-art viewing experience from any angle, two back-to-back TVs can be mounted to swivel 360 degrees with a dual screen, lift-swivel mount as well.
• When high-definition projectors are used instead of TVs (for conference presentations or company screening events), motorized mechanisms can be implemented with extremely compact lifts that operate at the touch of a button.
For more information, call 1-661-257-9282; email [email protected]; or visit auton.com.