Digital Signage Magazine is proud to unveil the winners of its 2020 DIGI Awards.
In a year marked by industry highs, including predictions that our sector will show year-on-year growth for the foreseeable future, it was heartening to receive so many entries that reflect a thriving category driven by innovation and an eye toward setting the bar higher for digital signage integration across several markets. Discussion among our committee of experts in choosing winners was thoughtful and reflective, with a focus on rewarding boundary-pushing and category-defining products and applications.
[The 2020 Digital Signage Best Practices Guide]
"This year's winners reflect a breathtaking array of projects and products that are transforming the digital signage landscape," said Camille Burch, editor, Digital Signage Magazine. "As the digital signage sector continues to grow and evolve, we are excited to honor these cutting edge contributions. With so many worthy contributions, the judging panel had their work cut out for them. But I think you'll agree these winners are truly outstanding."
Chosen by a panel of highly regarded digital signage-focused integrators, consultants, and end users, here are the 2020 DIGI Award winners.
Best Digital Signage Application: Corporate
Nanolumens/Cenero/Second Story—Bank of America Tower Lobby
The Legacy Union development in Uptown Charlotte is on a mission to assert its primacy as the Queen City’s most impressive high rise development. After breaking ground in 2017, the signature building of the development, Bank of America Tower, sought a way to draw the community together into what they hoped would be an inspiring new hub of Uptown activity. The lobby of the tower is framed by tall two-story floor-to-ceiling windows that look out across a lively plaza toward Tryon Street, Charlotte’s main thoroughfare. Legacy Union knew they needed a modern digital visual feature so compelling it couldn’t be ignored.
Read more about the Legacy Union install here.
Best Digital Signage Application: Digital Signage as Art
Sensory Interactive—San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
This 107-foot by 16-foot digital display at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art presents a digital mural created by internationally recognized artist JR. To create the mural, The Chronicles of San Francisco, JR set up a mobile studio in 22 locations around San Francisco, where he filmed, photographed, and interviewed more than 1,200 people from across the city’s multifaceted communities. The completed work scrolls across the enormous LED display, bringing together the faces and untold stories of everyday people.
Read more about the SFMOMA install here.
Best Digital Signage Application: Entertainment
LG Business Solutions—TopGolf
With a growing number of venues, Topgolf wanted to identify digital signage and software solutions that would be durable, reliable, and allow simultaneous control of content delivery and display management in an innovative fashion. The displays would need to accurately and clearly present rich colors and vivid details, while splitting the screen into three sections to accommodate varying content needs. More importantly, the displays would need to seamlessly connect to one another for quick, easy use from a central location. Upgrading from consumer TVs to industry-leading commercial displays and software would solve the end-of-life problem and improve the longevity of the units themselves.
Read more about the Top Golf install.
Best Digital Signage Application: Retail
NEC Display—Living Retail Lab
The 15-week, real-world test demonstrated how imagery and movement on digital menu boards had an influence on customer behavior and bar sales. Using NEC's Analytics Learning Platform (ALP Pro), which includes anonymous detection cameras, they tested three different types of content, and by delivering different promotional content based on gender triggers, the ecosystem of Living Retail Lab partners were able to see what types of content increased throughput (by lowering dwell times), which ones increased sales (overall, and sales of certain products), and which types increased check average.
Best Digital Signage Application: Hospitality
Design Communications Ltd./Real Motion—The Seminal Hard Rock Hotel & Casino
The facade of the hotel is both a media system and a dynamic sculpture. Lined with LED video fixtures, the building facade will serve as a screen and stage to daily musical showcases. The clients wanted to create a moment for Hard Rock guests and fans to come together and watch a daily celebration.
Read more about the Hard Rock install.
Best Digital Signage Application: Large Venue
Samsung Electronics—Chase Center
The Chase Center’s Samsung LED centerhung main videoboard adds up to a massive 9,699 square feet of active video display, making it the largest LED video display centerhung installed in a sports arena, according to Samsung. The board integrates 15 displays varying from 6.7mm pixel pitch on the main displays and upper halo ring, to 4mm pixel pitch on the underbelly displays, amassing a total of more than 26.3 million individual LEDs.
Best Digital Signage Product: 4K Routing Device
Datapath Hx4
The Datapath Hx4 is a stand-alone display wall controller and an ideal processor for digital signage with the capacity to run a single 4K HDMI source across four HD outputs in ultra-high definition. When used with the company’s Wall Designer application software, the Hx4 can represent any arrangement or configuration of the source image desired. A popular choice for advertising boards, corporate signage, and live event visuals, this cost-effective control system is both easy to use and simple to set up. A single HDMI1.4 input provides four HDMI1.3 outputs, allowing infinite creative possibilities and the ability to rotate crop, upscale, and mirror content.
Best Digital Signage Product: Display Device, Large Screen
ViewSonic CDE9800
The ViewSonic CDE9800 is a 98-inch 4K Ultra HD commercial display designed and built for high-impact, messaging. Developed to deliver stunning visuals on a single, colossal screen, the immersive CDE9800 captures attention in hotels, restaurants, retail, business, and more. With intelligent Ultra HD upscaling, the CDE9800 offers edge restoration and noise reduction to deliver 4K picture quality, even for content with lower resolutions. It comes with integrated content sharing and casting software for wireless presentations and content sharing from just about any device.
Best Digital Signage Product: Display Device, LED
NEC Display A Series dvLED
The NEC A Series dvLED poster is designed to provide attention-grabbing, high contrast images at nearly any viewing distance. The 1.9mm pixel pitch model delivers vibrant and colorful content visualization and is ideal for viewing from four to 10 feet away. The iPoster is a turnkey solution that is designed for fast and easy setup, with its built-in media player, lightweight and maneuverable footprint (70lbs/35mm depth), and its front-serviceable design.
Best Digital Signage Product: Display Device, OLED
LG Transparent OLED
The LG Transparent OLED digital signage display transforms commercial spaces with a unique ultra-thin, see-through display, delivering an immersive customer experience. The LG Transparent OLED illuminates spaces that once were hidden away behind traditional displays, unleashing a new level of creativity for displaying content that harmonizes with its surroundings. LG’s OLED technology, featuring self-lighting pixels, maintains accurate and vivid colors even when the digital display becomes transparent. LG Transparent OLED brings content to life by blending digital content with real objects when positioned together. The solution seamlessly and naturally blends into its surroundings thanks to its high transparency.
Best Digital Signage Product: Innovation
Matrox QuadHead2Go
Matrox QuadHead2Go multi-monitor controller appliances and cards simplify digital-signage-based video wall installations by supporting any source, any size, and any configuration. Its controllers capture a single video signal—of up to 4Kp60 and 8Kx8K—for display across up to four screens, at resolutions up to 1920x1200 per output. The input content could be from any source—including digital signage players, professional graphics cards and integrated GPUs, laptops, and more. QuadHead2Go guarantees out-of-the-box plug and play when using the default 2x2 landscape configuration, without having to install software or connect to a video source.
Best Digital Signage Product: Kiosk
Peerless-AV Ultra-Stretch Portrait Kiosk
Peerless-AV’s versatile Ultra Stretch Portrait Kiosk—designed exclusively for LG Ultra Stretch Digital Signage (86BH5C and 88BH7D)—allows users to optimize their dynamic, digital content. Available in one-, two-, three-, or four-sided models, the kiosk accentuates the sleek look of the Ultra Stretch display with its slim profile and curved design. It is designed for a wide array of applications, including transportation terminals, retail stores, banks, museums, and more.
Best Digital Signage Product: Mounting Device
Premier Mounts PFC-OMND
The PFC-OMND is a new mount built for the dual sided Samsung OMN-D display; it is designed for retail storefronts as can be installed from the ceiling, directly onto the floor, or on a free-standing base.
Best Digital Signage Product: Projection
Epson PowerLite L615U
The compact, affordable PowerLite L615U laser projector delivers powerful performance and convenient installation to meet a range of digital signage needs where high ambient lighting is apparent and impactful imagery is required. The PowerLite L615U offers versatile connectivity and control with integrated wireless networking with enterprise-level security, plus 360-degree flexibility and geometric correction tools. Projecting dynamic content onto virtually any surface, the PowerLite L615U is designed to immerse consumers into engaging experiences through digital signage.
Best Digital Signage Product: Signal Management
Hall Research Versa 4K
The VERSA-4K can extend and switch multiple HDMI video and USB data to virtually an unlimited number of receivers on a simple Gigabit network. Bidirectional IR, RS-232, and auxiliary stereo audio can also be extended. Advanced features for video include, low latency video and audio, CEC and Serial over IP for control, video wall processor to expand and split 4K video on to multiple screens, video rotation and flipping (horizontal and vertical). In addition it has USB Device class filtering for excluding specific USB device types such as USB flash drives, automatic KVM switching, Telnet and WebGUI control, Dynamic Virtual Matrix (DVM) operation, PoE (power over Ethernet) support, and more.
