The Digital Signage Expo starts next Wednesday, and a lot of eyes will be on LED– not on the strip in vegas but in the booths on the show floor. As the industry looks for a better way of getting millions of pixels of content to all the fabulous direct view LED going up and in everywhere, D3 has made a name for itself. In the field, and at trade shows. At last summer’s InfoComm, they made an impressive showing (see that story here). At the DSE next week, you can look for more from them– including some new developments I was just briefed on today that should cause a whole new crop of AV integrators and high level LED end users to take notice. Because even for a company that’s caused a stir the past year, their new offerings at DSE next week will surprise.
The background, and the story to date from D3 is: large-palette LED video solutions represent a huge and growing opportunity for integrators who can provide turnkey and/or custom solutions. But out in the field, we are now seeing so many different LED pixel pitch configurations in so many different sizes, shapes and resolutions, it can be a puzzle to figure out the best way to get content to all those screens. Many integrators end up cobbling together a patchwork of scalers, media servers and other content delivery tools that create synchronization issues and increase cost. Enter D3, that does not just ship LED modules but also provides installation, commissioning and in-the-field backup and service; offers turnkey options that avoid assembling LED screens, mounts, video processors, switchers and media servers from different vendors; and does not leave you on your own to “get the content to the pixels” but instead offers a complete and integrated media solution that can efficiently deliver native resolution content to 100 million pixels from a single device.
If all that is not enough, next week D3 will be showing something intriguing: an extension of that device, D3’s powerful AEP IMS– the Advanced Element Processor and Integrated Media System, i.e. their industrial strength scalable digital media control system that provides massive processing capacity with gigabit per second data delivery. D3 will be showing in their booth (1351) their new controller, a “universal remote” or “master control” that is, according to D3, “an extension of the AEP, in your hand.” I’ve seen the AEP in action, and that is an ambitious feat. D3 says that they will have a iPad interface at their booth that lets the user control content– content at the highest pixel count level you can imagine– with an ease of use we’ve never seen (again, think tens of millions of pixels of content, over different pixel pitch/resolution screens).
“We will be showing, at DSE,” said Jason Barak of D3, “one simple interface, a customizable iPad interface, that does what no controller in this arena has ever done: act as a ‘universal remote’ so to speak, to manipulate and direct complex content to screens, play with transparency layers, choose backgrounds and foregrounds, and different feeds including live feeds.”
And it’s not a demo tool, it’s a real control tool. And can also be programmed to not just control content on the screens (any screen BTW, not just LED) but to display monitoring info like heat of the screens etc.
There’s more– but I’m looking forward to seeing it all work in real time in their booth at the DSE show next week.
For more on D3 click here.
