Conference at Marriott, Forest of Arden

Premier supplied our client, SAIF, with AV production for their conference and AGM at Marriott, Forest of Arden

We were approached by our client to providing AV support for an upcoming multi-purpose event, taking place at Marriott’s Forest of Arden Resort.

The event would run for three days, and feature AGMs, meetings and evening functions. To complicate the brief further, we were to support three companies – SAIF Charter, SAIF and Golden Charter, all with separate content and AV requirements.

We provided pre-production services to liaise with the client regarding content – this included suggestions on design, proof reading, troubleshooting, creation and music editing. We also had the facility on site to make last-minute changes as necessary.

After discussions with our client, we agreed on a white drape set, housing twin 8x6ft rear projection screens. The stage would be 8m in width, and carpeted in white to match the client’s white lecterns. Our lighting install was discreet, but with a high output. We opted for 3m high truss towers, housing intelligent moving lights, conventional profiles and LED washes to ‘tone’ the truss. The entire perimeter of the room was uplit using high power 1m LED bars, and the whole system was controlled from ‘front of house’ with an Avolites desk and dedicated lighting engineer.

We supplied LCD comfort monitors for use on the lecterns, to provide presenters with a clear view of their notes without having to carry a paper copy with them. The rear projection setup meant that clear images, were projected without obstruction by presenters, and a pair of 50” plasma displays ensured that guests and delegates seated out of clear sight of the main screens still had a clear view.

A low-key, self-powered PA system was installed around the room to provide even, detailed coverage to all seats. Control was courtesy of a Yamaha LS9 digital sound desk, giving the engineers the flexibility to ‘ring out’ the microphones from anywhere in the room. Both lapel and handheld wireless microphones were specified, and the use of these changed between presenters and event. These were from the Sennheiser G3 system, a highly impressive option giving flawless coverage and outstanding audio quality. Lectern microphones were also provided, along with a wireless ‘clicker’ for control over slide advances.

All video sources were fully redundant, run through a seamless switching system so that in the event of a failure, changeover to the backup source would go un-noticed. We kept our ‘front of house’ position to a minimum – taking up only 12x5ft at the back of the room, and hidden from view by 4ft high discreet black surrounds.

Here is what our clients had to say:

“It was a pleasure to have you with us, everything from SAIF’s point was absolutely brilliant!” – Arran Brudenell (SAIF)

“Many thanks for all your hard work over the weekend, by the many compliments all was received very well, thank you and well done.” – Linda Jones (SAIF)

“Just wanted to say thanks so much for all your help over the weekend. It is a busy one so your support was much appreciated.” – Valerie Smith (Golden Charter)