AV30-QUT - Pro AV Solutions

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FEATURE
RESHAPING EDUCATION
Queensland University of Technology squares off with a unique
feat of audiovisual engineering.
Text:/ Derek Powell
As I walked up to the two story high screen, a life-sized whale
appeared to eye me curiously. With a lazy flip of his enormous fluke,
he disappeared into the distance, leaving the sonorous notes of his
mysterious song resonating throughout the atrium.
The Cube hits you right in the face when you first walk into the
brand new Science and Engineering Centre at Queensland University
of Technology. It’s meant to, of course. But what exactly is it? I asked
Gavin Winter, QUT’s Cube project manager.
“The best explanation is that it is a multi-node interactive display
wall…” he began enthusiastically, sounding like a typical Windows
error message – totally accurate but also completely incomprehensible.
Sensing my confusion, he switched down a gear or two: “…but
perhaps the best way of thinking about it is as a giant, $3.5 million
multiplayer video game that’s capable of absorbing busloads of school
students at a time and switching them on to science and engineering”.
“So how did it evolve?” I asked, feeling just a little more enlightened.
“Ah – that’s a long story,” he mused. It is long, but the story also
puts audiovisual technology front and centre in the role of community
engagement, and that makes it worth the telling.
First, let’s get some facts and figures out of the way. The Cube is
actually six separate display zones totaling 145 megapixels, the largest
of which is a spectacular 14 metres long by nine metres high. Several
of these zones are split between edge blended projected images on top,
and dozens of interactive multi-touch monitors lower down which
allow visitors to interact with and control the single giant image that
spreads seamlessly across the monitors and projectors. The images are
real-time animations, created by a metric tonne of custom-built servers
housed two floors above. Despite The Cube consuming a staggering
45kW of power when operating, the whole building is eco-friendly,
powered by rooftop solar cells and recovered heat using state of the
art “trigeneration” power systems.
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FEATURE
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COMPUTING SYSTEMS
There are 30 Silicon Graphics workstations serving content to the Cube walls.
Each serves video to two panels or projectors.
Features:
Dual quad-core Intel Xeon E5-2643 3.33GHz CPUs
32GB quad-channel DDR3, 1.6GHz RAM
160GB SSD (operating system)
1TB SATA HD (data)
EVGA 2690 NVIDIA GeForce GTX 690 dual-GPU graphics adapter
Creative X-Fi Xtreme PCIe sound adapter
JEWEL IN THE CROWN
The Cube sparkles in the foyer of the Science and
Engineering Centre, incongruously located metres
from one of Brisbane’s earliest historic buildings
– Old Government House, on the Garden’s Point
QUT campus. Ironically it was this location that
spawned the Cube in the first place.
A visit to Old Government House and
Parliament House is on the agenda for every
school student in Brisbane, so QUT saw the
opportunity to entice hundreds of weekly
visitors to extend their stay in the Science and
Engineering Centre – and to hopefully raise
the profile of science, technology, engineering
and maths that have suffered downturns in
enrolments across the country.
The Centre’s project director Anthony Perrau
explained that the vice chancellor’s vision for the
new structure was “to be a building that could
reach out and showcase science and technology
to the broader Brisbane and perhaps the world
community”. The question was how to create a
feature exciting enough to draw in the students and their teachers. Perrau knew the answer lay in
some form of high impact audiovisual so he called
in Professors Ian McKinnon (QUT Institute for
Future Environments) and Jeff Jones (Interaction
Design); together they sketched out a daring brief
for an interactive attraction that would fit the
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bill. Time was of the essence as the building was
already underway, so Jones set about organising
a team to convert the dream to reality.
Gavin Winter was one of the first recruits
and he recalled those early days: “We really
began with a picture on a napkin. The Cube
actually started out as a cylinder because the
void that we’re in today was simply a hole
through the building. We went through a lot of
concept forming exercises with sketch artists and
consultants to form basically the structure we’re
standing in front of today.”
TAKING SHAPE
That structure is now more like a boomerang in
shape with images on both sides of its elongated
vertical surfaces. The outside faces have four
separate projector and monitor display walls,
two on the ground level and two on the floor
above. The inside face, called “the wedge”,
spreads across two walls that push up two stories
high into the atrium. Four Panasonic PT DZ-21K
20,000 lumen projectors form a seamless edge
blended image that can be viewed from floor level
or from the second level balconies and walkways.
But along the bottom, the picture continues onto
an array of 20 interactive touchscreen monitors –
and this is where the magic really happens.
The 55inch touchscreens are made by
Multitouch from Finland and they really are
unlike anything seen before. “Their product
is unique in the world in that it is a ‘computer
vision through screen’ touch screen, which is
essentially cameras seeing through the panel not
only your hand, but yourself. So the touch panel
knows you are there,” Winter explained.
“The unique characteristic of this technology
is that it can be strung together in lengths.
Typically a touch panel will have very large edges
and you can’t do that.” Later he showed me a
panel undergoing maintenance and I could see
the arrangement of 32 infrared cameras that sit
behind the screen amongst the LED illumination
array, looking out through the LCD panel.
Each touchscreen, with its internal PC, becomes
a “game controller” that several people can
manipulate at once, all linked back to the servers.
There are currently five different programs, all
developed in-house by a team of programmers
and visual artists. Though the computer and
display systems are all integrated, different
programs can run at once using different faces of
The Cube. “The Virtual Reef” is a majestic, lifesize animation of a real part of the Great Barrier
Reef that allows viewers to manipulate and
interact with a scientifically accurate cross section
of passing underwater inhabitants. As students
explore, they learn about specific marine animal
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FEATURE
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behaviours and relationships. Other programs
include the “Physics Playroom”, filled with virtual
building blocks where people can come together
to construct (and destroy) each other’s creations in
engaging physics simulations. You can toss a block
into the air on one touch screen and see it come
down again to interact with what’s happening
several screens away. New projects will be rolled
out every six months or so to keep the content
fresh and QUT students will have the opportunity
to work on content creation.
To make it all work, QUT contracted
integrator
ProAV
Solutions
Queensland
(formerly AVI) for the supply and installation of
equipment and more than 8km of mostly cat6a
wiring. There are no less than four separate cat6
networks connecting the custom built SGI servers
to the displays. Video and multi-channel audio
comes via AMX DGXLINK cat6 transmitter/
receiver pairs; there is a separate network to
handle only the touch commands between panel
and server. A third network allows the servers to
communicate with each other to synchronise the
animation elements as they pass between screens
and a fourth network, the QUT LAN, provides
overall communication and control.
ProAV’s technology solutions specialist
Shannan Brooksby has lived and breathed the
project for two years. He explained that because
the whole Cube system has to remain as flexible
as possible, there are five AMX Enova routers
handling trunking and the interconnection
between the graphics outputs from the servers, and
the projectors and monitors. Extra transmitters
allow ad hoc sources from virtually anywhere in
the foyer to be routed to any part or all of the
display. For the edge blended projectors, the router
outputs feed TV One CORIOmaster videowall
processors which provide ultimate flexibility to
send any image to any combination of screens. An
AMX network provides behind the scenes control
over the complex routing schemes while RMS
software monitors and reports on the system and
provides asset management for all the hardware.
SOUNDS ALIVE
Audio has certainly not been forgotten. A 96 x
80 Biamp Tesira DSP system provides mixing and
processing with outputs transported and routed
via the AMX DGX down to the main displays.
To tame the difficult acoustics of the space, a
10-driver line array sits beneath each monitor
to provide clicks and localized audio feedback
as users move things on screen. Other speakers,
also specially created by Brisbane manufacturer
Acoustic Technologies, include multi-element
dipole enclosures to provide ambient sound and a
truly massive custom subwoofer that sits inside the
screen enclosure to help give life to the whale song.
So does it all work? Can a bunch of projectors
and monitors actually get people in and inspire
them? If the visitors I saw are anything to judge,
then the answer is a resounding yes. The most
common comment heard from visitors was
simply, “Wow!”
Winter is well pleased with the response
from his visitors. “Kids know exactly what
to do when they get here,” he noted. “It’s just
that gravitational pull that the walls have, and
straight away they go – ‘well I understand what
this is; now how can I play with it?’”
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FEATURE
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EQUIPMENT LIST
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MORE INFORMATION
QUT – The Cube: www.thecube.qut.edu.au
ProAV Solutions Queensland: (07) 3367 3300 or www.proavsolutions.com.au
MultiTouch www.multitaction.com
Panasonic Projection: panasonic.net/avc/projector/products
BiAmp: www.biamp.com
Acoustic Technologies: www.atprofessional.com.au
AMX MATRIX SWITCHERS
4 x EnovaDGX 32x32 enclosure
1 x EnovaDGX 16x16
29 x EnovaDGX 4 DVI input card with HDCP
4 x EnovaDGX 4 DXLINK input with HDCP
6 x EnovaDGX 16 stereo audio insert/extract
16 x EnovaDGX 4 DXLINK output with SmartScale
15 x EnovaDGX 4 DVI output with SmartScale
15 x DXLINK multi-format UTP wall plate transmitter
1 x DXLINK multi-format UTP transmitter
62 x DXLINK HDMI UTP receiver with SmartScale
AMX CONTROL
1 x TPI-PRO4-DVI total presentation interface - 4 multi-format DVI inputs
1 x ELO 19” 16:10 touch screen
1 x iPad2
1 x Crestron Prodigy in-wall dock for iPad 2
PROJECTION
4 x Panasonic PT-DZ21KE 3-chip DLP WUXGA; 20k ANSI lumens
8 x Panasonic PT-DZ6710EL 1-chip DLP WUXGA 6k ANSI lumens
2 x Panasonic PT-EZ570 3LCD WUXGA 5k ANSI lumens
IMAGE PROCESSING
3 x TVOne Corioscan C3-540-1001 master chassis
15 x TVOne Corioscan CM-DVIU-2IN CORIOmax DVI-U input module
9 x TVOne Corioscan CM-DVIU-SC-2OUT CORIO DVI-U output module with scaling
MULTITOUCH LCD DISPLAYS
52 x MultiTouch MultiTaction Cell 55-inch, full HD LCD ultra-thin bezel
AUDIO
Biamp Tesira audio DSP system
4 x ServerAVB Tesira DSP processor
24 x SIC4 4 ch balanced line level input
20 x SOC4 4 ch balanced line level output
1 x Netgear GS724TAVB 24 port AVB enabled Ethernet switch
Speakers and Amplification
48 x Acoustic Technologies AT TLA1102 2-inch 10-element line array speaker
2 x Acoustic Technologies AT DS2255 5-inch 25-element dipole speaker
4 x Acoustic Technologies AT DS226 6.5-inch 2-element dipole speaker
1 x Acoustic Technologies AT SB115 15-inch sub bass speaker
4 x Bose DS16FW FreeSpace flush mount loudspeaker
56 x Acoustic Technologies MK AMP PACK monolith amplifier pack
1 x Acoustic Technologies AT 5K multi-channel power amplifier