When we started making initial plans for our inaugural OFFLINE Summit, our CMO, Alexandra, and I knew that one of the first decisions we would have to make was picking the perfect event venue for our conference. After we decided upon the Gelsey Kirkland Academy in Brooklyn, we looked for someone to help us with custom lighting and AV to make the venue represent our brand’s look and feel, and so that our attendees would have a great experience absorbing all of our top-notch content throughout the day.
Once we began our search, we were surprised to learn about all of the intricacies, and unexpected costs, that both of these crucial conference aspects would entail, but knew that this wasn’t an area in which we could scale back without sacrificing major aesthetic and logistical elements for our event.
Fortunately, we were introduced to Brian Quinn at 7 Red Productions through our investors, who went above and beyond to ensure that our inaugural conference went off without a hitch, kept speakers and attendees engaged throughout the entire day, and made sure that our venue was transformed into the digital wonderland that we had in mind.
After describing the vision for OFFLINE and doing a venue walkthrough, we first started thinking about our various AV needs to make sure that our attendees were able to consume our speakers’ top-notch content. We started in the studios, which we used for our breakout sessions and to host lunch and a working space throughout the day, as these rooms were blank canvases and didn’t have any equipment conducive to running an educational conference.
To keep things as simple and cost-efficient as possible, we created a raised platform set-up to serve as our stage in three of the four studios (the fourth was used as our meal and work space). Each stage had two 55” TVs on stands to which our presenters could easily connect their laptop so that the audience could see their slides, wireless clickers to advance slide decks, two portable speakers and wireless microphones so that speakers could easily be heard, and a table of controls off to the side or in the back of the room that our AV techs operated the day.
Pro tip: If you’re using wireless microphones and clickers, or any other similar equipment to deliver your presentations, make sure you include additional units in your rental to account for any equipment malfunctions, and in the case of mics, so that you can get your speakers ready for their session in advance, while the previous presentation is still going on.
Next, we tackled AV for the main theater and the lobby before transitioning into lighting. Fortunately, our venue, GKA, had a good amount of equipment that we were able to include during our rental negotiation process. This included a sound system that they used for their ballet productions, and a projector that the venue owner had been planning on purchasing for his academy, but did it earlier than anticipated so that we would be able to use it. We supplemented those key assets with a complete DJ system that friend of the Farm DJ Sylo used to keep the energy and momentum alive in between sessions and during breaks, as well as to make important announcements for all of our attendees throughout the day.
Once our AV needs had been properly assessed, we continued onto lighting, which is often the easiest and most cost-effective way to transform a venue into a space that can temporarily represent the look and feel of your event and brand. One of the biggest benefits of decorating your venue primarily with lighting is that you can create a beautiful, aesthetically pleasing space at a relatively low cost, without any permanent structures that may be prohibitively expensive or potentially damage the venue structure. Fortunately, the experts at 7 Red have done this time and time again, and used a complete lighting package to transform GKA into our digital wonderland.
To start, we lined the entry hallway and lobby with red and blue colored LED light cans to create a subdued and soothing visual effect, and supplemented them with lekos (normally used in stage lighting) to better illuminate the space. 7 Red also used two additional light cans to project the OFFLINE Summit logo onto the entryway floor, as well as on the black curtain that partitioned the theater’s stage from the lobby. This was the most straightforward way for us to imprint additional OFFLINE branding throughout the venue and helped to create a great first impression when it came to the venue’s visuals. We also supplemented 7 Red’s lighting with floor lamps to create some additional soft lighting in the lobby. All in all, our approach to lighting and the music from DJ Sylo created a great lounge-like setting, where attendees could network with other like-minded event professionals in and recharge in between sessions.
When everything came together on June 2nd, the end result was really fantastic. Thanks to the lighting and AV pros at 7 Red, our venue looked better than we could have imagined, and our speakers and attendees had an easy time facilitating and absorbing our amazing content, respectively.
One last pro tip: When we were organizing set-up and load-in for the conference, we didn’t quite understand that ALL pieces of AV equipment had to be in place before our installers could think about things like lighting and we could start arranging furniture, setting up chairs and so forth. Make sure that you schedule all AV load-in and set-up as early as you can so you can finish the rest of your set-up ASAP.
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