Sets in the City!

Metropolis AV & FX has completed a major technical refurbishment at the Sports Café in London’s Haymarket. The project follows on from Metropolis’ design and supply of the complete lighting, sound, and AV system to the latest Sports Café in Manchester, and their long-term servicing of the maintenance contract at the flagship London operation. Upstairs, Metropolis replaced all the old TVs with 28″ and 32″ widescreen televisions, installing a total of 33, plus one of the new Generation 6 Panasonic TH42 PW6 plasma screens – the first in the UK. Two new Sanyo PLC SL15 video projectors were also installed – some of the first in the country – fitted with protective POAP smoke housings to extend longevity.

Metropolis also fitted an additional six Bose Panaray speakers to the existing audio system and re-calibrated the system to spread the sound more evenly around the area. The existing RF cabled network for the video was stripped out and replaced with a full composite video system. This is distributed throughout the building via 10 video distribution amplifiers, fed from two Kramer VS-162V video matrix units that allow any video source/s to be sent to any destination. The Kramer devices were picked for their reliability.

The overall video distribution is controlled via a customized control panel manufactured in-house by Metropolis. This communicates with Alcorn McBride 1064 video controllers that talk to the two Kramer units, allowing independent control of each plasma, projector, and group of televisions. Metropolis also installed three new Bose 1800V professional amplifiers to the existing five, boosting the system’s power capacity.

All the Sports Café’s audio sources are routed via a Soundcraft Spirit Live 4 x 2 console to a new Allen & Heath IDR8 multi-processor for EQ, compression, limiting, etc. The system has been set to run as ‘loud as is safe’, and also has limits set to prevent abuse and overdriving. Metropolis’s project manager was Stuart Clowes, who worked closely with Shane Winterbourne who designed, engineered, and oversaw the installation of the new elements.