Digital View Blog

Time was, using digital displays in vending machines was a tricky business. Screens were heavy and expensive to employ. As technology moves on and standards improve it is becoming easier to integrate screens with anything. Vending machines are no exception. Why bother though? Read more…

Increasing sales and customer loyalty is the dream of every business owner. Of course there are many ways to go about this, but I want to give you some thoughts on how to go about finding the best digital signage package for you.

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Digital signage is everywhere, some of it amazingly good, some not so good. What separates the good from the bad and what is being done to build on successes? Read more…

Just to be clear, I am not recommending the following as a solution for digital signage content – however I do think it strongly hints at things to come…

Xtranormal.com is a web based service that makes it easy to author  video, extremely easy. The site provides templates with actors and action that you combine with audio via their text to speech engine to create videos for sharing on sites like YouTube. With a bit of effort it seems significant customization is possible covering actors, scenes and many of the attributes. There is also a downloadable Windows based version for offline authoring.

So I couldn’t resist trying it out – here it is using the text above.

Could this approach to creating content ever be good enough to create content for digital signage? The answer has to be yes – it may be some development generations away from being good enough and of course not suitable for all content or all types of content, but some, definitely.

As a final note, having made the video I see that there is a high quality download option, I haven’t received this but when I do I will note the resolution.

Update: The HQ (High Quality) rendering for download was quite quick, the resolution is 640×480 and the format is MP4.

Digital screens and interactive digital posters can still present the public at large with a challenge when it comes to using them. It can be tempting to think that ‘If you build it, they will come’, but that’s simply not the case. Read more…

There have been a number of blogs and articles recently considering the differences between consumer TV’s and commercial monitors for use in digital signage. Many interesting points have been raised and argued but to jump to the conclusion it seems very clear that for a lot of professionals there remain important differences despite the relentless pace of development in consumer products.

So what are these differences:

• Reliability was a significant issue with some commentators questioning how this was validated. Also in this context it was pointed out repeatedly that the warranty on consumer models does not support commercial use.
• Power supplies were identified as a primary issue affecting reliability. Indeed in the Integre we use over spec’d high quality power supplies with the option of dual supplies with power balancing and fail-over protection.
• Inputs & connectors: There is no question that many consumer models have a reduced number of video signal inputs, this is the sort of restriction that affects complete system design so it is quite understandable that a good choice of signal inputs was identified as important.
• Temperature and Air-flow management: Consumer TV’s are designed to be used in landscape mode for a limited number of hours a day at ‘room temperature’. The expectations of commercial display systems usually go well beyond this.
• RS-232: It was interesting to note that this was raised as an issue, see our earlier blog re RS-232 lives on.
• Remote monitoring and control: This is not a possibility with consumer models that stop a long way short of what is possible with commercial units, for example control and monitoring of fans, backlight, runtime, on/off and a myriad of other diagnostics.
• Panel options: Many commercial applications require high bright panels, something that is simply not an option on consumer models.
• Quality of electronics in the sub-assemblies: We can vouch for the fact that components vary greatly in their specification which in turn will affect their reliability and longevity.

Furthermore with the introduction of 3D (with glasses) and connectivity increasingly focused on other consumer devices the chances are that the differences between consumer and commercial models may grow rather than reduce.

Stock video can be an incredible resource for creating digital signage content. There is a lot of it, it is easy to access and easy to use – prices vary. A quick search on the web for stock video websites produces many results but one we use regularly is iStockPhoto which offers both stills and video.

So if for example the requirement is to make a menu board for a restaurant there is a huge selection of relevant video clips available, this is quickly apparent with a search of a couple of sites using the word ‘food’: Artbeats gave 1,601 clips as a result and iStockPhoto gave 11,401. A purchased clip can be used to create a video background with either a fixed or changing menu display in the foreground – this is an easy exercise in video editing software.

There are certainly many topics covered by stock video, for example searches for video on topics such as dinosaurs or 17th century gave a respectable number of results for each.

One final point – always check the usage license. Even royalty free video is likely to have usage conditions.

It came as a pleasant surprise recently to see AV professionals commenting in a forum state a preference for commercial monitors with RS-232 over alternative consumer models lacking RS-232.

Here at Digital View we have made great use of RS-232 over the years and continue to do so with standardized command sets and various utilities, for example:

- All our media players can be fully controlled by RS-232 commands and can equally send out RS-232 to other devices. This can be data or instructions and allows for remote device monitoring and control. In addition powerful and innovative interactive systems can be created.

- The DV LCD interface controller range has a significant RS-232 command set giving access to the extensive range of functions available.

It can sometimes be hard to explain the possible benefits to users, it is a bit like the rather unhelpful ‘your imagination is the limit’ promotional line – indeed, that is the challenge. One of the more common uses we see is to make custom button sets so a single button executes a number of commands. Another is for communication of monitoring data and our own DisplayMark digital signage display and temperature monitor is a good example.

At times it has looked like RS-232 was going away, certainly seeing it vanish from the consumer market was ominous. It is reassuring the professionals still understand and seek the benefits.

Just see how digital signs inspired this troupe to put on a show, it’s brilliant.

I like this because I think it reminds us why we enjoy graphics in the first place. Well designed content makes us watch because it’s fun. It’s simple.

What do your customers think about your product or service?

Was the restaurant to warm/cold/just right? Should there be more accessories available? Was the waiting time too long? Are the facilities clean? Will you return?

Enable customer feedback – the VideoFlyer is an incredibly cost effective way to poll customers and can combine both information gathering and digital signage type promotion in a single easy to use package. Five straightforward steps:

1) Using any touch screen VideoFlyer (10″ or 15″ display size) or add a button bar to a standard VideoFlyer (10″, 15″ or 21″).

2) Create appropriate videos or still images and organize using DV Studio.

3) Deploy in-store.

4) Collect data.

5) Analyze and report.

Looking at each of these in more detail…

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