‘A direct connection between consoles and enclosures is the facility that enabled us to win an Award for Product Innovation at Plasa in London last year. Climbing aboard the ‘magic tablet’ was inevitable and relatively simple for our R&D team, thanks mainly to the iMode technology we launched in 2009 and which is gradually being incorporated in all our self-powered loudspeaker systems’, comments Outlin’e Michele Noselli.
‘iMode means having a computer in every enclosure, complete with web server and specific IP address. Users don’t access an enclosure, but a web page. And from that page they can control whatever they want, even from the other side of the globe, since the web knows no frontiers. Thanks to the eclectic iMode platform – which is genuinely avant-garde – it is now possible to do all this from an iPad, with a touch of the screen. This is what I’d call maximum digital interaction.’
Frankfurt’s Pro Light & Sound and Bergamo’s Show-Way allowed Outline to demonstrate what can be done with an iPad. ‘In Frankfurt, we wanted to see the reactions of the public to this unique possibility,’ says Outline engineer, Daniele Pagani, who is responsible for the project. ‘We didn’t expect to arouse so much interest and even a sort of physical pleasure – even for “laymen” – regarding the control of an enclosure in real time by means of a tablet computer that can be carried around as easily as a diary.
‘Even using sophisticated FIR filters and carrying out complex operations really is child’s play. But the most enjoyable spectacle was seeing the look on people’s faces as they watched the “wings” of our Mini-Compass move on the screen of the iPad a moment after having moved them by hand. This definitely enabled the concept of sensor technology to be instantly understood…’ he adds.
The combination of intuitive user interface, long battery life, wireless and 3G connectivity, light weight and compact size, plus a robust and stable operating system, means that the iPad can be used for almost anything, from a gaming platform to a serious tool for commercial use.
‘On one hand, iPad might seem to be simply a toy for geeks,’ says Outline’s Noselli. ‘Then, when you use it, you stay up late at night and discover that, as well for playing games, it makes even serious work enjoyable. You can also leaf through books, navigate, keep the house under control from a distance, check the weather forecast, make video calls, record videos, take photographs, enjoy a film or a nice cartoon (ideal for the kids on the back seat of the car during long journeys), watch the TV news and do thousands – literally thousands – of other things.’
