With its focus on the latest audio concepts and technologies, new German event sound design team Panix aims to bring new life to corporate and special events. Panix partners Jorg Rapp and Stephan Diebel founded the company in late Spring of 2013 and have made good use of audio show control, imaging and spatialisation at events including: the VW stand at the Frankfurt 2013 IAA motor show, as well as branding and conference events for Adidas and the Fraunhofer Institute.

Both designers have previously worked on a wide range of specialist audio productions in the event sector, across a broad spectrum of premier clients and brands. Their operation uses covers Pro Tools, Q-Lab and Ableton, and was recently complemented with the purchase of a TiMax SoundHub-48S/Madi playback server and audio show control matrix.

Among the services offered by Panix are overall audio design conception, strategy and creation, through to pre-production then on-site programming and management of all audio content and mixing before and during an event. Their multichannel sound designs are tailored to optimise message impact and audience immersion through the use of delay-matrix localisation techniques referred to as source-oriented reinforcement (SOR). With the help of TiMax SoundHub-S Timeline and PanSpace graphical spatialisation programming environments, their designs typically include complex 3D multichannel layered soundscapes and dynamically moving spot effects.

The Adidas Global Brand 2013 Conference centred on a 21m 3D projection screen with TiMax SoundHub used to program and replay sound effects, using a combination of manual triggers and time code to sync audio events to video content. Simultaneously, TiMax provided EQ, level and routing for loudspeaker system management, as well as SOR reinforcement of all mics to localise the presenters to their positions on stage. This helped ensure audience attention and eliminate subtle stress caused by trying to work out who’s talking.

‘TiMax fulfilled a number of functions simultaneously and was a very flexible tool for us,’ says Jorg Rapp.

The objectives were similar at the 2013 annual Fraunhofer Institute conference at the HCC Kuppelsaal in Hannover. TiMax SoundHub provided system management for approximately three-quarters of the sound systems; multichannel playback for music jingles and stings; dynamic panning of audio content to match the movements of elements in the video content; SOR vocal localisation to four separate locations in the room for different presenter and performer mics.

Panix claims its clients are impressed with the spatialisation results and overall sound quality they have achieved with TiMax, as well as its flexibility: ‘The clearest added-value parts for both events included a superior localised replay of audio content and therefore a higher attention of the audience, a soundscape with impressive audio effects, and a better comprehension of the video content due to a clear synchronicity between image and sound,’ says Diebel.

‘For us on-site, the well-structured TiMax SoundHub software allows fast programming which is especially important for industrial events where we have very short periods of production. Also the operational stability has been good, plus the sound quality and overall functionality respectively have convinced us this was a good investment.’