Top 3 Finds at InfoComm 2017

If I’m being totally honest, there aren’t too many good reasons to visit Florida in June. The temperature and humidity really feel like you’re living inside a mouth and I ended up spending half of my per diem on bug spray. However, if you’re like me and enjoy spending your free time checking out cool new AV products, Florida in June isn’t at all a deterrent from attending InfoComm, which took place this year in Orlando from June 14th-16th.

I could very well spend the next few days of my life writing up highlights from all the cool products I checked out at the show, but I’m going to save us all some time and share my top three finds from InfoComm’17.

Sony Crystal LED Display

It comes as no surprise that Sony had an amazing booth at InfoComm. What drew me in was Sony’s HUGE 8K by 2K Crystal LED display. Sony introduced its Crystal LEDs last year and now the product is being shipped. The colors, contrast, and resolution on this screen are indescribable! The picture honestly seemed to look better than what I see with my naked eye. Sony produces the Crystal LEDs in tiles so the final size and resolution are really only limited by your imagination, though your wallet might stop you before your imagination does.

Sony’s Crystal LED Display stole the show with its brilliant resolution, colors, and contrast.

The display system has 99% black surface area, so contrast is more than 1,000,000:1 – far beyond the reach of conventional LEDs. Companies are using the screens for a broad mix of digital signage and design, but what I’d really like to see how this would look in my basement playing Mario Kart—I’m a simple man.

BREAKFAST Flip Disc

If there’s one thing that absolutely stood out to me at InfoComm, it was BREAKFAST’s “Flip-Disc” screen. BREAKFAST took a technology that’s been around since the 60s and drastically improved it with its Flip-Disc kinetic screen. You have to check out the video to fully appreciate what’s happening here.

Tell me it wouldn’t be amazing to play Space Invaders on this display!

Flip-Disc works by using an electromagnet to flip round, physical discs at rates of up to nearly 40 fps. Each disc is roughly the size of a dime and has one solid color on each side. Sitting back and watching/hearing each disc flip is just as addicting to watch as ocean waves crashing, a campfire dancing, or re-runs of Cops.

Flip-Disc is modular and can be tiled together to create a screen of nearly any size. You can also customize the color and finish options for the discs and panels. Using Flip-Discs API, developers can push any custom content directly to the screen and even enable an interactive mode which uses a 3D depth camera to allow those standing close to the screen to interact with static images or text. Flip-Disc was definitely the most unique and intriguing product I ran across at InfoComm.

Viveroo

I’ve always been a huge fan of modern design. There’s something beautiful about simple products and solutions that get the job done without a bunch of frills and curls that get in the way. That’s why Viveroo also made my list of coolest products at InfoComm.

Tablet enclosures are usually super boring. An enclosure really only needs to do two things: hold a tablet in place without losing functionality, and prevent the tablet from being stolen. Viveroo took the traditionally boring enclosure and made it sleek and sexy in a few different ways.

With its appropriately named “Free” product, iPads can be mounted portrait or landscape on a wall or other surface while only covering two sides of the tablet. The Free enclosure really makes iPads appear to float on a wall without compromising security. Viveroo has two other, and equally impressive, enclosure options: Loop, and Square.

Viveroo’s “Free” enclosure shows off the already sexy iPad. I love how simple and clean this enclosure is.

Well, there you have it; my top three finds from InfoComm’17. Trust me when I say i’m not even scratching the surface here with these highlights—there were 950 exhibitors spread over 545,000 net square feet of exhibits! I didn’t cover every square foot of the floor so if you attended InfoComm this year, leave a comment on what you saw that really stood out.