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QFlex Delivers Clear Message at Frankfurt's Museum of Communication
As one of the cornerstones of human civilisation, the act of communication - passing information from one to another and creating networks to enable the sharing of information - makes for an obvious subject for exhibition. Frankfurt, famous for its museums, has devoted an entire establishment to the story of how information has been passed around since earliest human history - the Frankfurt Museum of Communication situated on the city's Main riverbank. So it's perhaps a most fitting environment to find Tannoy's QFLEX steerable array system installed, being one of the most cutting edge examples of modern communication technology.
Founded in 1958 as the Federal Postal Museum (Bundespostmuseum), it is part of one of the city's oldest Museum institutions, and moved to its current purpose-built premises in 1990. The modern, transparent and open 4-storey building invites visitors on a journey of discovery through the ages, looking at how means of communication have developed and evolved, from ancient cuneiform scripts to the most recent advances in information technology such as email, the World Wide Web and mobile telecoms. As is typical with examples of modern architecture such as this, extensive use has been made of hard reflective materials such as glass, exposed concrete and expansive hardwood flooring. While this allows for open, well-lit and unrestricted spaces, it often leads to spaces that are acoustically extremely challenging. And so it proved to be, as the initial years of the museum have been blighted by frequent complaints from visitors about the poor intelligibility of both speech and background music - especially where audio program material was part of the various exhibits.
The irony in being faced with a major communication challenge at this particular museum certainly isn't lost.
Thankfully, such acoustical problems have been overcome however, thanks to Tannoy's revolutionary QFlex beam-steering array system. Just four QFlex 16 devices were all that was required to cover the majority of the affected areas, installed around the main circulation spaces of the museum, discretely mounted on the concrete structural pillars. QFlex uses multiple channels of advanced amplification and DSP to produce beams of acoustic energy, which are directed on user defined target areas. With this ability to focus acoustical output in target areas where needed, comes better speech intelligibility in highly reverberant spaces such as those found throughout the museum. This beam-steering approach significantly increases the ratio of direct sound to a desired area, by minimising indirect (reflected) sound and gives far greater control of coverage than would be possible using conventional loudspeakers. The discrete profile of each array means that aesthetic impact is also minimised, particularly compared to the far less effective alternative of installing a distributed system with a large number of loudspeakers around a given space.
While QFlex is by no means the only loudspeaker system available that makes use of DSP beam-steering technology, it has many key advantages that led to it being specified for this particular job. While others provide beam control at lower frequencies, suitable for speech material, QFlex delivers effective beam control into the higher octaves as well, making it a perfectly viable system for delivering highly intelligible music as well as spoken word. Intuitive control software, digital audio input and full provision for easy integration with emergency evacuation systems are just some of the other critical performance advantages that made QFlex the obvious choice.
The final results here in Frankfurt speak for themselves, not only has QFlex solved a major communication problem for both staff and visitors, it has done so in the most discrete way - with very little impact on the crisp, clean lines of this modern piece of architecture. As one of the oldest loudspeaker manufacturers in the world, it makes sense that Tannoy's cutting edge technology is responsible for delivering a clear message at a museum dedicated to communication.
11th February 2010
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