Nanolumens Nixel makes Verizon's design and innovation project a reality

To design the original industrial videowall of the Verizon innovation center, a Nixel equipment has been used 1,5 mm of Nanolumens in an array of 5,4 meters wide by 3,8 high.

Design concepts, Engineering and ingenuity have led to the construction of the innovative Verizon. And this has also been reflected in its AV facilities, where the technology of Nanolumens has had a special role.

For the project of this center, the group of experts of Nanolumens worked to determine the complexities and possible outcomes and challenges of this high-level project. The installation posed certain challenges: a complex design, a concave wall and a new product topology

The goal was to design a 16:9 that will be separated from the main screen to create a videowall industrial and rebuilt to look like a circuit board.

It had to have a clean aesthetic, but also look industrial with the parts and wiring exposed, as if a TV had intentionally exploded. The industry has coined a phrase for this as 'Tech-o-rating‘, and the result was a very technological design with shape and functionality.

The challenge and the solutions

Dan Rossborough, Director of the Special Projects Group (GSP) of Nanolumens, realized that this facility posed many challenges. It took four months to develop a new product topology for the Nixel of Nanolumens, that would serve as the basis for this design.

The model of a miter chassis was created on a single Nixel to emulate the ‘Orphan Nixel’, a phrase Dan coined to describe Nixel satellite displays that were independent of the main video display.

Together with the Nanolumens R&D team, the SPG developed a 'daughter plate' that could be placed on the back of a Nixel. They attached a reception card so that it could be treated as if it were a complete matrix. This tailor-made idea simplified the handling of power and data ports..

Development

Autonomous Nixels have their own chassis and data to stretch and form any array you can imagine, each programmed with its own offset in two coordinated 4K content rasters (aspect ratio 32:9).

Orphaned nixels, housed in a custom-printed 3D printed FDM chassis, can be mounted frontally on adjustable aluminium telescopic brackets in 6 axes and with feed/data anchors on bars to the main body.

The main body of the screen was made with miters at the top, bottom and on the sides, so that the whole set looks like it floats. All this was possible thanks to the topology Frame-and-Skin of Nanolumens.

The chassis of the orphaned Nixel was 3D printed and designed with space for the 'daughter board' and the Nixel. A custom mounting bracket with adjustment of 4 shafts and pitch allowed precise calibration of the new Nixels. Before using these 3D printed chassis, were tested taking into account thermal dynamics, and the design turned out to be solid.

This complex design required the team to work with the limitations of a concave sound attenuation wall made with MDF.. The Nanolumens solution could not be mounted on it, so he had to do it through her.. Spacers were used to compress the substrate behind it and allow for precise alignment of the main screen and its orphaned Nixels. 1,5 Mm.

These were independently aligned with a tolerance of less than a tenth of a millimeter on a grid face that aligns them precisely..

Another element that helped in the design phase was a model developed in the design laboratory of Gensler, with a section of 2×2 meters as proof of concept. Nanolumens also hired a media artist to help him map this complex video wall..

The results

For the Verizon Hub project, a Nixel of 1,5 mm of Nanolumens in a matrix of approximately 5,4 meters wide by 3,8 high.

The main section of the videowall is 16:9, just like each of the circuit board-style 'wings'. And although it had been a long time since Nanolumens used Led panels of 9 mm indoors, also provided a video wall suspended in the ceiling. It is rather a lighting element to create atmosphere in the space. This video wall adds almost a diffuse mirror effect of the larger curved screen for the innovation center.

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