Swansea Library – Every Picture Tells a Story ... > Connectvision

Wednesday, September 02, 2009

	Swansea Library – Every Picture Tells a Story ... By host @ 11:10 AM :: 450 Views

When Swansea Central Library moved to the City's new Civic Centre it took the opportunity to put in place a host of new technological features, including self issue and return areas, automated book sorting and Connectvision digital signage, plasma screens, providing customers with news, and information on special events and current library offers. The central library in Swansea contains over 60,000 items including, DVD's, CD's, maps, journals and, of course, books. Typically 10,000 people visit the library during the week. The library has seven large plasma screens which are used to show TV news and digital music channels, library news and events. The screens are organised in three zones: a TV zone showing BBC News on screens at the library entrance and back of library, using subtitles. A teenage books area is another zone featuring a screen showing the TFM music channel at low volume. The remaining four screens are located close to Library Information Desks and orientated in portrait format - two on the ground floor and two on the 1st floor. The Senior Librarian explained the library's approach to digital signage.”We were looking for a way of engaging visitors attention that was impactful and informative, yet could be easily updated by library staff. It was Connectvision's ease of use, and ability to zone and schedule information that set it apart from other solutions.” Ease of use and content management are fundamental to the way in which Connectvision is deployed. It allows users to draw on a wide variety of image formats and multimedia file types such as jpeg, avi, mov, digital video, PowerPoint Files, and HTML Web Pages. In addition, the software allows information from 'live' feeds from the Internet and Intranet to be included in the screen content. From the outset, Swansea Central Library has taken a complete hand-on approach to digital signage, even to the extent of developing their own screen templates. These are used to position information sources on the screen, allowing a mix of text and video imagery. Connectvision has been used to create a themed children's books area at certain times of the day, and then reverting to the BBC News and details of forthcoming events during the evening. Again the Senior Librarian commented, “We have explored showing local news RSS feeds on the screens as well as announcements of book clubs and video interviews of authors. The flexibility of Connectvision means we are never at a loss in finding ways to communicate effectively with our library users.”