If you're organising a conference, AV is probably the line item you understand least and worry about most. Fair enough — it's technical, it's expensive, and when it goes wrong it goes wrong in front of everyone. Here's the practical version: what a conference actually needs, what's nice to have, what you can genuinely skip, and the questions that separate a good AV partner from an invoice.
Start with the run sheet, not the gear list
The single biggest mistake we see: choosing AV off a package list before the program exists. A conference with one plenary room and three breakouts needs a completely different setup to the same headcount in one big room. Panel discussions need more microphones than keynotes. Awards segments need lighting moments. A hybrid stream changes everything about audio. Sketch the day first — even roughly — and let the AV design follow it.
What every conference actually needs
Audio people can hear without thinking about. A PA matched to the room (not just "speakers on sticks" for 400 people), a wireless microphone per simultaneous speaker plus a spare, and — this is the one that gets forgotten — a technician mixing live. Feedback during the CEO's opening is not a gear problem, it's a nobody-was-driving problem.
Screens people can read from the back row. Whether that's projection or LED depends on the room's ceiling height, sightlines and ambient light. The test is simple: can the person in the worst seat read a slide's smallest text? If the venue has windows, ask specifically how the screen holds up in daylight.
Confidence monitors and a countdown clock. Presenters who can see their notes and their time stay on schedule. This is the cheapest thing on the list and it saves more conferences than anything else.
Stage lighting that makes faces read. Not a light show — just even, warm light so speakers look human in the room and on camera. If you're recording or streaming, this stops being optional.
A show caller. One person who owns the running order, cues the walk-up music, advances the right deck and knows what happens next. Above roughly a hundred people or three sessions, this role pays for itself.
What's nice to have
IMAG (live camera close-ups on screen) earns its keep above about 300 people or in very wide rooms. Recording is cheap insurance if the content has any life after the day. A second screen for a program/sponsor loop keeps the room feeling alive between sessions. Uplighting and set dressing move the room from "hired hall" to "our event" — worth it for flagship days, skippable for internal ones.
What you can usually skip
Moving-light shows for a daytime business program. LED floors. Holograms (someone asks every year). A separate AV package per breakout room when two rooms could share a technician with a schedule that staggers the sessions. A good production partner will tell you where the money isn't doing anything — that honesty is worth more than any discount.
Hybrid and streaming: decide early
A stream isn't a camera pointed at the stage. It needs its own audio mix, someone switching between camera and slides, a stable dedicated internet line, and a plan for remote presenters. It roughly doubles the complexity of the audio design, so decide whether you're hybrid before the AV design is done, not the week before the event.
Questions that sort the good partners from the rest
Will the person planning my event be in the room on the day? Do you own your equipment and employ your crew, or broker it out? What happens when a microphone dies mid-keynote — what's the redundancy? Can you work with my venue's rules and rigging? And can I see the run sheet you'll be working from? If the answers are vague, keep looking.
We've produced Melbourne conferences end-to-end since 1989 — own equipment, own crew, and the person who plans your day is the one calling the show. If you're planning one, talk to us early — the best AV design happens while the program is still flexible. More on how we approach corporate events here.