Every photo from your event will outlive the event itself. The step-and-repeat shot on a publicist's grid, the press conference clip on the evening news, the launch moment replayed across socials — that's the real deliverable of a media event. And whether those images look world-class or washed-out comes down to two things most run sheets under-budget: lighting and audio.
At Pro Light & Sound, we've spent more than 35 years producing events where the camera is the most important guest in the room. Here's what PR and comms teams should know before the media arrives.
The media wall: built for the lens, not the eye
A media wall isn't set dressing. It's a photography studio that happens to live at your event, and it needs to be treated like one.
Get the wall itself right first. A media wall should be seamless, taut and matte. Gloss finishes bounce flash straight back into the lens; wrinkles and joins show up mercilessly in high-resolution images. Logo placement matters too — repeats should be sized and spaced so a clean logo sits beside every face, whether the shot is a solo headshot or a group of six. Because we design and build media walls in-house, we plan the artwork around camera crops, not just how it looks on a mockup.
Then light it properly. Ambient venue lighting will not cut it. A well-lit media wall uses dedicated front light — typically soft, diffused sources set either side of camera — to lift faces evenly without harsh shadows or shine. Colour temperature is matched across every fixture so skin tones stay true and brand colours reproduce accurately. Done right, every guest is lit like talent, every photographer gets a usable frame without relying on flash, and your brand colours look the same in every publication.
Think about spill and background. The area behind the photographers matters as much as the wall. Uncontrolled light from a nearby bar or LED screen can throw colour casts across the wall and undo careful work. We design the media wall zone as its own controlled environment within the event.
Press conferences: one chance, every camera
A press conference is the least forgiving event format there is. There's no second take, and every outlet in the room is recording.
Lighting for broadcast. TV cameras need more, and more even, light than the human eye. Speakers at the podium or panel desk should be front-lit at a consistent level with no hot spots, and separated from the backdrop so they don't merge into it on camera. If there's an LED screen or printed backdrop behind them, its brightness has to be balanced against the key light on faces — a screen that looks fine in person will blow out on camera if it's running too hot.
Audio for broadcast. This is where press conferences most often go wrong. Journalists don't just need to hear the room — they need a clean feed. A properly produced press conference includes a press mult box (audio distribution feed), so every TV crew, radio journalist and podcaster plugs straight into broadcast-quality audio instead of pointing shotgun mics at a loudspeaker. Add redundant microphones at the lectern, wireless handhelds for Q&A, and an operator mixing live, and your spokesperson's message arrives everywhere exactly as it was delivered.
Contingency is part of the design. Backup microphones, spare channels, redundant power. When the announcement is market-sensitive or the minister is mid-sentence, "the mic dropped out" is not an acceptable outcome. We build press conference systems assuming something will be asked to fail — so nothing does.
Major PR moments: the whole room is the shot
Product launches, red carpet arrivals, brand activations — at this scale, lighting and audio stop being services and become the storytelling.
Lighting sets the narrative. A launch reveal lives or dies on a lighting cue: the room dims, the product hits full intensity, and every phone in the room comes out. Colour, texture and movement can carry a brand identity across an entire venue — the way we transformed a bare warehouse into a room that "felt more like a concert than a conference" for Heidi's product launch, or built a fully branded McLaren environment for Grand Prix weekend with Airwallex. Designed lighting also means every corner of the room is content-ready, because guests don't only photograph the stage.
Audio carries the moment. Big rooms with hard surfaces, hundreds of guests and background music are hostile environments for speech. A properly designed system — the right loudspeakers, positioned and tuned for the actual room — means the CEO's three-minute address lands clearly at the back bar, not just the front row. And when the event is being filmed, live-streamed or clipped for socials, the recorded feed is mixed separately from the room, so the content holds up long after pack-down.
One team, one cue. The reveal only works when lighting, audio, vision and staging move together. That's the case for an end-to-end production partner over a patchwork of suppliers: one show caller, one crew, one standard — and one person accountable for the moment that matters.
The questions to ask your production partner
Before your next media event, ask your AV supplier these five questions. The answers will tell you quickly whether they've produced for press before:
- How will the media wall be lit, and with what colour temperature?
- Will there be a press feed / mult box for broadcast media?
- What's the redundancy plan for microphones and power?
- Has the backdrop or LED screen been balanced for camera, not just the room?
- Who is calling the show when the reveal happens?
Make the moment land
Media walls, press conferences and PR events are judged by the coverage they generate — and coverage quality is production quality. When the lighting flatters every face, the audio feeds every camera and the whole room reads on-brand in every frame, your story travels further.
Since 1989, Pro Light & Sound has been Melbourne's trusted production partner for brands including Adidas, McLaren, Samsung and Universal — from intimate press calls to full-scale launches that made headlines. Every event, every effort.