The opportunity had evidenced early-on in the planning of their 2004 International Auto Show booth exhibit: "I've done a lot of people-watching at our exhibit in the past, and as engaging as our presenters are, where we lose folks is in the transitions from presentation to presentation. This year, I want the transitions to be seamless. I want the video, and especially the audio, to help us hold people," concluded Beckman.

Enter ElecSound. Mike Miosi's company has been providing sound system design, maintenance and support for Ford Motor Company for 11 years. Ernie turned to Mike, and Mike turned to his head engineer, Tony Valente and the design team, with the task of developing a surround sound system large enough to envelop up to 2,000 auto show patrons, spread out over the 240 x 156 foot exhibit floor.

Drawing on the Crown IQ Network architecture he had used successfully at Marshall Field's department store in Chicago, Tony used Crown's CTs4200 multi-channel amplifiers and BSS ProSys Cobranet-equipped PS8810C matrix processors to power and process each of the Ford system's 56 outputs. "The CTs/ProSys structure gave me complete freedom," Valente detailed. "Each speaker has its own 200W channel, and all the delay and EQ processing I care to give it. I could manipulate the 32 x 56 matrix to get all the EQ, volume density and shading I needed per scene."

48 hours prior to the show opening at Detroit's Cobo Hall, Yessian Music handed over to ElecSound a single CD recording with all the music and effects for the show. They assigned Gerard Smerek to break the music tracks and sound effects into separate tracks, so that each could be manipulated separately. All tracks were recorded into two Richmond Sound Design AudioBox AB1616 hard-disk matrix processors, operating as a huge 4-video plus 32-audio playback device. Using his Macintosh computer, Valente programmed each of the effects to swirl, fade, bend, and ultimately focus the public's attention on the next presentation, while maintaining a strong undercurrent of energy throughout the booth.

Says Beckman: "I watched people at the booth moving almost involuntarily from presentation to presentation, riveted by the sound and visuals. We held the public's interest long enough to impart the message we wanted to convey and in the world of trade shows it doesn't get much better than that."