Documentary Evidence

The most difficult part of installing a sound system is dealing with all of those little details once you have been successful getting sound to come out. After a sound reinforcement system begins to reinforce the sound, many of the people involved in bringing the system online begin to lose interest. Now there are a whole series of lesser problems to overcome that may be very important to the end user but seem insignificant to the installer. However, anyone that has had to repair a poorly documented sound system recognizes the need for those final details. The installation crew may know what it is like to be pushed to finish before the owner's first show, but may never have had the excitement of trying to find the dead component minutes before the 100th show begins.

Documentation is not only time consuming to generate but often is begun when the profit margin for the installation have already shifted from numbers in light blue to crimson ink. For many that have worked in a concert venue, the word "documentation" may sound like a foreign language. Something that was referred to once in the contract but failed to materialize in the final days of the installation. Those as-built drawings, owner's manuals and operation guides must be imagined and retold verbally. Passed down from the senior venue technicians are tales of trunk cables crossed, distribution amplifiers mal-adjusted and the loudspeaker wires gone missing between racks and stacks. The grease pencil marks to identify the real amplifier for the balcony high-frequency horn and the correct setting for the equalizers. These forms of post-installation documentation are as familiar to venue technicians as the pre-show check and the squeak in the stage elevator.

The biggest obstacle to achieving good system documentation is the difference in point-of-view between the people involved in creating and building a sound system and those who use and maintain it. While there are many sound contracting firms that are associated with sound production (rental) firms, there may still be a gap between the needs of these two very different ends of the business. After a lifetime of working without adequate documentation at hand, many technicians have developed the necessary techniques to cope. When asked what documentation they require, they may simply state that they never read manuals or schematics, anyway. After all, if you were asked to list the misleading street signs in your neighbourhood, you probably wouldn't have the same list as a new FedEx driver. Those familiar with a system during the installation are often the worst people to be developing the User Manual. They will often make assumptions that leave critical gaps for the end user.

The documentation for a completed system must be a team effort. It must include people that are familiar with good system documentation in general but not with the system at hand. The person most familiar with the details of the installation must be involved in getting critical but obscure details included, once their (up till now) critical presence is lost. There must be the neophyte that asks the naive questions of How? and Why? that are so easily forgotten. In addition, someone with the writing skills and experience to expunge those misleading and indirect instructions. Then the documentation must be reviewed for accuracy and concise correlation between drawing, writing and physical reality. For instance, using the same name for a device in each form of the documentation and on the device itself is very reassuring to the end user. It also saves a great deal of time when a service technician arrives onsite with only a tool kit and the equipment room keys.

Creating good system documentation is an art and a science. Providing concise technical descriptions and drawings for long term maintenance is balanced by the logical and complete instructions for adjustment and operation of the system. Excellent documentation can take many forms, from binders to computer databases. Each has an advantage and in larger and more complex systems both paper and electronic forms are required. Searching for a specific device in a shelf of paper is frustrating but it is also hard to balance a notebook computer while you apply the solder.

Once a system has been installed, the documentation must grow with the system. The additions, modifications and repairs must be clearly documented, or even the best original documentation will be rendered useless. The team that created the great sound system is joined in the history of the venue with those that operate and maintain it. The documents should be there to prove it.

United Entertainment Media Inc.
460 Park Avenue South, 9th Floor
New York, NY, 10016
Ph. 212-378-0400
FAX 212-378-2160

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