A videoconference is a live connection between people in separate
locations for the purpose of communication, usually involving audio and
often text as well as video. At its simplest, videoconferencing
provides transmission of static images and text between two locations.

At its most sophisticated, it provides transmission of  full-motion
video images and high-quality audio between multiple locations.

Videoconferencing
should provide a complete simulation of a normal meeting environment,
enabling both parties to see, hear and present material, just as if
they were in the same room.

Videoconferencing
can speed up business process and procedures in the same way that the
fax and the e-mail have revolutionised the way we share information.

Tangible benefits are most easily related to actual cost savings. The
most obvious quantifiable saving is the cost of travel and the cost of
the time wasted during travel.

-Greatly improved communication between remote sites both within a company and between suppliers and customers

-Videoconferencing appeals to students’ different learning styles; students who are visual and auditory learners can benefit.

- Reduced pressure, stress and fatigue from travel

-
Using the technology allows multiple classrooms at various locations to
collaborate while learning about other cultures from primary sources.

-
Shorter product/project development times (this can be worth millions
when it reduces time to market and/or improves the quality of the
product or project)

- Faster and better decision making

– Reduced time of meetings as the principle often applies when visiting

Place the webcam on the top, center, of your screen or monitor :

By placing your webcam on the top-center of your computer, it will appear as if you are looking at the person you are conversing with. If you place your webcam on the side of your monitor, the other party will only get a side view. This is only a good thing if you love your profile.

Having the camera in the center also allows you to watch the person you are conversing with while making it appear as if you are keeping eye contact with them.

Make sure you have good lighting:

It is crucial that you have good lighting. If there is a bright window or strong lighting behind you, it will make you look dark—but direct sunlight can make you look washed out. To achieve the perfect color, close your blinds or curtains and use indirect lighting to illuminate your face (no tanning required).

Position yourself correctly:

You should not be too close or too far from the camera. Your face should be the centerpiece. When properly composed, you should appear with your head and shoulders nicely framed in the picture.

Use a good webcam:

SightSpeed can transmit 30 frames per second, which is what televisions receive. Some webcams cannot keep up and detract from what otherwise would be a good image. In the case of webcams, price infers quality. As a rule of thumb, stay away from anything under $50 and look for CCD sensor cameras to get better picture quality.

Headsets and sound quality:

The best way to ensure good audio is by using a headset with an attached microphone. This will eliminate feedback problems, such as echoing, and background noises that might occur when using a computer with speakers and a microphone.

Limit your movements while on camera:

Movements like waving your hands or rocking in your chair will cause a lag in the video. It may also make the other participants to become dizzy and sick to their stomachs.

Dress for TV:

If you wear clothing with large patterns, shiny clothing or distracting jewelry, slight movements will cause the video software to spend a lot of time compressing and decompressing the images on your clothing. This will make your face and head movements unclear, and these are the most important.

Internet connection:

Broadband service is recommended over other Internet access services. Your connection speed, as well as the connection speed of the person with whom you are conversing, directly impact the quality of your video experience. Slower connection speeds result in fuzzy or paused video and choppy audio.

Be yourself:

Speak naturally and clearly. Imagine that the person you are conversing with is in the same room as you because…they are. Enjoy!

Be Safe:

Don’t give out information that you wouldn’t give to a stranger. Just because it’s the Internet doesn’t mean it’s safer! And hey…you can always “google” the person before you meet on SightSpeed! Know the person you’re talking to.

Sony Launches an Extremely User-Friendly and Economical Video conferencing System.  Sony reinvents its usual Video conferencing system making it compact & user-friendly with more features added to it.

According to Live Conferencing Equipment (a subsidiary of CBM), an online reseller for Sony’s video conferencing products in the US, Sony’s PCS-1 is such a videoconferencing system that provides the latest in conferencing technology while having extremely easy user features & at the same time conforming to all industry standard.

The system reaches speeds up to 2 Mbps over IP networks and up to 768 Kbps over the ISDN network.

The PCS-1 offers a high performance internal MCU option connecting up to six sites for a video conference using any combination of ISDN or IP connections with the optional multipoint software option. It also has such new features as enhanced data collaboration capabilities and built-in electronic whiteboard interface. The PCS-1 provides built-in Sony QoS technology to help ensure and enhance video quality over unmanaged networks.

With its superb video quality, it’s industry’s first product to support MPEG-4 video as a standard feature provides TV-like quality. Superb audio is featured through AAC (Advanced Audio Coding) at 14 kHz, compliant with the MPEG-4 standard. With PCS-1, audio is brought to another level of clear sound for the videoconference creating a more conversational tone.

These and other features incorporate the most advanced IT and Sony’s world-wide proven AV technologies into a compact and stylish two-piece body. This unique design affords users the ability to accommodate almost any installation requirement of a meeting room layout.

A video conference (also known as a videoteleconference) is a set of interactive telecommunication technologies which allow two or more locations to interact via two-way video and audio transmissions simultaneously. It has also been called visual collaboration and is a type of groupware. It differs from videophone in that it is designed to serve a conference rather than individuals.

video conferencing saves you time and money on business travel

• Save time and money on business travel costs: flights hotels taxis, plus time spent travelling when you are not available to work.
• Develop global opportunities your customer or supplier market can be anywhere in the world
• Improve client services, video conferencing allows you to have more ‘face to face’ meetings at a fraction of the cost.

video conferencing is now already well established within a growing number of major organisations for its high end facilities. Millions of high quality video conference systems, are in use across the world today and using our network of public video conferencing facilities you can link to them all.

video conferencing can be used for:

• Recruitment interviews
• Giving evidence to Magistrates or Crown Court
• In house business presentations
• Product training for employees and clients
• Sales representations and product launches
• Design and creative assessment, project liaison
• Business to business consultancy services
• Casting for television production

High definition videoconference systems really do have to be seen to be believed. Given sufficient bandwidth they give you really superb picture and sound quality. They are easy to install and operate and all the videoconference standards for maximum compatibility with legacy systems. video conferencing removes the obstacles of time and distance to allow people to conduct business naturally.

What is video conferencing and telepresence?

Using ISDN technology or IP networks your image is digitally reproduced: it works like 2 way TV with real time audio and vision. Sometimes a video conference connection is also known as a ‘video link’ or ‘video meeting’. The main video conference equipment manufactures are Polycom, Tandberg, Sony, Aethra. These manufacturers are all working to the same protocols so the systems are able to link across brand.

It is possible to link more than 2 sites together, this is known as a multipoint conference. Some video conference systems are able to link up to 4 sites together, but it is more usual to use a bridging service to connect the locations as bridges are able to connect to an unlimited number of video conferencing sites.

Telepresence is a form of video conferencing which uses large screen, high definition technology to simulate being in the same room. Currently some telepresence systems are using proprietary technology and are not able to link with other video conference systems.

With most video conferencing systems you can display papers using the electronic document camera, show information direct from your personal computer, you can also play a pre-recorded video or DVD, or even record your own presentation.

There are numerous benefits to businesses of all sizes from using audio conferencing.

With our range of advanced teleconferencing services, Live-Conferencing.com gives you all these important benefits, and at a fraction of the cost of BT. Whether you need to hold a conference call once a month or two or three times a day – all our teleconferencing services guarantee superb call quality, local rate or free phone dial in access at great value prices.

You have the ability to conduct scheduled or on-demand teleconferencing – anything from an ad hoc project meeting for three or four people to a large scale global investor relations briefing.

All our audio conferencing or teleconferencing accounts are simple to set up and easy to use. For your UK audio conferencing calls you have a choice of permanent, easy to remember dial in numbers; a local rate 0845 number or 0800 free phone number.

For international teleconferencing calls we give you a UK global access number. You can also give your international callers a local free phone number in their own country.

Reservationless Audio Conferencing

Reservationless gives you on-demand audio conferencing, allowing you to initiate a conference call 24 hours a day, 7 days a week – without the need to make a reservation or rely on an Operator.

To hold a teleconference you simply dial a permanent number and enter your conference code. This type of audio conferencing is the perfect solution for your regular conferences with the same group of participants or, for any of your last minute calls.

Operator Assisted Audio Conferencing

Live-Conferencing.com operator assisted audio conferencing service combines a personal touch with our feature-rich audio conferencing service to make all your conferences memorable experiences. Let Live-Conferencing.com manage the details of your conference so you can concentrate on delivering your message.

We will call the participants for you and our operator is there to be of assistance throughout the meeting. We can record the meeting for your future reference and even have the call transcribed.

Installing video conferencing services you can regain your costs of installation at different locations.

video conferencing services applied at companies can bring great impact in businesses, bring in prospective clients and gain advantage over competitors.

Videoconferencing products and services allow users to hold many types of conference meeting situations to fit their own particular requirement. Video can be linked up with 1-4 different locations anywhere in the world using just a standard TV monitor and multi-point meeting system.

Videoconferencing is not a permanent replacement for every meeting. When you install video conferencing services, the main purpose of it is to have meetings with people who are not physically present in the same room. If you substitute 35% of your physical meetings with video meetings you will immediately regain the cost of the equipment installed at three independent locations.

Videoconference meetings bring an instant impact on businesses, saving the company’s considerable costs, time and stress caused by the over congested roads and unavoidable heavy traffic, which is also predicted to increase by 20% over the next four to five years. With the time you save you can increase your productivity you can earn more funds and you can invest them in your employees and business expansion.

Video conferencing today has become an important daily business tool. It can form a fundamental part of the company’s disaster contingency plan, allowing the business to continue functioning even in difficult situations. Companies can communicate with prospective clients and retain advantage over your competitors.

Video Connections has several portable video conferencing demonstration facilities. Video conferencing companies set up a live video demonstration at offices within five minutes. For this companies only need either one or two ISDN2 128kbps telephone lines or IP bandwidth at 256kbps.

Video conferencing companies constantly update their video conferencing services and products.

Video Conferencing company’s applications are designed for secure, multipoint and synchronous communications.

Video conferencing is a great blessing of internet and telecommunication. Many industries, education sector, the media, even the field of medicine uses video conferencing.

Video conferencing is conducted between two or more participants at different localities by using computer networks to transmit messages and ideas, in a nutshell presentations and proposals. It works much like a telephone but it has an additional facility of video meeting. Each participant has a video camera, microphone and speakers mounted on their computers.

Video conferencing companies supplies video conferencing equipment on hire, lease or sales. Every company has the own specialized conferencing equipments and business running companies contact for the equipment according to their equipment’s quality.

Video Conferencing company should be considered on security and support for internal/external applications.

Some Video Conferencing companies‘ applications are usually selected on the basis on their designs. The designs such as secure, multipoint, synchronous communications platforms are mainly for corporate and government networks. The design attributes of some companies have a support for routing in distributing environments, multiple data types and huge payloads.

An important consideration for your Video conferencing company include security, support for internal-only and internal/external applications. With this demand, many conferencing companies are using a “bolt on” strategy for Video conferencing, adding licensed or 3rd party utilities to their services. This is done on a fine trial period but problems only come up when security and internal/external participants ask more from the system.

You can also install your own Video conferencing server. Besides the O/S and an assigned static IP address (physical or mapped address) there are no other requirements, considerably simplifying installation and maintenance. Once you have set it up and starts running you have your own Video conferencing site.

IT experts can restrict other parties to access to your server and meeting hosts can secure their conferences using password protection and encryption.

Videoconference equipment is been installed in industries, universities and hospitals.

Many businesses, industries, educational sector as well as the medical field have moved on in technology and implemented videoconference in their respective sectors. Videoconference equipment has been setup in the conference halls in the companies and hotels, teaching facilities and in the big hospitals.

Videoconference equipment requires to be set in a separate dedicated place. There are different types of equipment to be used in different locations. Equipment could be a PC based system, a portable, a rollabout or an installed system.

A PC based system just like an ordinary Personal Computer at home can be used by two individuals. A portable system can be utilized for two to eight participants, the roll-about can accommodate three to fifteen and the installed system can be used by twenty or more people.

Videoconference equipment is not complete without the codec which is responsible for video conferences.

For a good and efficient video conference a right sized monitor should be used so that all participants in a conference can get a good view of the presentation being projected. Most companies’ video conferences use a 20 or 35 inch monitor but it could be small and the people may have difficulties, so an alternative or a solution is to get an LCD projector.

Once you have decided on the equipment you want to get for your meetings, the next thing you have think about is the bandwidth because a good and fast bandwidth speed can make your video conferences and meetings smooth in real time.

Most video conferences use two ISDN lines to run their conferences but for a good service for conferences, IP should be used. Video conference transmissions should move at least 1.5 MB per second.

The most important Videoconference equipment is the codec. When looking for one, you should make sure that it is compatible with the other versions in the market.

For a smooth and successful presentation you might want to consider having multiple monitors and projectors. This will help you to see the other party clearly and also be able to present your ideas and proposals. It will prevent you from any errors and everyone in the room will be able to listen to you clearly.

Some people prefer to have just one monitor instead of multiple monitors, but they should have a monitor with picture in picture feature. In this way you will be talking to more than one party, you must also have some kind of bridging system.

Coming to the side of camera, there are different types to choose from. You can get multiple cameras to show different sides of your presentation or you can just simply get a robotic version that will follow you through out the meeting.

Lastly you have to really consider about is the phone line for your conference calls, you can do this during the meeting but when a lot of people has to be attended then bridging system has to be done.

Audio-video conferencing has reduced and saved time, money and energy of representatives traveling foreign lands. Audio-video conferencing has greatly helped in educational sectors by educating ‘Distance-learning’ students.

Audio-video conference is a popular trend in the business world and also very useful in connecting people of various fields and designated in various places. Thanks to this great technological development, it has become easier to communicate and exchange data with people across the globe.

The history or the existence of conferencing technology can be looked back in the early 1960s. These conferences were equipped by unsophisticated and expensive picture phone device. Today that machine has evolved as complex business equipment with additional features such as color monitors and other features.

Audio-video conferencing is very much applied in business and education sectors. In the business sector, companies that deal with international clients or have their branches overseas needs to hold conferences and meetings efficiently, since they have chosen to cut down their air travel expenses to the minimum.

While in the education sector, audio-video conferencing has been actively useful when conducting seminars or lectures for students located in different parts of the country and the world. And in this way ‘Distance-Learning’ has been successfully running and have reduced many educational barriers.

The term used for Audio-video conference in educational sector today is ‘remote students’ and ‘remote professors’. Audio-video conferences are of two types, asynchronous and synchronous types. In the Asynchronous type, conferences are recorded and can be viewed by the participants anytime they prefer. The other type which is the synchronous type enables participants to interact with each other in real-time. The advantage of this type of conference is that immediate feedback is attained just like a traditional ordinary meeting.

Audio-video conferencing is a very helpful and a great technology. Many industries and educational institutions are benefited by this technology in achieving their goals and saving time and money. Experts say that still there are more improvements and innovations to be done in the future because they feel that this technology has not fully reached to that satisfaction level. Huge telecommunication companies have adopted Audio-video conferencing through cell phones and smaller telecommunication companies are working on further improvements in this technology.

Video conferencing solutions are not only applied in the business sector but it used in the education sector as well.

Video conferencing solutions have greatly helped industries in saving energy and investments by conducting conferences with parties located in different areas.

In today’s fast paced business world, video conferencing are fast becoming the leading communications tool for large and small businesses.

Looking at the fact that offices and businesses representatives are located thousands of miles, getting everyone present in the same room for important meetings and trainings were virtually impossible from logical and perspective point for most industries.

Information Technology is the most valuable commodity in the business world today. People using different means of information technology to convey all types of messages can easily do so spending the least of their investments. Video conferencing solutions is one the developments of information technology that is allowing the users in the business world in doing those activities with less expenditures.

Video conferencing solutions have been around the market since the early 1960s, but it has only gained popularity ten or more years later. The systems in the earlier days were very expensive and comparatively low quality due to the fact that today’s technologies were not available easily.

Today due to the demand of VoIP networks, high speed internet, Web Castings, improved audio/video Codec’s and affordable enterprise solutions, video conferencing technology is finally covering the business market and helping in achieving goals and gaining success.

In the education sector video conferencing solutions have been put into use for students and teachers to communicate and learn no matter which part of the world they are located. Also, in the field of medicine, doctors and nurses consult patients and colleagues in real time and send and receive medical queries, documents and images within few minutes. video conferencing allow experts to diagnose ailments from their office located at one place to the patient being diagnosed at another place.

Video conferencing solutions are highly convenient and an easy means of virtual communication. Thanks to this technological development communication all over the world has never been the same.

Video conferencing equipment comes in variety in terms of setting up in a particular location. Like if you plan to get the equipment for your office you have to choose whether to buy a PC based system, portable, roll-about or an installed system. Now we explain the choices of the video conferencing equipment in a few lines each.

A PC based system accommodates one or two viewers just like users of a home PC. The portable system nicely accommodates two to eight people; the roll-about is good to be used for an audience of three to fifteen and the installed system is best for 20 or more participants.

For clear and good projection of the media, a right sized monitor is necessary so that all of the audience can have a clear view of the projected media. An LCD projector is the best solution.

Video conferencing is the greatest need when presentations are to be given to high valued clients.

The next thing to think about after you have decided on the type of equipment and projection screen, is, bandwidth because the faster the bandwidth the better it will be able to compress audio and video signals in real time. The best recommendation is moving your transmissions at 768k to 1.5 megabytes per second.

In the Video conferencing equipment the most important equipment is the codec. Companies when looking for one should look out whether it is compatible with the other versions in the market. The representative of the company should also check if the system supports full duplex audio and digital echo cancellation so that the conversation with your clients is completely clear.

Video conferencing equipment comes in various setups.

When you have to give a very important presentation to your big money client and want to be successful, you should consider having multiple monitors and projectors so that you can view your presentation and explaining your client simultaneously. This reduces chances of errors and ensures that everyone sitting with you is listening to what you have to say.

People giving the presentation can also use one monitor but they have to make sure that the monitor has picture in picture feature so you could get to see the preview of what you are presenting next.

Now the question comes up about cameras. There are different types of cameras to choose from. Multiple cameras can be used to show different sides of the presentation. The document camera is a must in video conferences because besides your face, other people with you in the room will be able to see the visual aids that you have prepared.