Immersive LED Soundstage & SkyAscend™ System
Indiana University’s School of Liberal Arts has a new state-of-the-art digital media production studio. Completed in April 2026 and ready to be incorporated into the 2026/2027 academic year, the Kinetic Immersion and Extended Reality Lab (KIX Lab) “is a hub for faculty and student research and creative activity related to technologies for immersive experiences and virtual environments. Located in the Radio-Television Building, the lab consists of three key technologies: ‘The Wall’ LED display, a high-density loudspeaker array, and a motion capture system.”
The Wall, pictured to the left, is a 160-panel array of square Unilumin Upad IV 1.9 500mm x 500mm panels in an 8-panel high x 20-panel wide configuration creating a 13’- 1 ½”h x 32’- 9 11/16”w curved immersive soundstage. Note that the LED panels on the floor are walkable.
As this is a ground supported structure, IA Stage designed and fabricated a custom frame to hold The Wall upright. The stage jack cantilever video wall structure is comprised of (15) counterweighted steel jacks attached to the upstage side of the framework that houses the LED panels. It takes over 3000lbs of ballast to offset the weight of The Wall. Aircraft cable tie-backs along the top of The Wall are connected upstage directly to the building steel as a secondary anchor for additional stability and to prevent shifting.
The (3) sections of LED panels that form the ceiling of the sound stage are hung in perpendicular orientation to a 9’10” SkyAscend™ self-climbing truss system, complete with a push-button control system and pendant. Attached directly to the overhead grid steel, the SkyAscend™ was engineered to mount and lift forty-eight (48) Unilumin URMIII 500mm x 1000m panels grouped in three 4 x 4 sections. IA Stage designed and fabricated custom substructure alignment brackets along with the specialty hardware required to precisely position each of the LED panels that make up the ceiling.