VAVS Home Videoconferencing

Videoconferencing

Video conferencing - what is it?

  • Videoconferencing delivers audio and video to bring people together irrespective of their geographical locations with the added ability to share content in real time.
  • Zoom, the preferred soft codec video conference solution at JCU, is available to all staff and students. Zoom interoperates with traditional video conference hardware (Cisco/Tandberg/Poly) enabling cross communication regardless of platform. .
  • MS Teams is widely used amongst staff for internal communications, however it does not directly interoperate with traditional video conference hardware (Cisco/Tandberg/Poly).
  • Video sessions can be as simple as a conversation between two people in private offices (point-to-point) or involve several sites (multi-point) with one or more participants in rooms of various sizes and complexity at different locations, sharing presentations in various formats.
  • Multi-point calls are linked by Zoom, hence a Zoom ID is required and the Zoom invitation forwarded to videoconferencing@jcu.edu.au when one or more video conference enabled rooms are participating.

JCU videoconference hardware systems (personal and room based) are located in Atherton, Bourketown, Cairns, Cloncurry, Longreach, Mackay, Mount Isa, Singapore, Thursday Island and Townsville with hardware lecture capture recorders located at Cairns and Townsville.

Venues are fully integrated videoconferencing hardware systems (130) or dedicated ZoomRooms (55).

JCU Teaching Spaces (Supported by VAVS)

  • Small conference rooms - board room style set ups, are ideal for groups of 8 to 14 persons, where a large degree of interaction (audio, video, content sharing) is required between the participants at both ends.
  • Mediums sized presentation/lecture rooms - these room are typically accommodating student numbers in the range of 40-60 where some degree of interaction is desired between all participants.
  • Large theatres - facilities such as the Sir George Kneipp auditorium (492 seats), Crowther 1 (300), the Medical School theatre (295), Nursing Science theatres (200+) and the Science Place lecture theatre (150) are fitted with sizeable projector screens and voice reinforcement, suitable for presentations and lectures to the larger groups.
  • Equipment standard - Centrally bookable video conference enabled rooms at JCU are fitted with the following equipment:
    1. Single or dual display system (flat panels or projectors)
    2. In house AiO desktop presenter PC
    3. Document cameras/visualizer
    4. Microphones (Wireless microphones in the larger rooms)
    5. HDMI Cable with adapters to connect laptops
  • Training - Experienced technicians are available to assist with customized training.
  • Zoom is the virtual video meeting room (VMR/soft codec) platform to facilitate communication and collaboration throughout the university and elsewhere. Zoom is available to all staff and students at JCU. For assistance in getting Zoom up and running, contact InfoHelp on 15500 or 21777.