OF THE MONTH

Mayhem Media

Greensboro, North Carolina

AMX recently launched the Valued Independent Programmers (VIP) program designed to acknowledge, support and reward those companies who specialize in design and delivery of custom control solutions on the AMX technology platform.

This month, we introduce you to Jon Bullard and his team at Mayhem Media, located in Greensboro, North Carolina. Jon has been programming for over five years and we recently met with him to find out why he enjoys programming AMX systems and his thoughts on being successful. Here's his story.

Multi-Faceted
My wife Sarah and I founded our company as a side business a couple of years back and it wasn’t long before part time became full time. In addition to control system programming, we offer consulting, design, and installation services. We also provide web and e-commerce programming.

AssistedAudio.com is one of our personally designed Web sites, which has done very well in its first year. On the site, we offer assistive listening systems and personal amplifiers for various markets including churches, schools, manufacturing, tour guides and others.

Simply Amazing
I thoroughly enjoy being an AMX programmer. It allows me the ability to work with a wide variety of equipment in several different environments. We might be working on a government project one week and a multi-million dollar home the next. AMX programming was cool back at Generation 3, but now it’s simply amazing with what we can do with it. The idea that you can control just about anything from anywhere just fuels ideas and creativity. We’d be playing with this stuff even if it wasn’t our job.

Besides my role as lead programmer/designer, our talented team includes my wife Sarah Bullard, who is a programmer/designer, Chad Warner also a programmer/designer and Steve Abondolo, our Sales Director. We also employ several part-time installation personnel as well. I am also excited to share that Sarah and Chad are just about to complete their ACE certifications.

VIP Program Opens Up Doors
Being an AMX VIP has been great for us. I can’t say enough how much it helps to be endorsed on the AMX.com Web site. It’s opened us up to customers we never would have had a channel to previously. We get to work with all kinds of customers and as an AMX Pro Services Group partner, we’ve also enjoyed the relationship we’ve been able to develop with the AMX PSG Team.

Favorite Installations
In working on various AMX projects, it’s been interesting to watch the convergence of AV and Internet technologies. It’s fun and exciting to see how we use each technology to help the other.

One of the AMX programming projects that we are most proud of are the President’s Conference Room at the Federal Reserve in Richmond, Virginia. The technology controlled in this installation included video teleconferencing, audio conferencing, 3-Chip PTZ cameras, Cable TV, the DVD player, lighting and shades.

We provided touch panel design and source code for an MVP-8400 and an NXT-1200. We controlled all source equipment and environmental aspects. All Federal Reserve conference rooms are displayed on the touch panels and can be dialed up with a minimal number of touches.

We also enjoyed programming a multi-million dollar, four-story vacation home on the coast of North Carolina. We provided touch panel design and source code for two MVP-8400’s, which controlled all source equipment and lighting in the AV spaces. Plasma displays, lighting, satellite tuners, a MAX media server, and Matrix Distributed Audio keypads were also controlled throughout the home. Custom touch panel design included a sailing theme to reflect the home’s interior decoration and placement as the centerpiece of an exclusive sailing community.

We also provided interfaces to the MAX server and Matrix Distributed Audio throughout the house. This installation was featured as part of Coastal Living magazine’s 10th Anniversary Idea House in their November 2007 issue.

Pushing the Envelope
We look forward to developing our relationship further with AMX and growing as a VIP. This program is ideal for good programmers who like working with AMX technology and want to push the envelope on what we can do with it to make life simpler for the end user.

For more information about Mayhem Media, visit them at mayhemmedia.net or contact them at info@mayhemmedia.net.