The Hidden Challenges to Installing an Outdoor Screen

With such rising popularity, outdoor digital signage is becoming an important part of external marketing for many businesses. Increasingly, more and more information screens are being used outside too, especially around transport hubs, and schools and colleges. Part of the rise in outdoor screen use is due to the falling cost of LCD screens and the availability of protective systems such as

"Using outdoor screens has hidden challenges"

While it is obvious that most outdoor screens whether they are used for providing promotional material or straight information, require protection from the elements, using outdoor screens does have some hidden challenges too:

Permissions

Unless it’s on private property, you can’t just place a screen outdoors without asking permission from the relevant authorities. In some locations, this can be a nightmare, with risk assessments, planning permissions and even conservation laws to be negated, resulting in a mountain of paperwork.

Mounting a screen on your own property, such as on the side of the building, usually doesn’t require permissions, although it is always worth checking with local authorities before you go ahead as different councils have different strategies when it comes to outdoor digital signage.

Networking/Installation

Placing a screen outdoors can be tricky when it comes to finding power access and networking. Again, if connected to your own property, things should be much easier, but there could be a high installation cost of running network and power cables through walls. Using a simple solution where content is uploaded manually through a USB slot can halve the headache.

Sunlight

The sun can play havoc with outdoor screens. Not only can the sun cause glare, making screens difficult to read. The sun can also overpower the screen’s brightness, making the content virtually invisible. For this reason, any outdoor screen needs to be as bright as possible. Screen brightness is measured in candela (or nits) with standard indoors screens luminous to about 500 candela; for outdoors 12-1,500 candela should be used.

Physical Protection

Making sure an outdoor screen is secured from theft and vandalism is also necessary. Often outdoor screens are left unattended overnight or for prolonged periods so the display needs some form of physical protection such as that provided by Armagard’s LCD enclosure range.