How to book studios, equipment and resolve technical issues.

How to book our facilities

All of our facilities run on a booking system called Stingray. At the start of each academic year, you’ll be allocated a certain number of advance and next-day credits to be used each week. Advanced credits can be used to book facilities up to three weeks in advance, while next-day credits can be used to make the most of last minute studio availability. Credit allocations are dependent on your course and current year of study. The studios work on a sliding scale where the smaller spaces, for example Audient Studio 1, costs less credits (25) than Spirit Studio (50). Credits are refreshed each week and cannot be carried over. 

Booking a studio in Stingray

• Login in to Stingray using your student number as your username, and the same password you’ve set for all of your Spirit Studios logins.
• You’ll see three tabs; Home, My Schedule and Bookings. Head to Bookings. The page will look similar to this, depending on which facilities you currently have access to.

• To check the availability of your chosen facility, click on its name and you’ll see the schedule for the next three weeks.

• Studios are booked in hour-long slots. To book, click on the hours you want and press the “Make/Update Booking/s” button below in the week you want to book.
• Your bookings will now show up in the “Home” tab and you’ll be sent a confirmation email. 
• If you want to add or change hours, go back to the booked studio in the “Bookings” tab and make your changes there.

If you can’t make your booking for whatever reason, be sure to cancel it on the Stingray portal or contact reception. 

How to book out equipment

We use Cheqroom for the management of all sign-out equipment. Cheqroom allows you to see what items we have in our stock by category, what the status of items are (i.e. available, already booked out, out for repair etc.) and make reservations for items. It isn’t used to book out facilities (see above). 

• To start a new reservation, click the plus button next to the search bar at the top of the page and select “reservation”.

• In the location box there will be three options. Please note you cannot take equipment from Spirit Studio and the Venue into other facilities in the building:
  – Sign-out stock (all equipment at reception for all facilities)
  – Charlie Jones Live Venue (equipment in the venue cupboard) 
  – Spirit Studio (Equipment in Spirit Studio cupboard)

• Next, make sure the facility, time and date of your reservation match your Stingray booking.
• Start by adding items in the equipment section. You can search by item or by category and you can keep adding as if it’s a shopping basket.

• Once you have added all the items you would like to take out, press reserve in the top right corner. If you want to make any changes you can find the reservation in your dashboard or the reservations tab. Click into it and press edit reservation. 
• When you come in to use the facilities, the on-shift Studio Assistant will wait for you to arrive and then check out the equipment you have reserved.

How to report a fault

Although our studios and equipment are well maintained and regularly checked, sometimes faults can occur. The Technical Support Centre is the place to go if you are having problems with our facilities and IT Services, or would like to report a fault.

If you find a fault during a session that is affecting your time in the facility, in the first instance you can go to reception and ask a Studio Assistant or Technical Support staff to help resolve the issue. Alternatively you can browse the knowledgebase FAQs in the Technical Support Centre, which may help you quickly self-solve any technical problems you’re having. 

If a member of the Tech Team isn’t available or you’re unable to resolve the issue yourself, you can “open a new ticket” and report the fault online using the Technical Support Centre. It will then be resolved by a member of the Tech Team as soon as possible.

Reporting a fault

• In the Technical Support Centre, at the top of the page, select “open a new ticket”.

• After you have filled out your contact information, select “03. Studio/equipment faults” from the Help Topic drop down menu.

• Here you can provide information about the fault including location or item, description and attach files or photos to help resolve the issue. 
• The fault will now be in the hands of the Tech Team who will work to resolve the issue as soon as possible. You will be notified once your issue has been resolved. You can also check a ticket status by selecting the “Check Ticket Status” tab at the tab of the page.

Technical Resources

You can find many technical resources documents and guides in the Technical Resources Google Classroom. 

As always we’re open seven days a week for you to come and use our studios, edit suites, DJ booths and live venue.