Last updated: August 2026. Written by Asi Vidal, founder of Angels Music Productions (Valley Village, CA). QSC and Shure certified. Running events across Los Angeles and the West Coast since 2015.
Audio-visual equipment rental means renting the projectors, screens, sound systems, microphones, LED walls, and event lighting you need for one event, with delivery, setup, and pickup handled by the rental company. In Los Angeles, most event AV rentals run from a few hundred dollars for a projector and screen up to several thousand dollars for a full production with sound, lighting, and video.
That is the short version. Below is everything people ask us before they book, in the order they usually ask it.
A real audio visual equipment rental service includes more than the gear. It includes delivery to the venue, setup before your guests arrive, a technician or an on-call number during the event, and breakdown after. Some companies drop gear at the curb and leave. Ask which one you are getting before you compare prices.
Here is what a full-service AV rental usually covers:
Number seven is the one people skip. A spare projector, a spare mic, and a spare speaker cost the company almost nothing to bring, and they are the difference between a small problem and a ruined ceremony.
Prices vary by gear, guest count, venue access, and how many hours of labor the job takes. These are typical Los Angeles ranges for a single-day event.
| What you are renting | Typical LA day rate | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Basic projector rental, 3,000 to 5,000 lumens | $250 to $450 | Fine for a small room with the lights down |
| Bright projector rentals, 8,000 to 12,000 lumens | $600 to $1,400 | For ballrooms and rooms with ambient light |
| Laser projector rental, 10,000 lumens and up | $900 to $2,500 | No lamp to fail, better color, quiet |
| Projector screen on rent, 6 by 8 tripod | $75 to $150 | Small rooms only |
| Fast fold screen, 7.5 by 13 or larger | $350 to $800 | Includes dress kit and skirt |
| Projector and screen for hire as a package | $450 to $1,500 | Cheaper than renting the two separately |
| Basic PA with two speakers and a mic | $250 to $500 | Speeches and background music |
| Full event sound for 150 to 300 guests | $800 to $2,500 | Subs, mics, mixer, tech |
| Event lighting rental, 12 uplights | $300 to $600 | Wireless battery units, no cable runs |
| Full dance floor lighting package | $995 to $3,800 | Moving heads, wash, controller, tech |
| LED video wall | $2,500 and up | Priced by panel count and rigging |
Labor, delivery, and after-hours pickup are usually separate line items. In Los Angeles, expect delivery and setup to add $150 to $500 depending on distance, load-in difficulty, and whether the venue requires a late-night strike.
Brightness is the number one thing people get wrong. Lumens are the measure, and the right number depends on how much light is in the room and how big your image is.
| Situation | Lumens you need |
|---|---|
| Small meeting room, 30 to 50 people, lights dimmed | 3,500 to 5,000 |
| Hotel ballroom, house lights at half, 100 to 200 guests | 6,000 to 10,000 |
| Large ballroom, big screen, lights up for dinner | 10,000 to 20,000 |
| Outdoors after dark, backyard or patio | 8,000 to 15,000 |
| Outdoors in daylight | A projector will not work. Rent an LED wall instead. |
A 3,500 lumen projector that looked great in your office will look washed out and gray in a lit ballroom. If your event has dinner service happening while a slideshow plays, you need light on the tables and light on the screen, and only a bright projector solves that.
The second thing to check is throw distance. A projector needs a certain distance from the screen to fill it, and every lens is different. Give your rental company the room dimensions and where the projector can physically sit. If it has to sit far back in the room, or very close, you need a specific lens, not a different projector.
The difference comes down to the light source. Traditional video projectors use a lamp. Laser projectors use a solid-state laser light source.
| Â | Lamp projector | Laser projector |
|---|---|---|
| Light source life | Around 1,500 to 4,000 hours | Around 20,000 hours |
| Risk of failure mid event | Real. Lamps fail with no warning | Very low |
| Brightness over time | Dims noticeably as the lamp ages | Holds steady |
| Color consistency | Shifts as the lamp ages | Consistent |
| Warm up and shut down | Needs a few minutes each way | Instant on and off |
| Noise | Louder fans | Usually quieter |
| Rental cost | Lower | Higher |
Rent a lamp projector when: the event is short, the room is small, the content is a slideshow, and budget matters most.
Rent a laser projector when: the projection is a centerpiece of the event, the room is large or bright, you are running content for many hours, or a failure mid-event would be a serious problem. Weddings, Bar and Bat Mitzvahs, corporate keynotes, and projection mapping all fall here.
Two simple rules will get the size right.
Rule one: viewing distance. The person farthest from the screen should sit no more than about six times the screen height away. So a screen that is 7.5 feet tall works for viewers up to about 45 feet back.
Rule two: screen height off the floor. The bottom of the screen should sit at least four feet off the ground. If it sits lower, everyone past row three sees the back of someone’s head instead of your content.
Common rental screen sizes:
| Screen | Format | Good for |
|---|---|---|
| 6 by 8 tripod | 4:3 | Under 40 people, small rooms |
| 7.5 by 10 fast fold | 4:3 | 50 to 100 people |
| 7.5 by 13 fast fold | 16:9 | 100 to 200 people, standard for video |
| 9 by 16 fast fold | 16:9 | 200 to 400 people |
| 12 by 21 fast fold | 16:9 | Large ballrooms and general sessions |
Front projection vs rear projection. Front projection puts the projector in the room, which means a light path guests can walk through and a shadow risk. Rear projection puts the projector behind the screen, which looks cleaner and keeps the stage clear, but it needs floor space behind the screen. If your venue has the room, rear projection almost always looks better.
Dress kit and skirt. A screen with a black dress kit and a floor skirt looks finished. A bare screen frame on a bare tripod looks like a classroom. It usually costs very little to add.
Renting a projector and screen for hire as one package is almost always cheaper and safer than renting them separately from two places. You get one company matching the lens to the throw distance, the aspect ratio to the content, and the brightness to the room, and one company responsible if the image does not look right.
A standard projector and screen package should include the projector, the correct lens, the screen with a dress kit, a stand or rigging, an HDMI or SDI run long enough to reach your laptop position, a switcher if you have more than one source, and a confidence monitor if someone is presenting with their back to the screen.
Ask for the cable run length before the day. The single most common problem at events is a laptop that ends up 60 feet from a projector with a 25-foot cable.
Event lighting rental covers everything from simple uplighting around a room to full dance floor production. Here is what each piece actually does.
Uplighting. LED fixtures placed on the floor along the walls, aimed up. They change the color of the entire room, and they are the highest impact per dollar in event lighting. Wireless battery units run 8 to 10 hours and need no cable runs, which matters in venues that will not let you tape cable across walkways. Most rooms need 12 to 24 units.
Wash lighting. Broad, even light over the dance floor, the head table, or a stage. This is what makes photos and video look good. Without it, your photographer is shooting into darkness and using flash all night.
Pin spots. Narrow beams aimed at centerpieces, the cake, or the head table. Small detail, big difference in photos.
Moving heads. Motorized fixtures that pan, tilt, and change color and pattern. This is dance floor energy. They need a controller and someone running them, or a program set in advance.
Monogram or gobo projection. Your names, a date, or a logo projected on a wall or dance floor. Needs a clean surface and enough throw distance.
Haze. A light haze makes beams visible in the air. Check with the venue first. Many Los Angeles venues have smoke detectors that will trip, and some require a fire watch. Ask before you assume.
String and bistro lighting. For outdoor and tented events. Needs rigging points and a power plan.
These are the local details that turn a smooth setup into an expensive one.
Load-in windows. Many LA hotels and venues give you a fixed window, sometimes only two hours before doors. If your AV needs four hours to build, you need to negotiate that window before you sign the venue contract, not after.
Freight elevators and stairs. Ask if there is a freight elevator, what it measures, and whether it is shared. A 16-foot truss section does not fit in a passenger elevator.
In-house AV requirements. Some hotels and convention spaces require you to use their in-house AV provider, or charge an outside vendor fee if you do not. Get this in writing early. It can change your budget by thousands.
Union labor. Certain convention centers and large venues require union crews for load-in and rigging. Your rental company should know which ones and price accordingly.
Power. A 20 amp circuit runs a limited amount of gear. Large lighting and video setups need dedicated circuits or a distro tie-in. For outdoor events at private homes, you almost always need a generator, and a quiet one if there are speeches.
Sound curfews. Many Los Angeles venues and residential neighborhoods enforce a cutoff for amplified sound, often around 10 p.m. outdoors. Confirm the rule with your venue and plan the timeline around it rather than finding out at 9:45.
Parking and rigging fees. Truck parking at some LA venues is a real line item. So is rigging if anything hangs from the ceiling.
When two quotes are far apart, one of these is usually the reason:
Ask every company these five questions and the quotes become comparable:
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Book four to eight weeks out for standard events. For peak wedding season, holiday parties in December, and graduation weekends, book three to six months out. Popular gear like large fast-fold screens and laser projectors goes first, and last-minute orders usually cost more.
Yes, most companies offer a dry hire where you pick up the gear yourself. It is cheaper, but you are responsible for cable runs, focus, sizing, and anything that goes wrong. For a business meeting, it is fine. For a wedding or a Bar Mitzvah, it is not worth the risk.
You need one any time content is being shown live, multiple sources are switching, microphones are being passed around, or lighting is being run to a program. For a static slideshow in a small room, you can usually get by without one.
A 7.5 by 13 foot screen in 16:9 covers most rooms with 150 guests, as long as the bottom of the screen sits at least four feet off the floor. If your room is long and narrow, move up to a 9 by 16.
No. Sunlight overwhelms any projector on the market. For daytime outdoor video, you need an LED wall, which produces its own light and stays visible in direct sun.
For most rooms, yes. Uplighting changes how the entire space reads in person and in photos, and it is one of the least expensive items on an AV order. Twelve to twenty-four fixtures transform a plain ballroom.
A laser projector uses a solid-state light source rated for around 20,000 hours, holds its brightness and color, turns on and off instantly, and will not fail from a blown lamp. A lamp projector costs less to rent but dims over time and carries a real risk of lamp failure.
Angels Music Productions delivers across Los Angeles County and the surrounding areas, including the San Fernando Valley, Westside, Downtown, Orange County, and points along the West Coast. Distance beyond the local area is quoted as a travel line item.
Have these five things ready, and any AV company can quote you accurately in one call:
Angels Music Productions is based in Valley Village and handles audio-visual rentals, projector rentals, event lighting rental, LED walls, sound systems, and projection mapping across Los Angeles and the West Coast. Call 949.394.2572 or request a quote.
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