Grass Valley Outfits New HD Truck for Detroit PBS Station

Detroit Public TV, WTVS, is building a new 35-foot HD production truck that will include a plethora of Grass Valley technology, including six Grass Valley LDK 3000 HD cameras with LCD viewfinders, a Grass Valley Kayak 2 M/E HD production switcher, and a Grass Valley K2 Dyno HD replay system.

The new HD equipment is currently being installed onboard the truck by Bennett Systems, in Sunbury, OH and is expected to be completed later this month.  The renovated truck will make its official debut on Feb. 7 at the Sphinx Competition Finals Concert at Orchestra Hall in Detroit. The HD truck will be used to cover a wide variety of local and national programs in 1080i, as well as fundraising programs for national public television audiences

“The HD truck production package selected by WTVS is perfectly suited to PBS member stations and commercial broadcasters looking for great value and reliable system performance,” said Jeff Rosica, SVP of Grass Valley. “It is clear how important image quality is to the final on-air product and WTVS understands that full bandwidth HD is the best way to ensure that its programs are not only competitive, but provide viewers with the exceptional HD quality that they expect from a PBS member station.”

The station recently built a new HD production studio, which features four Infinity Digital Media Camcorders (DMC) and a Kayak 1.5 M/E switcher in the control room. The new cameras will be used in both the studio and the field in stand-alone and system configurations. The cameras are configured with a Telecast Fiber Systems CopperHead INF fiber optic camera transceiver, which provides a fiber optic link between the DMC camcorder and WTVS’ new HD truck or production control room.

“By staying with Grass Valley technology across all of our facilities, we can share cameras from our studio for remote productions and vice versa, and maintain a consistent high-quality image throughout,” says Helge Blucher, VP of engineering at Detroit Public TV. “Plus, training will be minimal since our staff is already familiar with the Grass Valley equipment we have in house. This is critical to keeping productivity high because the staff can move between the studio and the field without having to rethink everything.

The Grass Valley LDK 3000 is a multi-format camera system that supports 1080i50/60 and 720p50/60 HD, allowing the station to use the same camera to produce HD projects in either HD format. The camera features three 2/3-inch, 2.4 million pixel CMOS imagers, specially developed for broadcast applications. The cameras use full-bandwidth HD triax transmission to allow cable runs up to 3,900 feet or 7,800 feet with a triax repeater. Like other cameras in the LDK family, it also utilizes existing accessories such as the SuperXpander long lens adapter.

The truck will also be on display at the Great Lakes Broadcasting Conference & Expo, March 2-3 in Lansing, Michigan.

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