Snell & Wilcox announced that French production company SOFT, based in Lyon, was using the Kahuna SD/HD multiformat production switcher to expand the HD handling and output capacity in its new 14-camera outside broadcast (OB) unit.
The system is configured with two control surfaces, one 4-M/E (mix/effects banks) board and one 1-M/E board, as well as an IMPAKT 3D DVE card. The twin-channel 3D DVE enables both background and fill-and-key manipulation. The IMPAKT provides a variety of effects including spheres, slabs, zooms, warps, tiling, ripples, rolls and peels, fragmentation, lighting effects and corner pinning.
When SOFT’s OB unit is required to provide more than one feed, the Kahuna enables not only simultaneous outputting of HD and SD, but also the creation of feeds customized for multiple clients. The switcher is installed alongside a variety of HDTV signal processing components from the Snell & Wilcox IQ Modular range. The HD IQ modules perform a range of tasks, such as audio mux and demux, decoding, synchronizing and distribution.
Also incorporated into the truck are 14 cameras and 15 record servers, including five slow-motion engines. SOFT put the OB truck into operation on July 1.
