The high-definition images of the 79th Academy Awards telecast, which aired on Sunday, February 25, were broadcast around the world with Grass Valley high-definition equipment from Thomson, just as they have for the past five years. This year’s HDTV broadcast of the Oscars was aired live in the US on ABC from the Kodak Theatre in Hollywood, in 720p HD format.
Mobile production facilities were provided by NEP Supershooters, which operated two of its all-digital HD mobile units, “Silver” and “Gold,” onsite for the main awards presentation telecast. The company’s “SS25” production truck was also employed to cover celebrities arriving as part of ABC’s pre-show “Red Carpet” coverage. All three trucks are equipped with Grass Valley multi-format HD production equipment and systems, including HD cameras, switchers, servers, routers, and conversion modules.
More than 20 Grass Valley LDK 6000 mk II WorldCam HD cameras were used throughout the Kodak Theatre in connection with Silver and Gold mobile units, along with two Grass Valley Kalypso Video Production Center switchers—one handling the 16:9 HD broadcast and the other handling the 4:3 SD show for analog viewers. Both trucks employed several Grass Valley PVS 2000 HD Profile XP Media Platform servers, Grass Valley SMS7000 and Concerto Series routers, as well as a full complement of Grass Valley Kameleon signal processing and conversion modules. NEP Supershooters' SS25 used a dozen LDK 6000 WorldCam cameras, a Kalypso HD switcher, and is equipped with the new GeckoFlex HD signal processing system.
For the live stage show inside the Kodak Theatre, video server company ProQue operated four Grass Valley PVS 2000 HD Profile servers and a mix of five PDR 200 and PDR 300 MPEG SD servers. All servers were controlled by ProQue’s Prodisk proprietary system. The servers provided random-access playback for the show’s pre-taped segments, commercials, and billboard packages, as well as the dozens of film clips that were shown onscreen during the telecast. ProQue has used the Profile server to support both the Academy Awards and Grammy telecasts (initially in SD and more recently in HD) each year for the last 11 years.
