NEW YORK—Sure Shot Transmissions is a mobile production and satellite services outfit with offices in New York, Dallas and Youngstown, Ohio. Last fall, owner Dennis Kunce added a fourth 40’ full-service expandable truck to its offerings.
The Cynthia Lee, featuring DiGiCo’s SD10B console, will handle sporting and entertainment events under the direction of Engineer-in-Charge Kory Loy. Kunce chose the SD10B based on a recommendation from ESPN, where the console has been utilized in X Games’ submix trucks.
The Cynthia Lee handled install feeds at the 39th Ryder Cup, the 2012 Allstate BCS National Championship, the Daytona 500 and the 2013 Super Bowl for Nippon TV in Japan.
“Our intention when we built the truck was to meet ESPN’s need for a mid-level production truck; one that was more like a 6-8 camera production rather than the typical 10-15 one,” said Kunce. “We worked closely with ESPN to determine what audio board would be suitable for them in this specific application.”
Kunce added, “The DiGiCo console offers us the kind of flexibility and versatility we have to have as an independent contractor working with all the major networks including NBC, Fox, Turner, ESPN, Sky Sports.”
“Even though I’m not one of the hands-on operators at these events, I do have to train, or at least show the different operators how to use the console, with only a couple days training. A lot of our events are setup, shoot and strike and in a single, 10-hour day, and I’ve got to give individuals that have never operated the console before a generic overview in 45 minutes to an hour time before I have to move on to doing other functions in the truck,” said Loy.
Sure Shot will cover major league baseball and basketball events for the major networks and ESPN, as well events as for NHK in Japan.
“We will be handling a lot of split feeds for them, the same thing as we did for the Super Bowl,” Loy said. “Nippon TV operator Shuhei Anraku took generic feeds from the NFL, supplemented by several of their own cameras, to create and produce their own game with their own announcers, which was fed to the broadcast headquarters in Japan.”
“Another benefit is that the console is scalable, you can literally have as many inputs/outputs as you want,” Loy said. “So, if we ever find a need for more ins or outs, we can add a few and connect them via fiber. Having MADI available in and out (the SD10 has 2 MADI ins and 2 MADI outs), also makes it very flexible to integrate either into a router or an intercom system. Another added benefit of DiGiCo is being able to assign any input to any fader on the console.”
For Janice Stief, a 30-year audio veteran, the Ryder Cup was her first DiGiCo experience.
“I was handling cut-ins for the Sky Sports news show back in London. I had about 8-10 mics set up around the course, from stick and RF mics to in-studio lavalieres. I was handling EVS inputs into my console for playbacks, as well as program feeds from NBC and the world feed, which added up to about 36-40 inputs on the console in addition to mikes I was controlling,” Stief said. “Prior to getting started, I was given a quick tutorial from Kory, who was fantastic and very knowledgeable. There’s a lot to the console that clearly you have got learn over time; you can’t learn it all on one show. It has a lot of depth.”
