Problem-Free Performance at Sports Stadiums Across the CountryMahwah, NJ (November 8, 2010)) − As a television production and design engineer with more than 15 years working with Telemetrics Coax Control Systems, Dwight Sturtevant has had the unique opportunity of working at every major league sports venue in the country as well as at several high profile college fields and many large entertainment sites. He’s crossed the country from east to west and north to south while on satellite media tours, and has helped design and build more than a few studios. This extensive field experience has led Mr. Sturtevant to form a list of favorite broadcast production tools, and sitting high on the list is the Telemetrics Coax Link Camera Control System.
Mr. Sturtevant stated that, as an independent production and design engineer, “My reputation is only as good as the work I do, and that can often depend on the equipment I have to work with. I recommend and use the Telemetrics Coax System because I know it is going to work - and work every time. It’s reliable, quick to set up and uses standard coax cable. There is no limitation on where to place the cameras or how much you can move them around. You just find the nearest coax drop and that’s a camera location. It is design agnostic and it doesn’t matter whether the cable run is 50 feet or 500 feet.”
It was while working as a production engineer for a satellite uplink provider that Mr. Sturtevant first gained his appreciation for the flexibility and ease of use of the Coax System. He said that set-ups for games at the old Yankee Stadium could be done the morning of the game using the Telemetrics Coax System and with just a few cameras. The cameras could be hooked up in the press box, locker room or almost anywhere in the Stadium, and moving them around during the production made it looked like they were using more cameras than there actually were and gave a feel of a larger production.
“At the various sports venues, we pull into the truck bay, hook up to the pedestal and then at any coax connection throughout the facility. The cameraman has to only hook up with a short coax cable between connection in the stadium and camera and he is ready for the show.” He added, “Using the Telemetrics System we had full camera control, including paint box, power, intercom, IFB, return audio, and so on at any pre-wired facility in the country. There are no multi-cable/multiple harness configurations to deal with when using the Coax System. Without the Telemetrics system, if the venue wasn’t pre-wired it took us more than a day to pre-cable and we were stuck with those positions and couldn’t move the cameras around. We would have to do home runs with the cables back to the production platform and this really limited flexibility.”
Compared to Triax systems, Mr. Sturtevant added that the Coax System offers the same flexibility but at a fraction of the cost. He points out that if some of the cables at the professional venues are not working, simply moving to another cable location is faster, easier and less expensive than repairing multi-cable connections. The after-sales service that Telemetrics provides also rates very highly on Mr. Sturtevant’s favorites list. He commented, “Telemetrics provides some of the best support in the industry. They’ve been around a long time and they know what they are doing. They’ll even have you send the camera and paint box to them to ensure the system will be optimized when installed.”
The Telemetrics Coax Link Camera Control system is comprised of the 55C Coax Link, 55C-BS Coax Link Base Station and the 55C-CA Camera Adapter. The system uses frequency multiplexing for signal transmission and the single cable connection between the base station and camera adapter provides optimum ease of use. Ideally suited for both permanently installed and mobile applications, the Coax System eliminates the need for video equalizers, frame synchronizers, intercom adapters, microphone phantom power and remote power supplies. And to additionally help ensure error-free transmission, bandwidth and S/N ratio can be optimized for many of the leading brand cameras. Additional options are available for pan/tilt control, non-docking adapters and HD fiber applications.
Over the course of the years, Mr. Sturtevant has also used competitive systems and has had to deal with signal drifting, loss of data control from the paint box to the camera and noisy or drifting audio on the intercom. He concluded, “I am always happy to use the Telemetrics Coax System because I know it is going to be problem-free.”
