Digitell adopts JVC's PTZ robotic camera system for coverage of educational events

The KY-PZ100 cameras have an SD card slot for local recording, integrated streaming capability, SDI output and a 30X zoom lens.

Digitell, a company that was founded more than thirty years ago in Jamestown (USA) as a provider of lecture recording, has large transnational corporate clients to whom it provides webcasting services. To do this, they use their own platform to which the signals from KY-PZ100 robotic cameras are connected. JVC.

In the events that Digitell covers, the complete JVC system is used with PTZ robotic cameras, camera controls (CCU) y remote control units. Digitell covers up to 100 events a year in various parts of the world.

“The added value that this JVC robotic camera system has represented in terms of return on investment is incredible,” he stated. Willliam Bacon, marketing director at Digitell. “They are products that provide a lot of advantages to companies like ours.”

Bacon explained that the KY-PZ100 cameras have several features that distinguish them from other robotic cameras on the market, such as their SD card slot for local recording, integrated streaming capacity, SDI output and a fantastic 30X zoom lens, more than enough to cover the vast majority of auditoriums and large convention halls. He also highlighted the smooth operation and precise motion control that the cameras' control panel provides operators, whose predetermined positions are an excellent aid to production agility. “Operators love the joystick, and it takes little time to become familiar with this camera control,” added Bacon.

Digitell currently has nine KY-PZ100 robotic cameras that the company acquired last summer to cover a multi-room event in France. Producing events using robotic cameras avoids the need to rent standard format cameras with long optics and also large tripods, greatly reducing costs.

He transport A robotic system like JVC's is also simpler and cheaper for a service company like Digitell. Bacon said in this sense that the small size of JVC's KY-PZ100 cameras allows them to be transported and shipped anywhere in the world in a small Pelican-type suitcase, including the camera, controller, tripod, encoder, audio card and cabling.

Workflow

A typical Digitel event consists of a PTZ camera mounted on a lightweight 7-leg tripod, surrounded by spreader posts with retractable straps to properly protect it. As a result, end customers do not need to rent platforms or elevators (one for the camera and another for the operator to minimize vibrations). Digitell usually implements cameras in the following way: they send the SDI signal from the camera to the encoder, on the one hand, and a graphic signal from a laptop, on the other. This way the producer can share one source or the other (or both as a double take) for the web audience. Background audio from the auditorium or conference room is also captured and taken to a Tascam table for better control and linked to the camera to be recorded locally.

Digitell, according to the conditions of each auditorium, comes to set up up to 3 JVC robotic cameras, one of them dedicated especially to public participation. Instead of using separate camera operators working on platforms or elevators scattered throughout the conference area, one of them stands next to the producer and controls the robotic PTZ cameras with the RM-LP100 control. This workflow that Digitell uses with the help of JVC cameras allows staff to be reduced and avoids the need to use intercom systems for communication between the production team.

“Having an operator close to the producer instead of on a distant stage is crucial to getting a good shot,” Bacon said. "I also consider it essential to have color balance and exposure control. The memories make it easier for the operator to work easily with the camera and generate a streaming himself," concludes Bacon.