Leading provider of outsourced teleproduction services taps AJA FS1 for Super Bowl, NASCAR and NBA broadcasts
AJA Video, a leading manufacturer of professional video interface and conversion solutions, completed a sale of 60 AJA FS1 units to NEP. FS1 is the universal HD and SD, audio and video frame synchronizer and converter from AJA, and NEP is a leading provider of live event teleproduction services.
“As an outsourced service provider, it‘s important for us to purchase assets that get used a lot,” explained George Hoover, CTO, NEP. “What‘s great about the FS1 is that one week it could be an up-converter, the next week it could be a down-converter and the following week we might use a few units to embed audio. So instead of buying a $50K box that might get used once or twice a year to handle one of these tasks--I now have a reasonably priced box that is highly adaptable for a variety of uses.”
NEP first came across the AJA FS1 when they were looking for a solution to help the company take live program feeds at the Super Bowl from 720p to 1080i in real-time for transmission to multiple international networks. After testing one of the units, Hoover realized it was an ideal solution for addressing many of the on-the-fly video and audio demands that mobile truck engineers are faced with when covering live broadcast events.
“We just took 40 of our FS1s out to the Super Bowl to facilitate real time video format conversions for the international broadcast feed, and we‘ll also be putting them to use at the Hollywood Award Shows and for NASCAR racing,” said Hoover. “Our engineers look at the FS1 as the video equivalent of a Swiss army knife--it‘s just a very powerful, multi-purpose and cost effective tool to have in your arsenal.”
NEP was also drawn to the fact that the FS1 is a freestanding unit. The devices can be used alone, bundled together or grouped in towers, and they‘re very easy to operate and move around. “With some card-based solutions, if you don‘t invest in all of the remote devices, they aren‘t that user friendly. There‘s nothing special required to operate FS1, it‘s very easy to use and integrate on the fly,” concluded Hoover.
Joseph Electronics, based in Illinois and California, introduced NEP to the AJA FS1 and has been a valued business partner of AJA‘s for more than 10 years. “AJA has always delivered very reliable products and over the past decade we have provided hundreds of our clients nationwide with a broad variety of AJA solutions into the mobile production truck and high end broadcast markets. The FS1 is yet another unit from AJA that packs a lot of punch and electronic capability into a very reasonably priced package,” commented Yohay Hahamy, Senior VP and Owner of Joseph Electronics.
About FS1
The FS1 is a universal HD and SD, audio and video frame synchronizer and converter. With an extremely flexible architecture, the FS1 can simultaneously support both HD and SD video--all in full 10-bit broadcast quality video and 24-bit audio. The FS1 supports virtually any input or output as analog or digital, HD or SD. This product can up-convert or down-convert between SD and HD while providing simultaneous outputs of both formats, and supports both closed captioning and closed captioning conversions between SD and HD formats. FS1 also includes 10-bit HD to HD cross-conversion for 1080 and 720 formats. For audio, the FS1 supports 8-channel AES, balanced analog or embedded audio with full flexibility. The FS1 is also network ready, offering web-based remote control.
About AJA Video Systems, Inc.
Since 1993, AJA Video has been a leading manufacturer of high-quality and cost-effective digital video interface, conversion and Desktop solutions supporting the professional broadcast and post- production markets. With headquarters in Grass Valley, California, AJA maintains an extensive sales channel of dealers and systems integrators around the world. For further information, please see our website www.aja.com.
