Sky Racing, a provider of horse racing telecasts to millions of viewers in Australia and around the globe, has contracted with Grass Valley to design and build three new mobile production trucks that are specially designed to handle the rough terrain and hot weather conditions of the country’s state of Queensland (the northeastern section of the continent). The new trucks will be used to help televise some of the more than 83,000 races that Sky Racing covers each year.
The deal includes system training and a multi-year Service Level Agreement. It’s also the largest OB truck design and systems integration order to date for Grass Valley, and includes a full complement of Grass Valley HD live production equipment and systems all tightly networked that will be installed on each mobile unit.
Construction of the three OB vans, with an option for a fourth, is now under way in Melbourne. The order was placed in September 2011, and the three trucks are planned to hit the road in Queensland by the beginning of 2012. They will each feature the latest Grass Valley HD live production technologies, including 19 LDK 4000 HD cameras (with Grass Valley’s 3G Triax transmission system), Kayak HD digital production switchers, multiple K2 Dyno Replay Systems, a Concerto series video router, and a series of products from the GeckoFlex family of signal processing modules. Yamaha digital audio consoles and an Apantac multiviewer system are also being installed.
