BOCA RATON, FLORIDA—Pine Crest School has added three JVC GY-HC900 Connected Cam camcorders to deliver content to students and families, via Vimeo, on the school’s website and social media accounts.
The acquisition is part of the school’s mission to provide a superior curriculum balanced with immersive arts and athletics. This includes media production for Pine Crest Television (PCTV) and Pine Crest News Network (PCNN), which operate from the Fort Lauderdale-based high school and two middle schools, respectively.
For its media production the school has been using equipment from JVC Professional Video for more than a decade. Given the need to provide live sports production feeds amid the pandemic, the school is planning to expand its streaming capabilities by adding GY-HC500 Connected Cams in the new school year.
With advanced streaming features and built-in SRT functionality, JVC Connected Cam solutions offer the school a high-end approach to online production while still working off the limited bandwidth found within the schools.
“We love the added benefit of having the directional video, communications and streaming built directly into the Connected Cam cameras,” said Dave Burgess, director of digital media production at Pine Crest School. “The increased quality and reduction in the amount of bandwidth needed, along with the ability to not have dropped frames on remotes, is really something; it’s very cool.”
Burgess also stressed that the JVC equipment gives them the ability to broadcast from the athletic field on the school’s standard WiFi network. This makes it possible to broadcast through a non-dedicated access point, to which one or all three cameras can connect. That same access point then makes it possible for the control room team to see and manage the video. “Now, we don't have to drive our truck out there and pull fiber optic cable,” he says. “We avoid the long setup times typically necessary to do a production.”
The new GY-HC900 cameras will be used by staff and students for a mix of ENG and live production needs, including live remote broadcasting and the coverage of events, such as ballet and sports.
According to Burgess, the design ergonomics, consistency between cameras and ease-of-use of the JVC equipment is a beneficial feature for the students. “You can really teach students on one JVC camera and they will be able to pick up any JVC camera,” he said. “From a teaching standpoint, that’s huge.”
The school has exclusively purchased JVC equipment over the past decade, including JVC GY-HM100, GY-HM170 and GY-HM710 ProHD camcorders as well as GY-HM200 and GY-LS300 4KCAM camcorders, many of which are still in-use today.
The school also utilizes its JVC DT-X71Cl monitors in various capacities. In addition to the sports and education aspects of the Pine Crest productions, Burgess and his team also utilize the JVC equipment for various in-house communications requests.
