NRJ TV Finds Versatile Solution in HARMAN Studer Vista 1 Digital Console

PARIS, France – NRJ TV has recently purchased a HARMAN Studer Vista 1 digital console for its television control room. NRJ TV has a television control room and two studios to manage the production of its NRJ 12 channels, Chérie 25 and NRJ Hits. Both channels broadcast news and live shows every day.

According to Cédric Drapeau, Technical Manager, it was important to upgrade to a console that could sustain the network’s production growth. “We have a variety of programming that takes place here at NRJ 12 and Chérie 25, so we need equipment that provides a high level of versatility to meet our varying needs,” he said.

To that end, NRJ chose the Studer Vista 1 digital console, which fits perfectly into the network’s technical environment.

The audio configuration of the two studios is based on an EtherSound network, allowing for easy routing and management of signals between the two TV studios and the control table. The Vista 1 has an EtherSound connection that can control over 32 inputs and 32 outputs to perfectly interface into the network.

The Vista 1 is highly suited to broadcast applications, with an integral DSP engine of 96 channels. The Vista 1 can handle mono, stereo and 5.1 inputs with ease, and is provided with 32 mic/line inputs, 16 line outputs and eight stereo AES inputs and outputs on rear panel connections.

The Vista 1 contains many of the same features as its larger brother, the Vista 5, including the patented Vistonics™ user interface plus features such as true broadcast monitoring, talkback, red light control, GPIO, N-x (Mix Minus) busses, snapshot automation and DAW control.

The Vista 1’s I/O can be expanded using the standard Studer D21m I/O controller’s card slot on the rear, to allow a wide range of protocols including MADI, AES, AoIP, ADAT, TDIF, CobraNet, Dolby E/Digital and SDI connections. A MADI link can connect to any of the Studer Stagebox range for XLR connectivity as well as other formats.

HARMAN (www.harman.com) designs, manufactures and markets premier audio, visual, infotainment and integrated control solutions for the automotive, consumer and professional markets. With leading brands including AKG®, Harman Kardon®, Infinity®, JBL®, Lexicon® and Mark Levinson ®, the Company is admired by audiophiles, musicians and the entertainment venues where they perform. More than 25 million automobiles on the road today are equipped with HARMAN audio and infotainment systems. HARMAN has a workforce of approximately 16,000 people across the Americas, Europe, and Asia and reported sales of $5.3 billion for the twelve months ended June 30, 2014.

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MIKO Event Equips New 15-Ton OB Van with HARMAN’s Studer Vista 1 Digital Console

TELFS, Austria – Austrian OB broadcast specialist MIKO Event & Rental has purchased a HARMAN’s Studer Vista 1 for installation in a newly configured OB van. The hub of a fully redundant system, the all-in-one Studer control package—which had been one of the specification prerequisites—has provided MIKO with a ideal solution.

The company runs a fleet of trucks that provide outside broadcast services, mainly for ORF, the Austrian public service broadcaster, and Red Bull Media House, the multi-platform media company with a focus on sports, culture, and lifestyle.

The new MF11D 15-ton Ü-Wagen (OB van) has been designed as a hybrid solution for video and Internet broadcasts or as high-quality radio. The sound infrastructure can also support complete live recording (up to 7.1). Originally built by Krämer in Germany it was rebuilt by MIKO to handle these video broadcasts.

According to Michael Kogler, who founded MIKO Event & Rental in 1991, “Although the truck was built for a total weight of 15 tons, we reduced it to 12 tons to give us fewer limitations—leaving around 1.5 tons available for other equipment.”

He immediately highlights a key advantage of the Vista 1. “Our previous console weighed 600kg and required 2,100W of power [as well as its own conditioning circuit]. The Vista 1, run in conjunction with our existing Studer MADI Compact Stagebox (CSB), is substantially more economical on weight and power draw—and it doesn’t need an air conditioning circuit. So we can drop the electric power consumption from 3-phase 400V-32A to 16A.

“But best of all in Austria the climate is only extremely warm in July and August, so we only need to circulate fresh air; it means we can drop the electric power consumption again to a single phase 230V-16A—this is really amazing for such a truck!”

Following on from their existing 3.5-ton Ü-Wagen, MIKO believe this is the logical progression to enable image handling and allow third video production companies to rent space and install their own equipment (whereupon the sound area can be compacted if necessary). Kogler adds that it also provides their technicians with a more enjoyable experience when handling events ranging from Ski Alpine to live music events and other high profile TV shows for ORF.


“Having an all-in-one package such as Vista 1 means that this compact control platform can be used as a standalone system outside the truck—for example at classical and musical sound reinforcement events—and also places where the ÜW cannot go, such as high up in the mountains or on a ship,” he continued.

“We really like the Vista’s compact form factor, its ease of use and the excellent sound quality and we are now looking forward to adding the Vista FX option.”

Meanwhile, the existing CSB, with 48 Mic/Line In and 16 Line Out, is linked via two Neutrik DuoCon Extreme 150m long fibre cables.

The new MF11D Mainframe was commissioned at the beginning of April and used successfully for an ORF and RAI Bolzano worship transmission. Then on April 19, the first live ski transfer from St. Anton in the Arlberg region was tackled successfully with Pilger Film-und Videoproduktion from Innsbruck renting the van.

In conclusion Michael Kogler confirms that the MIKO technicians are satisfied that the Vista 1 meets all their technical requirements, while the OB-van itself conforms to the ARD SWR and VBG BGI -811 standards for Ü-Wagens.

HARMAN designs, manufactures, and markets a wide range of infotainment and audio solutions for the automotive, consumer, and professional markets. It is a recognized world leader across its customer segments with premium brands including AKG®, Harman Kardon®, Infinity®, JBL®, Lexicon®, and Mark Levinson® and leading-edge connectivity, safety and audio technologies. The Company is admired by audiophiles across multiple generations and supports leading professional entertainers and the venues where they perform. More than 25 million automobiles on the road today are equipped with HARMAN audio and infotainment systems. HARMAN has a workforce of 14,800 people across the Americas, Europe, and Asia and reported sales of $4.7 billion for the last twelve months ended December 31, 2013.

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Media Prima Malaysia Takes HARMAN Studer Vista 1 Digital Console

Media Prima Berhad Directors of Audio Engineering,
Mohd Zaidi (right) and Nur Azrin (left).

KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia – Media Prima Berhad, Malaysia's leading integrated media investment group, recently purchased a HARMAN Studer Vista 1 for multipurpose usage throughout all the Media Prima companies. This was supplied by HARMAN Professional’s local distributor, Mahajak Trio Electronic Sdn Bhd, and was the first Vista 1 to be delivered and commissioned in Malaysia.

According to Mahajak Trio Senior Manager, Sales and Projects, Lee Chin Kah, a reliable, highly flexible and cost-effective solution had been required by the station and Studer represented one of the best choices, with its reputation for reliability and sound quality. The station has been using Studer platforms since starting out in 1984, when they adopted early analogue consoles.

“Studer’s reputation is legendary in the audio industry and the all-in-one Vista 1 console fitted the needs of our customer perfectly, containing all the advanced features of the Vista range, including surround 5.1, within the budget,” he said.

This function is one of the features the station had been eagerly awaiting within this price range, and as a result Media Prima will be able to migrate from stereo to surround sound mixing.

In addition, they noted that Vista 1 was extremely user-friendly, with an easy-to-learn Vistonics™ user interface and unique functionality, with 40 on-screen rotary knobs. Using Studer’s unique Virtual Surround Panning, the operator can take mono sources and create a realistic sound field.

The Vista 1 is a transportable all-in-one digital mixing console for broadcast, live and production use, with the control surface, I/O system, DSP and power supplies all contained within the console. This makes it the ideal choice when space is restricted, such as in OB and ENG vans. The Studer Vista 1 also features a redundant PSU for peace of mind, and RELINK integration with other Studer Vista and OnAir consoles means the Vista 1 can easily share signals across an entire console network. Two expansion slots for standard Studer D21m I/O cards may be used for interfaces connecting to popular formats, including CobraNet or Aviom A-Net, Ethersound, Dante, Dolby E and MADI I/O.

Another key feature is the Studer VistaMix, which is also available for Vista1. VistaMix offers a unique solution by mimicking the action of a human operator, increasing gain for 'talking' mics and reducing gain for all others, quickly keeping the amount of total gain constant; even when several people are speaking, a clean live mix can be created. VistaMix also offers the ideal solution for news operations when multiple mics are installed in the studio but the desk operator is not sure which ones will be used. Vista Mix switches on only those mics that are in use, with an enable function that is faster than human mixing.

According to Director of Audio Engineering, Nur Azrin, the learning curve with the Vista 1 was minimal, and the intuitive Vistonics interface and FaderGlow™ made it easy for the sound engineer to operate compared with other digital consoles on the market. But most importantly, he confirms, the sound quality is the best and the support is excellent. “We are in the process of adding the D21m AES EBU I/O card slot on the rear of the console to expand our AES I/O channels. It takes us less than a minute for the console to recognise the new I/O’s, just by pressing the ‘Reconfig’ button on the rear of the console. It’s so user-friendly to configure. Another advantage is that the Studer stagebox can be used or interchanged between Studer and Soundcraft, since we have few Soundcraft Si Performer digital mixers — so it will save the expense of buying another stagebox,” added Mr Azrin.

“We have had no hesitation in recommending the Vista1 to customers based on the excellent quality of the sound and the inbuilt sound processing,” he summarized. “It offers one of the best price-to-performance ratios and this was a vital aspect, as it allowed us to fulfill the customer’s requirement — namely for flexibility and cost-effective sound for all video production.”

HARMAN designs, manufactures, and markets a wide range of infotainment and audio solutions for the automotive, consumer, and professional markets. It is a recognized world leader across its customer segments with premium brands including AKG®, Harman Kardon®, Infinity®, JBL®, Lexicon®, and Mark Levinson® and leading-edge connectivity, safety and audio technologies. The Company is admired by audiophiles across multiple generations and supports leading professional entertainers and the venues where they perform. More than 25 million automobiles on the road today are equipped with HARMAN audio and infotainment systems. HARMAN has a workforce of 14,800 people across the Americas, Europe, and Asia and reported sales of $4.7 billion for the last twelve months ended December 31, 2013.

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HARMAN’s Studer Touts VistaMix, Lexicon Effects and StuderBroadcastAcademy.com at CCW Expo

NEW YORK, New York – HARMAN’s Studer will be exhibiting at the Content and Communications World (CCW) Expo in New York City on November 13-14, showcasing its Vista 1 digital console, which is now available with VistaMix and Lexicon effects. Studer is also promoting the online version of its Studer Broadcast Academy.

Instead of needing to manually adjust all the faders each time, VistaMix automatically mimics the action of a human operator so the 'talking' mic gain can be increased at lightning speed while reducing gain for all others — ensuring a clean balanced mix.

Studer has added Lexicon effects to the Vista 1 console through an integrated VistaFX engine. VistaFX is a suite of effects processing engines capable of providing high-quality world-renowned Lexicon effects, and was released last year as an external engine for the Vista 5 and Vista 9 consoles ranges. The Vista 1 FX engines are all integral to the consoles DSP system, so require no external signal connection or patching. As all the hardware required already exists within the console, the new functionality is available as a software upgrade to existing consoles as well as provided as standard in new systems, and without loss of mix processing power or I/O capacity.

In addition, Studer will be promoting the online edition of its Broadcast Academy training course at StuderBroadcastAcademy.com. The popular and informative training program has been previously held in the United States on the Soundcraft Studer mobile audio truck, which has visited numerous locations of Studer regional sale rep firms and flagship Studer customers in recent years.

StuderBroadcastAcademy.com is an interactive online course for engineers worldwide to learn the operation of the company’s Vista Series digital mixing consoles. The course consists of a series of modules, which participants must complete and pass 100 percent to officially certify as a Studer Vista Operator. The course is structured in an interactive format and students can download the Virtual Vista software that gives them a graphic, active representation of a Vista console. Virtual Vista can also be used for offline console configuration and online remote control of Vista mixing consoles. Video segments, system and technical diagrams, a dictionary of terms and other resources round out the program.

“I’ve found Studer consoles to be very user-friendly, intuitively laid out and much easier to operate than a lot of digital consoles out there,” said Brian Pannier, a freelance audio engineer who has recently been using a Studer Vista 1 on “The Crowd Goes Wild” program on FOX Sports. “Just as importantly, the sound quality is top-notch and we’re using the Vista 1 to its complete and full capacity and it’s performing great.”

Studer will be exhibiting at CCW Expo at booth 1149.

To book an appointment, please email studer-usa@harman.com

HARMAN (www.HARMAN.com) designs, manufactures, and markets a wide range of infotainment and audio solutions for the automotive, consumer, and professional markets. It is a recognized world leader across its customer segments with premium brands including AKG®, Harman Kardon®, Infinity®, JBL®, Lexicon®, and Mark Levinson® and leading-edge connectivity, safety and audio technologies. The company is admired by audiophiles across multiple generations and supports leading professional entertainers and the venues where they perform. More than 25 million automobiles on the road today are equipped with HARMAN audio and infotainment systems. HARMAN has a workforce of about 14,000 people across the Americas, Europe, and Asia and reported sales of $4.3 billion for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2013.

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VGTRK Takes HARMAN Studer Vista 1 for New Samara OB Van

SAMARA, Russia – The project team of RTV-RTC has carried out the installation of a new OB van for Russian broadcaster, VGTRK at its Samara base, featuring a HARMAN Studer Vista 1 all-in-one console.

The 12-camera van was commissioned in September this year with the audio and intercom design masterminded by RTV-RTC’s Alexander Yankovsky.

The Studer system comprises a 32-fader desk with optical MADI card and Studer Compact Stagebox, with 32 mic/line inputs and 16 line outputs. An Si Compact 16 with optical MADI card, from HARMAN Professional sister company Soundcraft, has been supplied as a backup audio mixer.

 RTV-RTC won the tender for the design and construction of the mobile television studio for VGTRK back at the end of 2012. This 10+2 HD camera truck has been designed for all types of OB filming and recording of social and political events, concerts and performance as well as shooting sporting events throughout the Middle Volga region.

“We recommended Vista1 to our customer based on the excellent quality of the sound and the inbuilt sound processing,” stated Yankovsky. “It offers one of the best price/function ratios — and this was a very important aspect, as it allowed us to put into practice the customer’s requirement, namely, flexible and cost-effective sound for video production possibilities.

“The other attraction was the user-friendly and logical Vistonics™ interface. The work of a sound director in live broadcast can be compared to the work of an aircraft pilot — needing to control numerous parameters in real time, and provide a swift override of the process if something goes wrong. Vistonics can handle this easily.”

The new OB van will produce two independent television programmes, including live broadcast and is designed to work in HDTV format, with the ability to switch to HD / SD. It has been designed on a two-axle trailer chassis with a total body length of 12.3 metres, with dedicated rooms for audio, video, engineering and computer room / rack room. There are also two external commentator positions with two-way signal delivery via Telecast T-POV receiving and transmission sets.

As for audio, the main Vista 1 has been integrated into the MADI router through two optical MADI connections, which provide all the necessary sources. The mixing console, with the Vistonics™ user interface and 40 on-screen rotary knobs, has built-in signal processing, 32 -fader direct access and signal level meters on each channel.

In fact everything is contained within the console — the control surface, I/O system, DSP and power supplies are all in one box making it ideal for restricted space environments such as in OB and ENG vans — or for applications where the console needs to be moved with ease. The back-up Si Compact 16 allows a basic mix of 24 channels.

In conclusion, Alexander Yankovsky added, “By using a main interchange of the sound signals via DOTEC MADI routing, we were able to achieve a very flexible audio structure as well as the integration of the backup mixer into the system.”

Other key people involved in the build were chief project (and video) engineer Evgeny Zaytsev and project engineer (power distribution), Georgy Kozhevnikov.

Further information from:

http://www.rtvcenter.ru/articles/desyatikamernaya_pts_dlya_gtrk_samara/

HARMAN (www.HARMAN.com) designs, manufactures, and markets a wide range of infotainment and audio solutions for the automotive, consumer, and professional markets. It is a recognized world leader across its customer segments with premium brands including AKG®, Harman Kardon®, Infinity®, JBL®, Lexicon®, and Mark Levinson® and leading-edge connectivity, safety and audio technologies. The company is admired by audiophiles across multiple generations and supports leading professional entertainers and the venues where they perform. More than 25 million automobiles on the road today are equipped with HARMAN audio and infotainment systems. HARMAN has a workforce of about 14,000 people across the Americas, Europe, and Asia and reported sales of $4.3 billion for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2013.

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CBC/Radio-Canada Upgrades Its Montreal Broadcast Facilities With Four HARMAN Studer Vista 1 Consoles

MONTREAL, Canada – CBC/Radio-Canada is Canada’s national public broadcaster and one of its largest cultural institutions. The Corporation is a leader in reaching Canadians on new platforms and delivers a comprehensive range of radio, television, Internet and satellite-based services. Beginning in July 2013 and continuing through 2014, CBC/Radio-Canada’s Montreal facility is undertaking an upgrade of its broadcast studios, including the purchase and installation of four HARMAN Studer Vista 1 digital mixing consoles, a Route 6000 routing and signal processing system, three Vista Compact Remote Bays and interfacing equipment. The consoles were sold through Studer distributor Soundcraft Canada.

Three 32-fader Vista 1 consoles and one 22-fader console are being installed in four separate control rooms in the Montreal video production studios: CDI Control Room 1, CDI Control Room 2, CBMT (which broadcasts English-language news) and CDI Control Room 3, which will employ the 22-fader console. Each console is configured with eight AES pairs in, eight AES pairs out, 32 mic/line in and 32 line out (including monitoring).

All four consoles will be connected to a central control room that will house a Studer Route 6000 router, seven Studer D21m high-density audio interface systems and a Studer D21 MasterSync clock. The Route 6000 can accommodate up to 1,728 x 1,728 inputs and outputs. It is fully modular and can handle a variety of formats including mic, line, AES/EBU, MADI, ADAT, TDIF, SDI and Dolby® E. An additional D21m will be located in the CMBT control room.

The consoles and components will be connected using Studer’s RELINK Resource Linking I/O Sharing System, which links together Studer consoles in various locations in a broadcast facility to allow audio source and control data sharing across a wide network. The Route 6000 will allow all the console operators to directly access all shared sources via each Vista 1’s control screen display. The Route 6000 will also be controllable from Studer’s new X-Y Panel hardware control panel and from PC workstations running Studer’s Route 1000 software.

In addition, Studer Vista Compact Remote Bays will be installed in CDI News Room 1, CDI News Room 2 and the CMBT control room to provide added mixing flexibility. The Vista Compact Remote Bay is a small, foldable unit similar to a laptop that can be used as a slave or secondary console in parallel with the main console and operated away from the main console, or even outside of the control room.

HARMAN (www.HARMAN.com) designs, manufactures, and markets a wide range of audio, lighting and infotainment solutions for the automotive, consumer, and professional markets. It is a recognized world leader across its customer segments with premium brands including AKG®, Harman Kardon®, Infinity®, JBL®, Lexicon®, and Mark Levinson®, and leading-edge connectivity, safety and audio technologies. The company is admired by audiophiles across multiple generations and supports leading professional entertainers and the venues where they perform. More than 25 million automobiles on the road today are equipped with Harman audio and infotainment systems. Harman has a workforce of about 14,300 people across the Americas, Europe, and Asia and reported sales of $4.4 billion for the fiscal year ended June 30, 2012.

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