NEW YORK -
McGraw-Hill Broadcasting Group is in the process of converting its news
operations, group-wide, to the DVCPRO P2 solid-state memory recording system
from Panasonic. The stations slated to upgrade to tape-less newsgathering
include WRTV (Indianapolis, IN), KGTV (San Diego, CA), KERO (Bakersfield, CA)
and KMGH (Denver, CO), all ABC affiliates.
Stations WRTV and KGTV have already made initial purchases of AJ-SPX800 DVCPRO
P2 shoulder-mount camcorders, AG-HVX200 DVPCRO P2 HD hand-held camcorders,
AJ-HPM100 mobile recorders, AJ-PS060G stores, internal/external P2 drives, and
P2 memory cards and accessories. In addition to news, Indianapolis station WRTV
will deploy P2 equipment for production and promotion.
As a result of the purchase, McGraw-Hill, through its affiliation with
the Azteca America Network, will also equip KXSD, the Azteca station in San
Diego, with AG-HVX200 camcorders.
Tim Boling, McGraw-Hill’s group director of engineering, says that stations
WRTV and KGTV will initially shoot news in DVCPRO25, with the option to shoot
series and long-form programming in DVCPRO50. WRTV will shoot production and
promotion pieces in DVCPRO50. The stations will use the Grass Valley NewsEdit
system and Apple’s Final Cut Pro for field editing.
“The P2 format is versatile, giving us plenty of options in terms of form
factors and scalability, including shooting in 16:9 and upconverting for high
definition news,” notes Boling. “Panasonic is expanding its line of P2 HD
products, and we’re impressed with pending products such as the AJ-HPC2000
shoulder-mount camcorder, which, with the AVC-Intra codec, will provide high
quality for news at half the bandwidth.”
Referring to the hand-held HVX200 camera, Boling says, “The small cameras are
easier to shoot with in many situations — investigative reporting, locker
rooms, overseas assignments, to cite just a few. The HVX200 also affords us the
ability to shoot HD, and we anticipate that the camera will address our initial
needs for high-definition newsgathering.”