Grass Valley’s Kayenne switcher
Apr 1, 2009 12:00 PM, By David Casper
The new switchers support today’s multifaceted productions.
Likewise, the architecture has been structured to accommodate the tight quarters of a production truck or space-limited control rooms. The switcher's control panel runs silently during operation because the cooling fans and CPU have been moved into an external panel control unit that can be located up to 50ft away.
Internal format conversion
The Kayenne includes in and out conversion features to handle any type of mixed format production. If an operator has an HD project and has to produce an SD output, he doesn't have to burn up an M/E to do so. This is accomplished via circuitry internal to the switcher. The switcher can handle both 16:9 and 4:3 aspect ratios within a single production by automatically inserting video into sidebars on 4:3 sources for 16:9 viewing.
Kayenne features a widescreen touch-screen control panel, which allows operators fast and easy navigation.
Mixed format production is handled with a feature called MatchDef, which facilitates internal input conversion (from SD to HD, or vice versa, or cross-conversion) so that the TD is always working in the same format inside the switcher. Another feature, SetDef, is used for setting the resolution of the required output. These internal converters use motion adaptor circuitry, color space conversion and other high-quality signal processing techniques.
FlexiKey allows an operator to create programmable clean feeds. Each M/E channel has four program outputs, and the user can specify which keys go on which outputs. This allows Kayenne to support multiple program feeds with different titles over the same background for multichannel applications.
The switcher is available in a range of video processing frames from 1.5 to 4.5 M/E (with the half M/E standard in all frames).
A switcher ready for today
Kayenne is being introduced at NAB 2009 with all frame and panel models immediately available. For the purist TD, many features of Grass Valley's switchers have been reintroduced. For example, the split-level arm that was used in earlier switchers is back on the Kayenne, this time for use by DoubleTake, the split M/E mode introduced with Kalypso. Now the primary and secondary M/E partitions provided by DoubleTake can be independently controlled at the same time to create captivating effects on-screen.
David Casper is the advanced development manager for production switchers and effects for Grass Valley.
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