TV Azteca signs on with Vizrt

Mexico s TV Azteca, one of the largest producers of Spanish language television programming in the world, has completed a multi-million dollar graphics upgrade over the last few months with Vizrt graphic systems. The upgrades were made to improve the programming s on-air look for its news, sports, news magazines shows, network promos and more.

The current installation includes the purchase of the latest versions of Vizrt s Viz|Artist real-time 3D animation software, Viz|Content Pilot content management and control software, Viz|Virtual Studio software for the creation of virtual studio graphics, Viz|Arenatm system for the coverage of live sports events and Viz|Engine high-performance renderer.

Based in Mexico City, TV Azteca encompasses a wide variety of Spanish-language programming, including three networks in Mexico, Azteca America in the U.S., and Azteca International, which broadcasts in Central America, South America and Spain. All TV Azteca networks will benefit from the system-wide graphics upgrade.

TV Azteca purchased its first graphics system for news and production from Vizrt in 2000. The system included Viz|Engine, Viz|Artist, Viz|Content Pilot and the MOS integration with Avid s iNews Newsroom. The Vizrt solution was used for on-air broadcasts and to render graphics sequences prior to ingestion in Avid NLE systems. With the latest upgrades, eight additional HD Viz|Engines have been installed within various TV Azteca studios. In March, Vizrt installed more than 15 Viz|Engines, five of which were used with Viz|Content Pilot and its automation interface for the network s master control operation. These machines produce promos and advertisements automated using Harris automation system. With Vizrt s family of products, we re able to design graphics, store them in the server and reuse them as many times as needed, significantly reducing the time we spend creating and finishing the project, said Rom n Gomez, General Director of Technological Development, TV Azteca. Vizrt is always there for us when we have a question about creating the effects we need to make a program look and feel a certain way. They will even come to Mexico to oversee what we are doing and train our people. They truly understand the dynamics of the television business. TV Azteca is very demanding with the level of service we require, and Vizrt meets these standards every time. At TV Azteca, teams of designers use Viz|Artist to create the on-air graphics for the company s diverse range of programming. Each team is designated to a specific program area one to sports, another to news, and one to news magazine programming. All teams create graphics that can be reused by the other design teams. The graphics from all teams are ingested into Viz|Pilot or Viz|Engine for live or replayed broadcasts. Viz|Arena and Viz|Virtual Studio have dramatically improved TV Azteca s live soccer coverage with dynamic graphics used for replays during the matches. The two Viz|Arena systems and the virtual set replace systems from other manufacturers The Vizrt systems have since improved the operation s productivity, flexibility, and speed of graphic production. TV Azteca is currently using the systems for virtually all programming. It will be used for the network s coverage of the World Cup soccer championships in June. TV Azteca will also employ the Vizrt products for the Mexican Presidential election in July. Presidential elections occur only every six years in Mexico, so TV Azteca will produce specially designed graphics for this year s election coverage, utilizing Viz|Virtual Studio for the first time to cover its country s Presidential election.