JVC intros full HD microwave equipped camera system

JVC Professional Products Company introduced a high efficiency Full HD microwave equipped camera system that, for the first time, brings affordable HD microwave capabilities to the ENG/EFP market. The ProHD Libre system provides native 60P HD capture, recording and transmission through a compact, on board camera-back transmitter developed for JVC by Broadcast Microwave Services, Inc. (BMS). A fully equipped system, complete with camera, lens, microwave transmitter and receiver can be configured for under $30,000. Previous systems with this capability began at more than $100,000.

ENG crews now have the freedom to report live news from locations that were previously off limits due to typical cabling limitations. A crew covering the garden show, for example, can now do live standup remotes from scenes that provide more spectacular and colorful HD images than those that are near the news van. While the system is targeted at ENG news, ProHD Libre is suitable for other demanding remote EFP HD applications including live sporting events.

The ProHD Libre system features a JVC ProHD 200 series camera with built-in Super Encoder that generates a high quality MPEG-2 stream. The BMS HD Mini-Coder camera-back transmitter accepts the camera’s compressed signal at 20Mbps via the IEEE 1394 connection and modulates it at 64-QAM, then transmits COFDM with an 8MHz bandwidth in the 2GHz channel. The entire transmitter is the size of a small outboard battery and uses the same mounting hardware. The complete wireless package offers excellent weight distribution both for shoulder use and for hand-held operation. In a typical remote ENG configuration, the BMS receiver would feed the encoded ASI signal directly to the truck’s microwave for relay back to the station. No additional encoding or delay is required.

“The BMS HD Mini-Coder is a natural fit for JVC’s ProHD 200 series camcorders,” states Craig Yanagi, National Marketing Manager, Creation Products, JVC Professional Products Company. “The GY-HD200U and GY-HD250 are the only HD camcorders currently capable of delivering a broadcast quality full raster 1280×720 60p encoded transport stream over an IEEE 1394 connection at a bitrate of less than 21Mbps. A new standard in untethered acquisition can be achieved with the high quality capability and price performance this system offers.”

“We’re excited to provide transmission technology that supports JVC’s ProHD platform,” said Graham Bunney, President, Broadcast Microwave Services, Inc. “JVC’s ProHD Libre package, featuring the BMS HD Mini-Coder offers an affordable and efficient way for ENG, sports and EFP applications to transmit native progressive 60P material in high definition.”

Separately, the BMS HD Mini-Coder ProHD wireless kit, which includes both transmitter and diversity receiver, is currently available through both BMS and JVC and starts from a suggested list price of $19,900. The JVC ProHD 200 series camcorders start with the GY-HD200U at a suggested list price of $8,995 equipped with a Fujinon 16x lens.