Mitsubishi, Sony bring HD to Nationals Park

By Andrew Lippe

While New York Mets and Yankees fans await state-of-the-art
stadiums, Washington Nationals fans just have to wait until Sunday. Sunday
Night Baseball on ESPN will give MLB fans the first glimpse of
Nationals Park, including its new 4,500
square-foot Mitsubishi Electric Diamond Vision HD scoreboard that is 101-feet
wide and 47-feet high and a new scoreboard control room based on Sony gear.
“There is just no comparison between our scoreboard and the one in RFK,” says
Dave Lundin Washington Nationals scoreboard producer.

ANC Sports Enterprises and Mitsubishi Electric Diamond
Vision Systems collaborated on the creation of the scoreboard and the video
display system that displays more than one million pixels.

“It is unbelievable how crystal clear the images on the
scoreboard are,” adds Lundin. The scoreboard uses line doubling so images are
displayed in an enhanced resolution. The Video screen is part of a LED display
that also features statistics as well as sponsor graphics. The LED Displays are
operated by ANC’s VisionSOFT software.

ANC Sports Enterprises built the control room that contains
a Sony MVS-8000 production switcher. Sony cameras, including HDC-1400 and Sony
XDCAM units, capture images. The control room also has an Avid Deko 3000, Adobe
After Effects, three Apple Final Cut Pro editing systems, and an EVS replay
server. The Nationals also use ScorePAD software to provide stats.

The new stadium also includes an LED out-of-town scoreboard
on the outfield wall; an LED fascia on the main level, LED signage in the
concession club area and fascia in the bullpens. “RFK was not built with modern
presentation in mind,” adds Lundin.
Nationals
Park required more than
180,000 hours for installation of all electrical systems. The stadium is
equipped with more than three million feet of cabling and is outfitted with
14,000 lights. The stadium capacity is 41,222 seats which is a little bit less
then RFK Stadium where the capacity was 46,000.