Serbian national TV channel RTS records around 10 days of government broadcasts each month. They needed an imaging system that could power through long debates up to 14 hours a day, stressing the importance of robust and reliable equipment.
“Depending on the schedule of Parliament, we broadcast an average of 10 days per month normally from 10am-6pm. Extraordinary sessions can last up to 14 hours a day! We needed a system that could work 24/7, sometimes until the early hours of the morning,” explains Aleksandar Topalovic, Deputy Chief Technical Officer at RTS.
After receiving a sample to test, Aleksandar said: “Our first concern was picture matching, which we were happy with. We wanted to keep the old EFP HD with tape recorder cameras, so it was important that the image quality matched. Then we tried out where we could position the cameras in the main hall and what shots we could capture.
“Another thing was to test the image quality and compare it to our existing system. Everything worked well, we were happy the Canon CR-N500 met our requirements.”
“We had good support from Canon during the integration, and Zanus as well. They even invented a bespoke shade to fit on top of the camera to block out some of the light from the glass roof.”
In terms of positions, one PTZ is central, two are on the side and one is fixed upstairs in the gallery for a wide shot and voting. “Now we have 7 cameras controlled by one person from one place, with two operators taking turns, reducing the overall manual operation.”