For client Dubai Sports City, Gearhouse Broadcast delivered an integrated broadcast system for a state of the art 30,000 seat cricket stadium. The stadium is described by Dubai Sports City as one of the most advanced of its kind in the world and the International Cricket Council (ICC), the world-governing body of cricket, has been involved at all stages of the design process to ensure that the stadium meets the relevant specifications for hosting international cricket fixtures. The ICC new headquarters will now be based out of Dubai and not Lords in the UK.

The installation provided by Gearhouse Broadcast was built in an incredibly fast time frame of four weeks and covered every area of the club including the field areas, commentator rooms, the stand areas and press rooms.

In technical terms the installation consisted of 37 wall boxes, 33 triax camera positions, 27 fibre camera positions, 53 video tie lines, 92 data tie lines and 136 audio tie lines, all of which use Belden or Draka cable.

The wall boxes have triax camera positions and HD fibre camera positions to cater for high definition productions.

To complete the installation Gearhouse Broadcast provided a crew of 5 Riggers, 3 Wireman, a Project Engineer and a Project Manager as well as using some local labour.

Gearhouse Broadcast and associate company AV Tech were awarded the contract to upgrade the technical infrastructure at four football stadia in Doha, Qatar – Al Gharaffa, Al Rayyan, Al Sadd Sports Club and the Qatar Sports Club.

As the preferred supplier to the Qatar National Olympic Committee, Gearhouse Broadcast and AV Tech have previously completed a number of broadcast cabling and audio visual contracts at various sports arenas including; the Aspire Tower and Aspire Academy for Sports Excellence, Khalifa Tennis and Squash Centre, Qatar Sports Club, Al Arabi Sports Club, Al Khor Sports Club and the Al Wakrah Sports Club.

The stadia were all being upgraded from SD to HD and the new installation consisted of installing new cabling, wall boxes and technical equipment. The installation was spread across four stadia and the upgrade consisted of 115 wall boxes, SMPTE hybrid fibre, HD video and audio and network cable. The equipment racks used for the upgrade were assembled in the UK prior to the installation phase and shipped to site pre-wired to all the local termination panels. This meant that only the wall box connectivity will need to be terminated on-site thus speeding up the installation process. Harris distribution and conversion equipment was used, along with Tektronix video test equipment, Bel audio test equipment and Belden and Draka audio and network cable.

To complete the installation Gearhouse Broadcast provided a supervisory management team of 12 Wireman, 16 riggers, a Project Engineer and a Project Manager. Each venue had a dedicated installation team headed up by a Site Supervisor, who oversaw the pulling in of all cables from the TV Rooms to the correct locations. The HD upgrade took two months to complete and was ready for the start of the Asian Football Cup which Qatar hosted in January 2011.

Al Jazeera required an equipment upgrade to one of their control rooms as the existing equipment had become obsolete. They also took the opportunity to upgrade various other systems within the control rooms.

After a full tender process, Al Jazeera awarded the contract to Gearhouse Broadcast Systems Integration division.

The project involved the replacement of key items of equipment including a Sony DVS-9000 vision mixer, Pixel Power graphics, and two Miranda multi-viewer systems driving eight new large 52” Sony LCD panels, Midas audio mixing console and Miranda iControl monitoring system.

Monitor stacks and desk furniture had to be either modified or replaced and this was performed around the operational requirements of a working studio requiring a great deal of flexibility and management

After competing in a fully competitive tendering process, Gearhouse Broadcast’s Systems Integration division was awarded the contract to upgrade Astro’s studio facilities in Kuala Lumpur to accommodate HD productions. The studios are used by both Astro and Arena to produce a wide range of shows including singing and dancing competitions, live music performances, game shows, talk shows and sport highlights. The state-of the-art HD digital broadcast facilities will be the first of their type in Malaysia for market leader Astro.

The project will include upgrading 4 Studios Floors, 3 Production Control Rooms and a Central Equipment Area. The project will be carried out in two phases. Phase one will be the technical upgrade and refurbishment of studios 1 & 2, incorporating their associated Production Control Room and Audio Control Room areas. Phase two will involve the technical upgrade and refurbishment to studios 3, 4, 5/6, 7 and their associated Control Rooms.

In terms of the equipment chosen for the project, Gearhouse Broadcast selected Snell Routers and Glue products, Harris Quads and Yamaha PM5D 64 Channel Analogue Consoles. The Snell range of routers are renowned the world over for quality and reliability. Coupled with extremely flexible control operations, they cater for all sizes and operations from simple edit suites to outside broadcast trucks. Snell were also able to provide Astro and Gearhouse Broadcast with 24/7 customer support within the Asia region ensuring rapid diagnosis and resolution of any issues that might have arisen.

Gearhouse Broadcast delivered a complete, high specification; turnkey broadcast installation at the State Mosque of Qatar. The new state mosque at Al-Khuwair in Doha is a prestigious new building which can accommodate more than 10,000 worshippers and is believed to be the biggest mosque in the Middle East.

The installation was configured to provide a connection for Qatar Television’s live broadcasts. QTV will be use the mosque for live feed in every occasion during Ramadan EID’s, Adha EID’s and every Friday during praying time.

The Broadcast Control Room was fitted out with a Sony DVS 9000 vision mixer, Harris routing, glue and Inscriber graphics, Sony VTRs as well as a Miranda Kaleido multi-viewer driving and six JVC 42 LCD display monitors. The audio mixer supplied was a Soundcraft BB100 and it all fitted into bespoke Custom Consoles technical furniture. The five Sony BVP-E30 system cameras supplied with a mix of Canon J35 and J22 lenses were supplemented by ten Panasonic AW-E860 cameras with Canon YJ20 lenses on hot-heads.

Some of the other major system components are provided by Trilogy Communications, Tektronix and Evertz. Panasonic remote control cameras will provide extra coverage of the main Mosque area. Comprehensive technical cabling to custom wall boxes was carried out throughout the Mosque, some fitted with marble inserts. This allowed great flexibility as each wall box was fitted with varying numbers of triax, video and audio connectivity back to the Control Room.

M-NET approached Gearhouse Broadcast when they were looking to purchase a high specification, high definition outside broadcast trailer for an outside broadcast facility. Gearhouse Broadcast was able to offer the systems integration of a custom built, multi-format trailer.

The trailer integrated by Gearhouse Broadcast is a triple expanding high definition outside broadcast unit which caters for 28 high definition cameras and up to 3 versions of 5.1 Dolby surround sound.

The unit’s lateral production area is large, spacious and air-conditioned with 3 tiers of desks which seat up to 12 production staff. The front desk houses a 4ME vision mixer and space for 84 monitors. The second desk provides 16 monitors and comprehensive communications. The third desk provides 32 monitors and comprehensive comms and monitoring facilities. The Unit is fully air conditioned to temperatures of 45 C°. The third expand provides room for a second desk in the VTR area to provide space for up to 11 operators and a co-ordinator. The unit is wired for up to 12 EVS/ 14VTR. In the vision area there is control for up to 28 cameras by 7 operators, plus an engineering test position. The vision router is 576 x 576 and the audio router is 256 x 256 AES and analogue. The unit is engineered with a large in/out capability making it ideal for major events.

Andre Venter, Head M-Net Broadcast Services Africa said “We were looking for a solution to our outside broadcast requirement and as Gearhouse Broadcast supplied us with three flyaways in the past, which were delivered on time and to budget, we turned to them to assist us with a highly specified, time sensitive requirement for a 28 camera HD OB vehicle, the vehicle was again delivered to South Africa well within the specified time frame and budget”.

As part of a major investment programme in HD technology Indian state broadcaster Doordarshan commissioned Gearhouse Broadcast to design a custom build high definition outside broadcast van. Built by Gearhouse Broadcast, the project was carried out in conjunction with leading Indian broadcast re-seller AGIV (India) Pvt Ltd.

Following the initial brief of this large scale long term project a TATA chassis was shipped to the UK for coach building by specialists JS Frasers. The van was then sent to Gearhouse Broadcast’s headquarters in Watford for the systems integration to be carried out by the team of specialist engineers and technicians. The van was then shipped back to India for final works and testing before the client took delivery. Doordarshan was consulted throughout the whole process which was carefully project managed by AGIV (India) Pvt Ltd and Gearhouse Broadcast.

The van was fitted out with four Ikegami cameras expandable to six, a number of Canon box lenses, a multi format Snell Kahuna Vision Mixer, Marshall/Barco Monitors, Harris Router, Crystal Vision glue and other equipment from EVS and Trilogy Communications.

An order for Gearhouse Broadcast to build another van confirms support for our services and acknowledges our specialist skills in this area of systems integration. Doordarshan’s high definition outside broadcast van raises the bar for standards in Indian broadcasting and sets a benchmark for others to follow.

A demanding schedule of 10 events taking place across the world covering Cincinnati, Shanghai, Indian Wells, Madrid, Miami, Monte-Carlo, Montreal, Paris and Rome, concluding with the World Tour Finals which since 2009 has been staged in our home town, at the O2 Arena in London. Over 50 broadcasters across the globe take coverage of the series include ABC, CCTV, ESPN, Fox Sports, Sky Sports, CBS, TVE and Eurosport.

Gearhouse Broadcast provides broadcast equipment, production facilities, systems integration and scalable flyaway solutions. The solution delivered by Gearhouse Broadcast employs state-of-the-art digital flyaway rigs consisting of audio and video routing, distribution, communication, CCU and monitor gallery rigs. These rigs are configured prior to arriving on site and are then integrated with other key elements and installed by specialist Project Engineers.

Supplying up to 80 crew members at any one location, 24/7 technical resources and full operational and logistics support, Gearhouse Broadcast have provided this type of project management across all ten venues since 2000 for ATP Media.

Dominic Gresset Head of production for TPL said “We opted for Gearhouse Broadcast to provide equipment, facilities and technical support for the Tennis Masters Series and subsequently the Masters Cup because we are confident in their capabilities to create the same broadcast environment anywhere in the world. They have demonstrated their expertise and professionalism time and again throughout the Tennis Masters Series tournaments that have taken place this year”.

Working to Channel 7’s brief Gearhouse Broadcast’s Project Solutions division provided a high definition facility for the Open’s main courts of Rod Laver and Hisense for the first time in the history of the event. Standard definition facilities were integrated for the remaining courts. This year the tournament was bigger than ever before with seven courts used for the event instead of the usual six. A high definition/standard definition production was more challenging to integrate than previous standard definition broadcasts of the tournament. This was due to cross conversion of signals from HD to SD and SD to HD.

The entire Broadcast Centre was built into a large prefabricated structure which comprised of a massive 45 metre by 15 metre double story temporary building. Broadcast Centre housed all the technical facilities including the Production Control rooms, the Audio rooms and MCR. Overall there were nine Production Control rooms in the whole facility which consisted of seven court control rooms, one World Feed Control room and a Unilateral Control room for the host broadcaster Channel 7’s main output.

For the first time in 2009 a large EVS server was installed, which gave a non-linear, integrated solution for logging, archiving, editing and insert playouts during the host broadcast. This was achieved by using a total of 26 EVS XT2s and 22 IP Directors which linked into an Avid Unity server and Avid Adrenaline edit suites.

Saul Shtein, Head of Sport for Seven Network said, “The 2009 Open coverage was the best Tennis telecast I have ever seen and the wonderful ratings have endorsed what you are doing. To produce a telecast of this world class quality under the incredibly challenging conditions is a testament to your talent and team work. We thank the Technical team for not only keeping us on air when the temperature has been similar to midday on Mars, but also for keeping us cool when fire extinguishers in the compound were exploding due to the heat”.

Gearhouse Broadcast was awarded the contract to provide the technical production facilities and broadcast transmission for the 2011 25th Winter Universiade. The games took place in Turkey between 27 January and 6 February 2011 and involved nearly 3,000 sportsmen from all around the world. The Organising Committee approached Gearhouse when they were looking for a broadcast solutions specialist to cover the Games opening and closing ceremonies, along with all the outdoor snow events.

Working closely with the Organising Committee, Gearhouse Broadcast provided high definition technical facilities and expert staff for each of the seven snow disciplines – Alpine, Biathlon, Cross Country/Nordic Combined, Sky Jumping, Ice hockey, Snow Boarding and Free Style Skiing.

In addition to the core contact, Gearhouse built and staffed the International Broadcast Centre (IBC) as well as providing location services such as studios and up linking facilities. The IBC facility comprised of a Master Control Suite, Quality Control Suite, 6x Final Cut Pro Edit Suites, Server based Media Management system, HD Studio, Digital Editing and Storage, Format exchange and DSNG Satellite facilities as well as a Satellite Farm to Up-link the outgoing program feeds. All the venues production was distributed to EBU for worldwide distribution and by TRT (Turkish State Broadcaster) for the Turkish market.

For the outdoor events, Gearhouse Broadcast provided state-of-the-art HD OB facilities. Each unit was equipped with 8 HD Sony HDC-1500 cameras, Sony HDC-3300 Super slow-motion cameras and EVS XT2+’s. Additional equipment included a CAMCAT high speed camera at the Ski Jump and a 100m Rail Camera at the Cross Country.

For the opening and closing ceremonies, Gearhouse provided 12 mainline Sony cameras and a HD Spidercam suspended 70m above the stadium. Two cameras were mounted on Jimmy Jibs whilst the two Steady Cams utilised the Riedel Radio Link System. The event was supported by a technical and engineering crew of 200 who were deployed across the seven venues for the 10 day event.