Blackmagic tours the world with One Direction
Published: ASIA
ASIA: Audiotech Services Ltd supplied One Direction’s current 120-date ‘Take Me Home’ Tour with an A/V control system built around Blackmagic Design infrastructure. This includes Blackmagic Design’s ATEM 2 M/E production switcher with ATEM 2 M/E broadcast panel, Broadcast Videohub router and SmartView Duo monitor.
Tour stops include Australasia, Asia, Europe and North America, and the show includes a huge amount of video. All of this is managed through a rack mounted A/V control system supplied by Audiotech, providing full HD monitoring and recording, eight live camera inputs, stills playback and live HD web streaming.
Situated at the heart of the A/V control system is the ATEM 2 M/E production switcher, operated using the ATEM 2 M/E and a Blackmagic Design Broadcast Videohub router, which includes 72 inputs, 144 outputs and 72 deck control ports.
Each night a backdrop is built for the show, featuring onstage LED screens with computer generated effects while a live camera relay is displayed on two LED screens, positioned left and right of the main stage. Seven HD SDI cameras are used to capture the main performance, while a further seven are deployed as on stage mini cameras.
Camera sources are routed via the Broadcast Videohub over SDI into the ATEM 2 M/E and mixed using the ATEM 2 M/E. Line cuts coming from the ATEM 2 M/E get routed into hardware which converts the SDI feed into DVI to be displayed directly onto the two side LED screens.
‘It would have been ridiculous to think that we could have run the One Direction IMAG (image magnification) system without an SDI router and ATEM switcher,’ said video engineer Thomas Levitt. ‘It makes it so much easier in that you're not physically having to patch and repatch cables. You can also control it via serial or ethernet, just logging in via Telnet and sending it the commands – or with the router’s iPad app. We can integrate that easily into our show if we have switches we need to make at strategic points. It can all be automated over our network without us having to plug in a serial cable.
‘It's extremely fast compared to other video switchers which maybe have one frame delay or sometimes up to four frames, which makes them unusable for us, other than for live relay,’ he added. ‘With the ATEM, we're ahead of the game already. That was a big selling point for the ATEM switcher.’