Jim RieckenOperations Manager

WANE-TV

FORT WAYNE, IND.

WANE-TV, owned by LIN-TV, is theCBS affiliate serving Fort Wayneand its surrounding counties,

including parts of Ohio. As a “centralcast-ing” spoke station, WANE receives all itsprogramming and commercials through afiber line from WISH-TV in Indianapolis.

In July 2002, WANE replaced its aginganalog cameras with four ParkerVisionDigital CameraMan three-CCD roboticpan/tilt cameras. The ParkerVision camerasare fixed on tripods and used for 25 hours perweek of live news, plus two in-studio sportsprograms. Our anchors also occasionally usethem for special reports.

Any new technology brings with it a learn-ing curve and we expected an adjustment peri-od of several months, though ours only tookseveral days. The directors learned to call upshots, control the cameras and tweak the posi-tioning of each shot with minimal training.

Anchors were particularly concernedabout how their eyes would appear on-screen as they read the prompter positionedabove the camera’s lens. Our anchors nowprefer these prompters to the old ones, asthe scripts are presented on easier-to-readflat-screen monitors as opposed to the tradi-tional prompters—the location of the mon-itor turns out not to be an issue with the dis-tance the cameras are from the talent.

From an operational perspective, theDigital CameraMan provides for a flawlessshow once the operators and talent arecomfortable. The ability to pre-programshots in the camera’s memory allows forfaster shot movement than is possible

through humanoperation. Zoomsand focus aresmoother and fasterwith robotics.

The cameras arealso quiet—pans, tiltsand zooms areinaudible. Thoughfixed on tripods, thecameras are versatilein movement. Thefourth camera rotatesmore than 180degrees to the sportsdesk for our live in-studio sports pro-grams on Friday andSunday. Signal quality is as robust as youwould expect from a digital signal.

One operator controlling four camerasalso creates a more controlled environmenton the news set. The operator is positionedbehind the cameras and controls the camerasvia two options: a ParkerVision Shot Directormulticamera controller or a DNF Shotbox.Though the operator could control the cam-eras from anywhere in the facility, this posi-tion allows for direct communication withthe anchors and access to the prompters.

There are other features within the DigitalCameraMan that will come into play in the

future. For example, the switchable 4:3/16:9aspect ratio will likely be vital to our opera-tion when high-definition enters the picture.

We will continue to explore many of thecamera’s advanced functions over time. ■

Jim Riecken has been with WANE-TV since1984 and became operations manager in July2002. He can be reached at jim@wane.com.The opinions expressed above are the author’s alone.

For more information, contactParkerVision at 904-737-1367 or visitwww.parkervision.com.

R E P R I N T E D F R O M A P R I L 7 , 2 0 0 3 W W W. T V T E C H N O L O G Y. C O M

Copyright 2003 IMAS Publishing (USA), Inc. Reprinted with permission.

WANE-TV uses ParkerVision’s Digital CameraMan three-CCD cameras in its news studio to deliver 25 hours of live broadcastingper week.

WANE Makes News with ParkerVisionUSER REPORT