A.C. Entertainment Technologies’ (AC-ET) video division have provided a Green Hippo HippoCritter media server system for the new TV set of Ford Monday Night Football, which returns this season on Sky Sports HD in the UK.
The influential football show forms part of the biggest season of live Barclays Premier League football on Sky Sports with 115 live matches all in high definition. In keeping with the original format, the show features innovations such as digital on-screen graphics and game analysis using the latest computer technology.
To carry this high-tech look and feel through to the studio set lighting and visual effects, show LD Malcolm Reed approached AC-ET’s video division to provide a real-time video playback control system for projecting moving content onto various LED display surfaces.
The company supplied Green Hippo HippoCritters to DMX pixelmap a series of abstract images onto Thomas PixelLine 1044 LED battens arranged as separate video screens behind the presenters. The HippoCritters also control an LED Tickertape running around the front of the rostrum giving score updates and Barco MiSTRIP LED strips arranged in a fan layout on the studio floor to create a free-form video display.
The HippoCritter media server was specified due to its VideoMapper component, which enabled the content to be mapped correctly as a single image across the complex LED fan layout and separate video screens.
A laptop running the Green Hippo Zookeeper control software was supplied to enable remote control of the video content from the studio gallery.
A.C. Video, in conjunction with Green Hippo’s Simon Harris, provided HippoSchool training on the system and technical support during the installation.
