Tattoo again

Viewers now on BBC1 watching the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo are again enjoying it after we have again supplied Otto ear defender headsets for the BBC coverage.

On Site give new Peltors a Try

Somewhere at the top of this 60 metre crane lurks some brave camera operator covering the Springboks v All Blacks Test match last weekend for OnSite Broadcasting OBs New Zealand at Eden Park Stadium, Auckland.
You can't see it at this distance but they are wearing one of two pairs of Peltor MT7 low profile earshell camera headsets from Showcomms provided last week.

On Site will be providing coverage of the Rugby World Cup in New Zealand next year, and are using the headsets in the Tri Nations in their build up for their RWC 2011 coverage. Duncan at Showcomms is a big Rugby Union fan and watched the match while eating his breakfast, and was very impressed by the quality coverage.

As well as selling these Peltors we recently hired comms to Omni OBs (NEP Cymru) for the England Rugby Tour of Australia and New Zealand.

More pictures below of the Eden Park match courtesy of Nick at On Site, thanks Nick.

Well done Hannah!

All of us at Showcomms would like to wish Hannah Chambers, our former student engineer, congratulations on getting a First Class Honours in Broadcast Technology from Ravensbourne College, and we all wish her every success in her new job at QVC as a Broadcast Engineer.

Reverb 2010

Every year Stratford upon Avon College HND Media students put on a massive one hour music show. Being held at Stratford Civic Hall, this year promises to be bigger and better than ever before.
Showcomms have donated radio comms with Otto eardefenders for Reverb 2010, which takes place next Wednesday, 26 May.
This year brings a whole new edge to the show as for the first time it'll be streamed LIVE, including here on the Showcomms blog.

BBC Election coverage communicates with Showcomms

The excitement of the election coverage on the BBC over the past few weeks has seen Showcomms supply Prolink Outside Broadcasts with walkie talkies and base stations for coverage at College Green, Westminster (some great pictures here), and at the London Eye. This included arranging licensing with JFMG (not an easy job with all the radio activity in the area), and arranging an extension for College Green for the period while coalition negotiations took place.
In addition BBC Northern Ireland hired two 4 way Altair wireless systems off us for their Election

32 pairs of eardefenders to CTV for BAFTAs

Our supplies of camera eardefenders have run out, on top of some other big hires, we have no less than 32 pairs of eardefenders at the BAFTAs for CTV OBs, a mix of double sided Peltors, Double sided Telex PH10s and 1.5 sided Peltors for hand held cameras!

Last night in the jungle

Tonight is the last night in the jungle for I'm a Celebrity Get Me Out of here! and it will be the last night in the jungle for our RTS hire kit that forms part of the talkback system on the show for Gearhouse Broadcast... now is it going to be Gino, Kim or Jimmy.

75 radios for Royal Film Premiere

We supplied 75 Motorola Walkie Talkies and headsets to Steve Bonich at Video Europe for the premiere of Peter (Lord of the Rings) Jackson's The Lovely Bones, last night at the Royal Film Performance in the presence of the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall at the Odeon Leicester Square.
The radios were used for production and security at the event.

British Gymnastics World Champion

As Britain's Beth Tweddle won Gold today at the World Gymastics Chamionships at the O2 Arena it was the same Showcomms Jelibox talkback used last month for the C4 Big brother final by Roll to Record that SIS OBs used for crane talback at their coverage for the BBC. Congratulations to Beth!

Proms in the Park and Thank you for the Music for SIS LIVE

Showcomms are providing backstage show and lighting communications equipment and crew to SIS LIVE for this weekend's Proms in the Park and Thank you for the Music.

The total rig consists of:
2 x crew (Alex Wrigglesworth and James Wilson)
16 x RTS BP325 beltpacks
1 x RTS single channel PS15 power supply
1 x RTS 3 channel PS31 power supply
1 x RTS SAP612 Source Assignment Panel
2 x RTS Biscuit boxes
5 x RTS SSA324 2 to 4 wire converters
4 x CTP 4 wire boxes (1 x 2 channel, 1 x 4 channel, 2 x 6 channel)
1 x Key Radio Base Station
Motorola GP300 radios
1 x JFMG Radio licence

This is the 5th year running that Showcomms have provided backstage comms for Proms in the Park (previously to BBC OBs before they were bought by SIS). As they say, happy customers come back!
Now, where is that Abba CD...

Big Brother Final

Tonight is the Final of Big Brother, and whoever wins out of Sophie, Rodrigo, Siavash, Charlie and David it will be another spectacular show, and the cranes will be using our Jelibox Talkback and Tally System supplied to Roll to Record

Making a splash at the Worthing International Birdman

Showcomms provided radio and wired comms for Factual Productions last weekend for their shooting of the Worthing International Birdman.
Pictured above is Cameraman Noel Greaves-Lord and Director Andy Roberts.
The winner of the contest Steve Elkins just missed the £30,000 prize for a 100 metre flight with a recorded distance of 99.86 metres.
The video below was edited from Factual's footage (though isn't their cut).

Otto ear defenders at the Edinburgh Military Tattoo

The Edinburgh Tattoo starts today. As everyone knows it is an event of pipes, drums, guns and fireworks!
So Showcomms are supplying 18 sets of our Otto Eardefenders for GP300 radios to BBC Scotland for their Tattoo coverage.
This is the third year running that we have supplied BBC Scotland with ear defenders for the event.

New Talkback returns from Isle of Man TT

Showcomms CTP 24 x 24 Matrix Talkback intercom system has returned from its first job - the coverage of the Isle of Man TT for ITV.
ITV featured nearly 50 hours of programming from the TT on ITV1 and ITV4 presented by leading ITV sports anchor Craig Doyle with commentary from former racers Steve Parrish and Jamie Whitham, who both competed at the TT.
The Showcomms hire system, used to connect production areas, features:
A Talkback 24 twenty four square 1U matrix, four wire talkback system. It is PC programmable, includes full IFB facilities, and can support any combination of talkback panels and four wires, up to a maximum of twenty four.
7 x 12 key panels. Each key has it's own volume control, automatically assigned to the reverse of the key destination(s).
Jackfield with 8 RJ45 ports and 16 audio 4 wire i/p, o/p & IFB XLRs.
Panels connect by CAT5 or CAT6 cable (cable not included).

(P.S. Motorcyclists reading this may be interested in our ProGuard Custom Motorcyclists earplugs... )

Rave on Air 09 sponsored by Showcomms

Showcomms are pleased to sponsor Rave on Air 09
In it's 39th year, every year for one day in June Ravensbourne College of Design and Communication is transformed into one of the country's most exciting and innovative broadcasters, as the students go "ON AIR" for 5 hours of live broadcast.
Rave on Air is a perfect chance for students to showcase their work to delegates from the broadcasting and creative industries as well as
giving the students "live" experience of creating and delivering a wide spectrum of content. This is the last year of Rave on Air at the Chislehurst campus before Ravensbourne moves to Greenwich Peninsula by the O2.
Showcomms Director Bruce Cocks took part in Rave on Air in 1990 in his last year at Ravensbourne.

BBC South presenter to open new University of Winchester studio

BBC South presenter and journalist Sally Taylor is formally opening a new TV studio with a linked newsroom at the University of Winchester on Wednesday 27 May. She will cut the ribbon at the opening ceremony in the presence of students, staff and journalists from local and national media.
Showcomms supplied and installed the Tecpro wired and Trilogy wireless intercom talkback system for the studio.



From the Spring 2009 inspection report produced by the Broadcast Training Journalism Council:

"The new studio is a high grade three camera digital TV studio.
"The studio has a good height – probably a double floor height and an extensive and highly flexible lighting rig. In addition, there’s a green screen area, and potentially this studio will be able to do a great deal more than just run an evening news magazine programme.
"In addition, there is a live studio facility in the newsroom, with a number of inject points around the campus, which should prompt some highly varied and imaginative treatments of news and current affairs programming.
"Portable equipment is easily available to the students and includes Marantz and Sony PD170 cameras.
Technical support is good and the technical team are very helpful."
In addition the university has a dedicated multimedia newsroom with work stations provided for all students producing weekly and daily radio and television bulletins, news and features websites.
The studios and newsroom are used by students on BA and MA courses and are part of the university's focus on careers in the television and multimedia news and journalism industries. Both UK and international students take part in courses that use the studios to produce regular scheduled TV and radio news bulletins, magazine work and multimedia production.

New Broadcast talkback system coming soon

Wednesday saw a scheduled power outage in Chelsfield for the day, so Bruce and Duncan set off to see Chris Thorpe at CTP Systems in Staplehurst to see a new system being assembled for Showcomms' line of broadcast dry hire kit. Chris, Bruce and Duncan used to work together at VMTV (Visions Mobiles/Molinare).

The new system will have a number of panels centred on CTP Systems' Talkback 24 PC programmable 24 square matrix. They were very impressed at how easy it was to set up, making it excellent for trouble free dry hire.

More news soon on on the first job for the kit scheduled for May.

Read about our past projects here

Broadcast Projects

R.N.L.I. AGM 2006 2007 2008



Backstage wired and wireless communications for the R.N.L.I. AGM at The Barbican Centre


BBC Proms in the Park 2005 2006 2007 2008



Stage Showcaller and separate Lighting Communications with Interface to BBC OB truck
3 Jelibox Camera Crane Talkback systems for the Technocranes
LD Turbo's comms to his 2 Spot Op Towers are kept seperate, even his truck 4 wires are sent over an Adder Fibre Optic circuit.



Live 8

In London we provided a Clearcom Easyspeak dual channel wireless intercom system for Streaky, the TV Stage Manger.
At Murrayfield we dry hired all the backstage wireless and wired beltpack communications for the show.


Industrial Communication Projects

DSTL Farnborough / RAF SpadeAdam 2006



Interface of an RTS system to a vehicle now stationed at RAF Spadeadam.
The system included repair of then interface to a Spadeadam Intercom (shown in image) plus duplex connection to 2 x Air Traffic Control radio systems and a further small system in another vehicle.



F1SuperAguri 2008



8 way Peltor Dect-com beltpack system for Car Refuellers supplied with Microm III noise cancelling microphone in-ear headsets worn under fire saftey equipment and integrated into their suits.


Eye Power Station

Lone Worker Radio System for this Suffolk Power Station


MSV Express

Setcom Radio Controller allows Operator to speak to more than one radio system (crane) on different bands using only one unit.


Isle of Man TT

Customer drops by to test and purchase2 headsets for passenger Police operators with Motorola Tetra Airwave radios
The microphone on the Mckay 3 Wire headset was found to pick up the least twin squirrel engine noise.


SPONSORSHIP

Rushden Firefighters 2006
Around the UK in 8 days - Showcomms supplied 2 VoiceVests and a small donation

The Rushden Firefighters visit Essex

2007 Metropolitan Police Fishing Team
The MPAS A team came 2nd in the National Championships
Showcomms sponsored the all Tee shirts for their teams