PRESS RELEASE
Gearhouse Broadcast has returned to the depths of the Australian jungle for the seventh time to deliver robust technical and production facilities for ITV Studios’ I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here!
HD flyaway solutions from Gearhouse were installed on the show’s permanent set in New South Wales alongside a brand new facility for the 2014 show. A newly constructed building housed a production gallery which separated the reality production – the day-to-day activity from within the camp – from the TX production handling all live transmissions for the first time in the show’s history. Gearhouse installed the gallery with production furniture and equipment which featured a 15 monitor video wall comprised of 32” Samsung screens fed by Evertz VIPA16-DUO multi-viewers. It also featured the 288 x 288 Pro Bel video router which had been upgraded to handle 384 inputs and 576 outputs.
The existing flyaway facilities were also upgraded for this year’s show. All studio camera cables were upgraded to SMPTE fibre which added up to nearly 5km of cable. An additional request from ITV studios was to be able to record the trials each morning and at the same time rehearse the daily challenges which meant the addition of a third audio mixing stream.
This Yamaha M7CL 48 channel mixer with a Yamaha DM2000VMC acting as a sub mixer was connected to the existing systems using Optocore. Also installed were five additional Sony HDC-1500 cameras to the 35 which were on site during last year’s production.
“Designing and implementing a workflow which is capable of producing a daily broadcast from the jungle is a huge challenge we undertake every year,” said ITV Studios production executive – Entertainment, Helen Kruger Bratt. “Gearhouse help us to achieve this with their knowledge, experience and can-do approach. There’s a reason why they’ve been here with us in the jungle for so long.”
“We love being a part of I’m a Celebrity… it really is about building a robust, hard-working production workflow from nothing,” said Kevin Moorhouse, Gearhouse Broadcast’s COO. “After so long providing ITV Studios with the equipment they need, we really feel at home in the jungle. This is the seventh year we’ve been here – that’s a testament to the broadcast facilities we’ve consistently delivered.”