Radial Revolutionizes The Press Box

Since the earliest days of broadcast, the press box has pretty much always been a centralized box whereby one or two microphones are connected and a plethora of cables send the output to the press gallery, says Peter Janis, CEO, Radial Engineering.

Although functional in principle, this approach results in a spaghetti of cables that invariably result in noise or transmission problems that are impossible to trouble shoot in a timely fashion.

Looking at the problem, the Radial Engineering development team asked why this approach was still in use and if a better solution could be developed. The result is the mPress... a modular press box with almost unlimited flexibility.

According to company president Peter Janis: "Being able to scale a broadcast event is critical. In some cases, you may want to feed a dozen reporters. In major events, this could escalate to hundreds of individual press feeds. This not only complicates the connectivity aspect but also involves the location of various groups.

"For example, having a single centralized outlet with 300 shared outputs is impossible. Instead, the mPress breaks down the setup into two sections whereby the mPress master head does the heavy lifting while an external modular output box called the ExoPod is used to create zones. Used on its own, the single rack space mPress can feed up to 8 press feeds via XLR outputs. For larger setups, these 8 outputs are switched from mic level to a high-gain output that can feed a number of ExoPods. These transformer-isolated passive floor boxes can be setup in either a star or series configuration to feed as many as 400 reporters."

Another aspect that is often forgotten is the management of the press event. In some cases, the press feed may be a line level input come from a mixing desk while in other events, it may be more of a 'town-hall meeting' setup with one microphone at a podium and another in the middle of the hall. The mPress is equipped with rear-mounted balanced line level inputs plus dual mic inputs to accommodate either scenario and features a built-in limiter to control loud peaks from over-zealous orators or those that are not familiar with proper microphone use. For condenser microphones, 48 volt phantom power is of course supported.

Another important challenge, is supporting the event with background music. Today's press events often include the public. This means that the press box must also be able to feed loudspeakers for both the event and music playback. To address this, the mPress is equipped with a choice of 3.5mm inputs to accommodate an iPhone or laptop, RCAs to accommodate a video player and ¼" jacks to plug in a small mixer. The line level outputs are balanced with a choice of XLR or ¼" TRS to accommodate a pair of active speakers on sticks. These additions allow the operator to play walk-in music while the crowd gathers, broadcast an audio visual presentation, and of course provide walk-out music at the event closing. Individual level controls for the program input and microphones mean that both can be used in tandem without disrupting the other.

Finally, yet equally as important as the functionality is the dependability factor. Radial currently produces nearly 100,000 electronic products per year and after 15 years, only has one technician doing repairs. Translated, this means our repairs are near zero percent and the quality and dependability of our Canadian made products is second to none in the industry. This comes from using heavy 14-gauge rolled steel and building all of our products under strict quality control under watchful eyes in Canada.

www.radialeng.com

This article is also available to read at BFV online here, page 53.

(JP)