SNP Wins Value Added Accolade

A UK-based live video control solutions specialist, SNP Productions, has become a 'value added reseller' for Active Silicon.
Active Silicon - which designs, manufactures and supplies specialist digital imaging products and technologies - signed an agreement that allows SNP to pre-install Phoenix boards into their Catalyst systems and sell them anywhere in the world, and also to market SNP as a 'value added reseller'.
SNP is said to offer competitive pricing on the popular LFG4 and Phoenix PE4 HD-SDI video input capture cards.
These are used in the latest spec'd Catalyst digital media servers - the leading Mac based video media processing system for live shows, television and events of all types.
The Active Silicon Phoenix PE4 is a 4-lane PCI express HD-SDI capture card with 2 x SDI inputs which can be either 2 x SD-SDI or 2 x HD-SDI.
A maximum of three cards can be installed in a MacPro server, providing up to six SD-SDI inputs and the potential for four to six (hardware dependant) HD-SDI video inputs with virtually no frame delay… this is four more SDI inputs than any other media server on the market.
This card is a new addition to the Active Silicon range, which includes the popular LFG4 capture card with 4 composite video inputs. With three cards installed in a MacPro server, the LFG4 gives a potential of 12 composite video (camera) inputs.
SNP recently supplied 10 x Active Silicon Phoenix HD-SDI video input capture cards to leading UK lighting rental company Neg Earth, some of which were used to upgrade the Catalyst systems being used for Muse's current "Resistance" world tour.
The show's eye-catching visual environment includes lighting, video and set/scenic elements, and is a creative collaboration between LD Oli Metcalfe, Set Designer Es Devlin and Video Director Tom Kirk.
Metcalfe designed the video control and Catalyst system which is run over ArtNet and controlled via a Hog 3 console.
Four Catalysts are used to output playback video and 12 different camera sources to three impressive 'tower blocks' onstage, each constructed from PixLED F30 screen.
Each tower comprises a flown top section and a bottom section which is scissor-lifted up from the stage deck, with video/camera outputs for the different sections driven by different mixes in the Catalysts.
Metcalfe is running the Catalysts hard and also using some advanced features including: timecode, MIDI functionality and sync ID to frame synchronise playback across the servers.
Neg Earth upgraded five of their existing Catalyst media server systems to new Intel MacPros for the tour, and SNP also supplied 5 x USB cards to secure the Catalyst dongles inside the MacPros, plus 5 x 250Gb OCZ Solid Stage Drives (SSD) on SNP Productions' new 2.5in - 3.5inch MacPro SSD Adaptors v2.
SNP's Simon Pugsley said: "Active Silicon's Phoenix cards provide Catalyst users with a high quality solution to capture HD-SDI video/camera images live in to the catalyst system with virtually no frame delay.
"We are proud to have already supplied NegEarth - one of the leading lighting suppliers in the Europe - with the latest versions of this product."
See:
www.snp-productions.co.uk
(BMcC/KMcA)