Hamlet waveform monitors used to eliminate suspect signals

The largest video editing facility in Europe is not at a television station or postproduction facility, but the National Video Identification Bureau, operated on behalf of the police forces of England by the West Yorkshire Constabulary.
The facility, in Wakefield, is the centrepiece of the Viper (Video Identification Parade Electronic Recording) project, and was opened on March 14 by home secretary David Blunkett.
The idea behind the Viper project is that 30 seconds of a suspect are recorded and sent to Wakefield. Here one of the team of video editors combines this with an appropriate selection from a library of around 10,000 volunteer image files. The compilation is then downloaded to the requesting police station and either burnt onto a DVD or shown to witnesses on a laptop or television screen.
Obviously it is essential for the probity of the system for video quality to be consistent across both library files and suspects. Maintaining signal quality through the system is the responsibility of Digi Scope 601AX units with remote controls and two specially modified 302 WVR waveform monitors from Hamlet.
Steve Nunney, Managing Director of Hamlet, said: "This is an exciting project for us on a number of levels.
"Any facility with 34 sets of Pinnacle Systems non-linear editing is just the sort of major installation which is ideal for Hamlet's cost-effective but accurate monitoring tools. Equally, as a part of the community we want to see the police improving their accuracy and cost-effectiveness, and the Viper project is set to do just that."
(GB)