Crystal Vision Unveils Safire 3 Xpress

Crystal Vision has unveiled its newest chroma keyer, the Safire 3 Xpress.

The product is ideal for weather, news bureaus and other single static camera 3Gb/s, HD or SD applications that use simple backgrounds rather than a full virtual set, and require high quality chroma keying combined with straightforward control. Useful features include input frame synchronisers and lighting compensation.

Working with 31 different video standards (including 1080p), Safire 3 Xpress combines processing with a simple features set, ensuring easier control for the operator. Operation of all functions is available via any web browser (using VisionWeb Control) – with a hardware control panel also available.

Safire 3 Xpress offers simple auto setup by sampling the brightness and hue of one representative point on the backdrop to set the range of colours to key on and to get the optimum chroma key values – suitable for most applications. For those who wish to optimise the picture further, there are tools to eliminate key noise and transparency, tune the backdrop key colour, adjust the variation around the key colour, manage colour spill, enhance edges and increase or reduce shadows.

It will produce high quality results for live virtual productions, compared to studio mixers for applications; for example, for news and weather. Studio mixers struggle to chroma key if the foreground is similar to the key colour, the production includes shadows, or the lighting is not perfect. Safire 3 Xpress overcomes these challenges with its foreground suppression of the key colour, key shrink to remove unwanted outlines, shadow enhancement and lighting compensation for uneven illumination of the backdrop, where it boosts the key to get a uniform key signal across the image. Furthermore, by using Safire 3 Xpress there is less for both the studio mixer and mixer operator to do, with the mixer's resources able to be used elsewhere and another operator usually in charge of setting up the chroma keyer.

Any timing errors will be automatically corrected by the frame synchroniser on each input – synchronising sources up to one frame apart for easy system timing. Reference timing can be selected to come from any of the video inputs or from SD Black and Burst or HD tri-level syncs. This provides flexibility in how the background is generated, even allowing the use of a PC-graphics card system which cannot be locked to the camera.

Flexible masks can be used to overrule the keying process – such as masking imperfect areas on a backdrop or allowing a presenter to move behind a virtual object. Keys can be faded in and out and the complete programme can be faded to black.

Philip Scofield, Crystal Vision's Managing Director, said: "The combination of Safire 3 Xpress and the original Safire 3 brings a new level of realism to a wider range of chroma keying applications – from fixed camera weather or news right up to the most sophisticated virtual reality programme."

Now available for shipping, Safire 3 Xpress is a 100mm x 266mm module which fits in Crystal Vision's Indigo frames – alongside the company's signal processing boards – with up to 12 boards fitting in 2U. Relay bypass protection is available as an option.

www.crystalvision.tv

(JP/MH)