mc²66 digital audio for China's favourite TV show.
Hunan Satellite TV networks Lawo mc² consoles.
China’s most popular TV program is back on the air, broadcasting from two studios which have been fully refurbished and equipped with new Lawo digital audio consoles. Hunan Satellite TV’s production facilities for its nationwide singing contest ‘Happy Girls’ are the first in China to network Lawo mc² consoles.
The entertainment-oriented Hunan Satellite TV is one of the most successful and popular television stations in China, popular for its chatty straightforward news and talk shows, its dating games and its lively Saturday night variety programmes. Spun out of its parent broadcasting company Hunan Television, HNSTV has been realising digital and network programming 24/7 from its Changsha base in Hunan province since 2001.
The broadcaster hit international headlines in 2004, when its televised singing competition, similar to ‘American Idol’, sparked a nationwide mania. During its three-year run, ‘Super Girls’ attracted more than 150,000 female participants in a single series and pulled in up to 400 million viewers for a competition finale.
Postponed to make room for the Bejing Olympic Games, the show is now back in the schedules, with a name change from Super to Happy Girls, and newly refurbished production facilities in Changsha. The show uses two studios which have been equipped for on-air broadcast with Lawo mc²66 digital audio consoles; the larger of the two offers some 1200 sq. metres of production space, and the second studio provides a further 600 sq. metres. The consoles are networked via tie-lines, ensuring maximum versatility for the space on this production and future programmes.
Rightway Audio Consultants worked closely with Francis (Fang Ming) He, Lawo’s chief representative in Beijing, to secure the specification of a 24+8+16 fader mc²66 console for the larger studio, and a second 16+8+8 model. These are the first digital consoles to be installed at Hunan Satellite TV, and the easy-to-learn intuitive user interface of the mc²66 was one of the main reasons for its choice.
“Sound engineers at HNSTV only had experience on analogue consoles, so the quick and easy operation of the Lawo desks was an important factor,” explains Francis He. “The mc²66 has a reputation for outstanding reliability and safety, given the high redundancy. The audio supervisor had high praise for the excellent sound quality of the new consoles, and confirmed that his team had enjoyed a problem-free transition from their old analogue desks into the digital era.”
At the heart of the system is the Nova73 HD router, which offers a 3000 crosspoint matrix, and plentiful DSP, 216 channels on the larger console and 144 channels on the smaller model. With the router centrally connected to the DALLIS frames and all the I/Os, both consoles are able to access all audio signals at any time.
Not only is HNSTV’s facility the first in China to network the Lawo mc²66 consoles, but it is also able to use them on-air. ‘Happy Girls’ is broadcast live as well as being recorded, setting a quality benchmark for on-air broadcasting in China. For this finale of the show, both the new consoles are being deployed, as main and back-up consoles, just weeks after Rightway Audio completed their installation.
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