[quote="Bill D"]Fun to hear about differences in other countries. I know I have heard that in Germany, they all use DD switchers. They hate GVG, much like a lot of people in the US seem to hate DD switchers.[/quote] I have worked over in Germany and I had a real Grass Valley switcher in a truck that was French. Sony 7000s were very popular and seen all over Europe till the DD35 came out. At the time, it was the only new thing in the market and it was marketed by Philips, a German company. In recent years, the Kalypso became the switcher of choice especially in OB trucks because of their ease of use, and as things were moving toward High Def they needed trucks and switchers which could output mulitiple formats. With the introdution of the Kayak, Thomson takes a huge step backwards since they obviously think the Philips way of doing things is correct. They may have misinterpreted the American market because the DD35 as well as their other switchers were a huge failure here. It was a failure for several reasons, but they don't seem to learn from that. Buying out your comptetition won't change that and it seems as if the Kayak will be headed in the same direction if they don't realize there way is not the way of the world. If I were a station chief engineer I would take a long hard look at what the other companies are doing, because this is not very user friendly which is the whole problem with all the Philips switchers. It might have the name Grass Valley on it, but it is no Grass Valley product.

[quote="Bob Ennis"]As to the way that they operate in Japan: From what I understand, in Japan graphics are most often a function of advertising - thus the TD doesn't put in the graphics; the advertising representative who sits next to or near the TD does that job. And that's one reason that many home-grown Japanese switchers won't have many keyers on each M/E, but will have up to 10 DSK's. I watched a newscast at NHK on that Panasonic switcher that Zach is using - for each news story, there was a different Director who would call the mattes for that specific story. There was literally a line of Directors in the booth waiting for their VT playback to hit air & each took their turn calling the fonts for their story. It was certainly different than what I'm used to seeing here in the US, but the system worked well for them.[/quote] Fun to hear about differences in other countries. I know I have heard that in Germany, they all use DD switchers. They hate GVG, much like a lot of people in the US seem to hate DD switchers.

Hey Zach... Any chance that you could take a picture of the Sony, too? I'd love it if you could post the pics here so that we could all see the differences. Very cool. So, the whole "dual feed" discussion that we've had here most likely isn't a problem in Japan, huh? :) Matt

As to the way that they operate in Japan: From what I understand, in Japan graphics are most often a function of advertising - thus the TD doesn't put in the graphics; the advertising representative who sits next to or near the TD does that job. And that's one reason that many home-grown Japanese switchers won't have many keyers on each M/E, but will have up to 10 DSK's. I watched a newscast at NHK on that Panasonic switcher that Zach is using - for each news story, there was a different Director who would call the mattes for that specific story. There was literally a line of Directors in the booth waiting for their VT playback to hit air & each took their turn calling the fonts for their story. It was certainly different than what I'm used to seeing here in the US, but the system worked well for them.

Zach, as for the Japanese working "differently", I remember the person who taught me the Sony 7000 told me that Sony had to build NHK a DSK panel with only two DSKs. (Talking 7000/7350 here.) They would not accept a panel with four DSKs, using only two.

[quote="Zach G"]I am told the Japanese don't operate that way. I think they just keep graphics in all the time. ...[/quote] Sorry that is a great quote, I laughed out loud it reminds me of cable news :)

Thanks Bob - I sent you an email and will take a picture and send it to you. The switcher model number is AV HS 5300. I think it was built specifically for NHK. It operates completely different than a Grass or Sony. It is not designed to call up different registers or Shotbox's quickly. It takes a long time to load an effect. Plus it very painstaking to create an effect! On another note I am also using a Sony 8000 in another NHK truck. The Sony is set up completely different than others I have seen. They are using different panels than we use in North America. There is no 10 digit telephone style keypad for macros and snapshots. Instead it is a 2 column and 5 rows keypad. Also there is no BG, Key 1 Key 2 buttons (transition cluster) for going clean and dirty to different sources. I am told the Japanese don't operate that way. I think they just keep graphics in all the time. The 8000 I am working on only has 2 channels of DME...

Without a model number, it's going to be tough to know which manual to look for. I found this link - maybe it'll help: In looking at this post, I see a "...x": after the .com/ should be panasonic/matrix_switcher