Vinten Radamec Launches APS Pedestal Positioning System

IBC2012 Vinten Radamec®, part of Vitec Videocom, a The Vitec Group company and world leader in robotic camera support systems, introduces a revolutionary robotic camera pedestal positioning system, APS (Absolute Positioning System). The APS system seamlessly integrates with Vinten Radamecs Fusion robotic pedestals, delivering unrivalled positional accuracy and operational flexibility never before possible with free-roaming robotic camera support pedestals.

An APS equipped Fusion pedestal no longer relies on the need to navigate to, and get its initial position from a floor target or tile. Instead, it detects unobtrusive, passive retro-reflective targets placed in the studio environment using a scanning laser-based measurement system. This allows operators to free up valuable studio floor space where once a floor target was sited, and removes the need to go through time-consuming targeting operation before you start a show or when switching from using the pedestal in full-manual mode.

Our APS positioning system removes all the operational overhead associated with targeting pedestals using a floor target, said Philip Dalgoutte, Product Manager at Vinten Radamec.  It is completely transparent to the operator, automatically detecting its absolute position within the studio environment and providing constant navigation correction to the pedestals core dead-reckoning navigation system. If the APS system is not able to detect enough targets to determine its position, it will seamlessly switch back to using dead-reckoning until it is able to re-establish its absolute position.

APS is available as both a factory-fit option on the Fusion FP-188 pedestal, or as an upgrade for existing FP-188 or FP-145 pedestals. Vinten Radamec has developed a novel range of unobtrusive targets that can be customized by the customer to colour-match their existing studio environment or particular elements of the set.