IN BRIEF

AMV acquires Unitel

All Mobile Video (AMV) has completed the $26 million purchase of Unitel Video's television studios and stages in New York City. The purchase, which took place via public auction in January, has resulted in a new company called AMV/Unitel.

The acquisition comprises four veteran production stages, which are located on the West Side of Manhattan and have been fixtures of New York's television-production scene for almost 25 years.

NBC's TotalView of NBA Finals

For its live telecast of the 2001 NBA Finals series beginning June 6, NBC Sports will supplement its usual multi-camera coverage with a full-court perspective of selected replays via the TotalView broadcast system from Los Angeles-based Be Here Corp.

The system comprises a special wide-angle lens, image-processing software, and production and playback hardware. Full-motion and freeze frames of panoramic (360-degree) images will be created with Be Here's patented compositing software and used before and after commercial breaks to enhance game analysis.

Ackerley meets CentralCasting goal

After nearly two years, The Ackerley Group has completed the linking of 16 local television stations in three station groups in New York, California and Oregon.

Digital CentralCasting, a term Ackerley copyrighted, is a system for delivering digital programming to several television stations from a centrally located server via fiber-optic network.