UGFM has just commissioned a new studio at the home of former resident and long time committee member and broadcaster with UGFM at Frank & Thea Arendse home at Thurgoona in Albury NSW.
Frank and Thea moved to their new home in Albury last year and have very much missed being a part of the station. They both regularly made the 5 hour return trip to Alexandra to do the odd fill-in shift which just goes to show their dedication to the station.
The UGFM Committee of Management decided to purchase a Tieline Bridge-It unit and necessary electronics and software and utilize Franks existing computers and internet connection to establish a remote Studio, so Frank can instead of travelling all the way to Alexandra from Thurgoona can simply power up the equipment and link into the studio via the internet whenever he is needed from home.
On the 29th & 30th of August the UGFM technical crew travelled to Frank and Thea’s home where the studio was constructed and established; and in record time were ‘On-Air’ for 3 hours filling-in for Fitzy’s program Sounds of the Upper Goulburn from 12 till 3pm Saturday 29th.
After some more fine tuning, loading software, making up cables and leads and a crash course for Frank the Studio was completed late Sunday afternoon 30th August. The new studio has been named ‘Studio 5’ with Studio 1 & 2 at Alexandra, Studio 3 in Marysville and the Outside Broadcast unit being Studio 4. A future studio for Yea is also planned in the very near future.
The new studio has access to all the necessary weather and information from the emergency services along with updates for sponsors and community announcements, thanks to the latest in technology via the internet.
Tuesday the 2nd of October saw the testing of the new technology with a link up of Frank’s ‘Studio 5’ in Albury and Marysville ‘Studio 3’ between ‘Echo of the Valley’ Gypsy Rose ‘live to air’ with the two studio presenters communicating back through the feed to the Alexandra Studio interface.
As always with UGFM; all programs produced by our various studios are broadcast across the entire UGFM network of transmiiters. Programs are fed to Alexandra from there they are mixed and swiched and fed out via links to our various transmitters that make up the network. Programs are not split to feed different transmitters making UGFM a Murrindindi Shire and surrounds wide area service, with the same programs also streamed via the web at www.ugfm.org
Frank will be returning to his old shift on Saturday’s from 10am to 12noon with Best of the Best and will be available for fill-ins when necessary which will be a great help to the station and Roster Coordinator Kim.
