Norfolk Amateur Radio Club

During these difficult days of complete social isolation because of the Coronavirus, at Norfolk Amateur Radio Club we feel it is more important than ever to keep the spirit of the club going embracing technology to stay in touch, especially as many club members are older, at higher risk and maybe on their own.

NARC has already been embracing modern streaming technologies such as Skype to bring speakers from all over the world into our physical club meetings and with a bit of thought and equipment we are planning to bring an online meeting to members every week, plus round up and encourage new on-air nets and training like CW.

Our first NARC Live! event was streamed out to the club’s Facebook page as a live video (restreaming part to YouTube by Sonny M0SYW), and after some club notices with details of local nets and radio activities by club chairman David G7URP we introduced Jon G4ABQ and Andy Carpenter of SDRplay who gave an excellent presentation of their SDR products and software. At the end of the talk we had an interactive question and answer session with David reading posts to Jon and Andy which viewers entered on Facebook and Youtube pages – the Chairman’s wife Tammy M0TC became director and vision mixer for the event so that they could sit together without any additional virus risk. From feedback received it was engaging, fun and most importantly brought the club together and will continue to do so over these difficult times.

For those interested in the technical aspects of the event, Jon and Andy were in Bedfordshire and Kent and were in a Skype group meeting with the club chairman on one computer, the output of which was fed to a video and sound mixer which could also select pictures from 2 camcorders in the makeshift studio and mix in caption slides and notices from another computer. A third computer streamed the output of the final mix to Facebook video where questions and comments could also be posted and read to the speakers.

Although the pictures show a lot of equipment mainly because we are fortunate to have access to because one of our members is keen on Amateur Television, it can be done in a much more modest way, the simplest being just a single computer running a Skype or Zoom group meeting with club members sharing.

Category: CV-Support