The tests were conducted with a range of existing
equipment and prototypes by the Sol@ris concept development and evaluation
facility at the Group’s Le Mourillon centre near Toulon to evaluate
the contribution of a video management system to operational decision-making
processes.
The study and tests were conducted in partnership with:
• The Thales optronics business, a specialist in search, surveillance,
observation and identification systems, particularly based on high-performance
thermal imagers
• Barco, a specialist in image processing and display systems,
which deployed a set of new-generation scenario management and decision-support
tools.
The tests are part of the continuing effort to meet the needs of
naval forces on protection and security missions in the fight against
terrorism, piracy, drug trafficking and other threats. The lessons
learned will enable DCNS and its partners to continue their work on
the design and integration of video technologies into state-of-the-art
information systems. “With real-time, on-screen video imagery
from high-performance sensors, our operators have access to additional
information about targets and their intentions that may be crucial
in maintaining the tactical advantage,” said Maurice Isidore,
Director of DCNS Le Mourillon.
With the help of French Navy, the experiment enabled the partners
to evaluate the operational and technical performance of a range of
high-performance systems:
• new-generation thermal cameras from the Sophie, Catherine
and Suzie families developed by Thales
• video wall technology, multi-input display controller software
and a lossless real-time video streaming technology, all developed
by Barco
• the DCNS Survi® (SUrveillance Radar Video & Infrared)
system, comprising a radar, a high-definition camera, an Automatic
Identification System (AIS) antenna, a weather station and a communications
subsystem
• a multi-screen immersive situation awareness console developed
by DCNS to display and analyse the different types of video imagery.