High Noon Entertainment -- a leading producer of unscripted series for cable networks including Food Network, Home & Garden Television, Fine Living, Animal Planet and Discovery Channel -- has made a significant investment in HDTV production that will result in the creation of 375 hours of HD episodes for those networks through the rest of the year.
This means 75% of the production company’s output will now be in HDTV.
Executives with the nine-year-old company said they want High Noon to lead the industry in the technology, adding that its clients have demanded this revolution.
CEO Jim Berger said High Noon has previously done some HDTV work for Discovery, adding that clients such as Scripps Networks have “really fired up their commitment” to HDTV.
This triggered the decision to invest in equipment and to retrain technical staff to make the transition from “a handful” of HDTV episodes to the greater tonnage.
High Noon includes Rocket Pictures, Great Divide Pictures and High Noon Productions. The three production companies have created more than 1,500 television hours. They joined together in June to form High Noon.
Its output includes such cable staples as Food’s Unwrapped, Surprise by Design on Discovery and Stripped on Style. Its broadcast client is Pax TV, which airs Faith Under Fire.
The company has invested $3 million in a 26,000-square-foot production studio in Denver, permitting greater quality and cost control, executives said. The company’s Los Angeles office has a staff of 50.
For more on High Noon’s HDTV plans, please see Linda Haugsted’s story on page eight of Monday’s issue of Multichannel News.
