Breaking New Ground at the RTL Spendenmarathon: Our First Multi-Camera 5G Live Production with the LDX 110 & Vislink Combination

30 years. 30 hours. On November 20th, 2025, with a highly emotional finale and a spectacular donation total, the 30th RTL Spendenmarathon came to an end. The anniversary edition of Germany's longest-running charity show raised a total of 23,077,166 for selected children's aid projects run by the Stiftung RTL - Wir helfen Kindern e. V. (RTL Foundation - We Help Children). This brings the total amount raised for children in need since the first RTL charity marathon in 1996 to 329 million.

When we began planning the 30th anniversary edition of the RTL Spendenmarathon, we knew this 30-hour charity production would once again push our team to its limits, creatively, technically, and operationally. What we didn't know was that it would also become the stage for a genuine industry first: the worldwide debut of Grass Valley's LDX 110 integrated 5G camera system in collaboration with Vislink, used in a full live broadcast environment.

And it worked. Really well.

A 5G Breakthrough in Real Live Production

For years, broadcasters have discussed the potential of 5G. The promise was always there: true mobility, bandwidth that rivals traditional RF, ultra-low latency, and infrastructure-free field coverage. But until now, there had only been a few real operational use cases that proved 5G could handle a continuous multi-camera live production with full camera control, shading, tally, return feeds, and a broadcast-grade image pipeline.

In our case, we were specifically looking for a solution that could handle all of this at once without the need to combine multiple systems, protocols, and vendors

During the 24h challenge outside our broadcast center in Cologne, we deployed two Grass Valley LDX 110 cameras, each equipped with an integrated 5G Vislink module, connected to our local 5G NPN network. These cameras weren't just sending images, they were fully integrated into our GV AMPP Remote Shading workflow.

What made this so unique?

A multi-camera 5G production using the LDX 110 & Vislink combination for the first time

Real-time camera shading and control over 5G, just like a cabled studio camera

Vislink handling video transport, return video, camera control, and tally

RTL's private 5G network providing flawless coverage for 24 hours

Demonstration that public or sliced 5G networks can be the next step

This wasn't a small tech demo. This was prime time, live on RTL.

Imaging Beyond Traditional RF

For storytelling, this breakthrough is profound.

Traditional RF links still impose limitations-coverage zones, frequency licenses, bandwidth constraints, or the need for expensive airborne relay links (yes, including helicopters and chartered airplanes). 5G changes that completely.

LINK:	https://www.grassvalley.com/breaking-new-ground-at-the-rtl-spendenmara...
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