Crawford Post Production, a service area of Crawford Communications, Inc. and the largest post production operation in the Southeast, provided high definition post production services for the high profile ABC primetime fundraiser, "The Concert for World Children's Day," nationally broadcast recently on ABC during prime time sweeps. The concert featured performances by Celine Dion, Enrique Iglesias, Josh Groban and many others. This was the first ever television entertainment special produced with 12 HD cameras at 24p and finished in HD at 24p with 5.1 surround sound. The concert and television special were created and produced by Executive Visions Inc. principals and co-founders Michael Marto, Charles Marto and Robert Marto, in collaboration with the Ronald McDonald House Charities (RMHC) and McDonald's Corporation. Musical Director for the project was David Foster, renowned songwriter, music producer, film score composer and performer. The Video Director was Jim Gable. Executive Visions hired Crawford's Ron Heidt as the HD technical consultant for the elaborate production. Heidt spent several days on location in Chicago, where the performance was taped before a live audience, providing technical supervision of the HD production path. Crawford also posted and authored a DVD version of the network special (recently glowingly reviewed in BillBoard Magazine) that included extended performances and behind the scenes footage. The DVD is now being sold in various retail outlets and on-line with all proceeds going to the RMHC. Crawford down-converted over 40 HD source tapes to NTSC for Gable's offline sessions in L.A. They then conformed the show in 24p HD, as well as a pan-and-scan 4x3 version for the NTSC ABC Broadcast, and completed the final audio mix in both stereo and 5.1. Many Crawford employees came together to make this production a smash. In addition to Heidt, Sheri Kidwell provided editorial assistance, Greg Crawford was responsible for stereo and 5.1 finishing, and Kathleen Fitch was the Executive Producer. Avril Palmquist oversaw DVD authoring, Maggie Wheeler provided DVD menu design, Curtis Elder created the DVD menus and did some additional HD editing in the AVID/DS HD and Tom Roche oversaw DVD bonus material in AVID. Crawford Post also recently teamed with Tribune Creative Services to create the promotions for the nationally syndicated launch of the popular sitcom, Will and Grace. Networks purchasing the programming received the promos as part of their package. The promos were distributed via satellite feeds in time for launch dates. Crawford created four spots for each show. "There were hundreds of spots," said Steve Davis, Director of Audio. "This is a huge project requiring lots of talented people." Davis credits audio engineers Dave Henshaw, Dave Wilson, Randy Garmon, Gideon Cohen, Brit Warner and Bryan Stone for the outstanding work on the spots. Crawford AVID editors Curtis Iocco, Mike Allen, Mark Davis, Tom Roche, Bill Bowen and Jim Bowhall also worked on the project. Kenny Sloat served as the Coordinating Producer for the project. Tribune has previously called on Crawford to produce successful promotional campaigns for Friends, Boy Meets World, Coach, Wonder Years, Hercules and Xena. They are currently working on promos for Andromeda and Mutant X, now tied for first and second in the syndicated series ratings.