Scottish Catholic Observer

Broadcasts from the Vatican will be available in High Definition from Christmas the Holy See revealed yesterday.

Thanks to a discount from Sony and a contribution from the Knights of Columbus, the Vatican television centre now has a multimillion-dollar high-definition mobile television studio, which will be operational in time for the Pope’s Christmas Midnight Mass.

The Vatican unveiled the mobile studio, a 45-foot-long, 18-wheel truck with 16 workstations, (pictured above) after a news conference yesterday.
Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, director of the Vatican television centre and the Vatican press office, told reporters the mobile studio and its all-HD equipment was worth nearly four million pounds.
Fr Lombardi said he knew some may think the project was too extravagant, but with television broadcasters around the world moving to high definition, ‘the image of the pope would gradually disappear from the world of television over the coming years without it.’