Inside: Vision mixer roundtable, NAB Preview, Graphics & Subtitling
TVBEUROPE
Europe’s television technology business magazine
www.tvbeurope.com
MARCH 2012
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Run to digital Olympics: Sport plus lasting legacy As the London 2012 Games approach, Philip Stevens talks to the lead BBC practitioners about its preparations — and the legacy from the event the organisers wish to achieve When the BBC televised the London Olympics in 1948, those involved could hardly have imagined what broadcasting the next Games from that city would entail. That said, it must have been quite an achievement to provide around 60 hours of coverage from a service that had only relatively recently been reactivated after the war.
The austerity Games? Things have moved on a great deal since the last time the BBC covered the Olympics in London in 1948
According to the BBC archive, one of the significant developments for the 1948 events was the introduction of an OB truck that allowed the crew to sit down for the first time! This time around, about 2,500 hours will be transmitted on two of the BBC’s broadcast channels, supplemented with up to 24 live streams on broadband and other events being shown via the ‘red button’ facility.
“These have become known as the Digital Games,” Roger Mosey, BBC’s director of London 2012, told TVBEurope. “That means we are operating in entirely new territory — and that brings its own set of exciting challenges.” Mosey recalls there was a great sense of excitement and anticipation when the announcement was made in July 2005 that London would be the venue for this year’s Olympic Games. “I was working in TV news at the time and there was a sense of elation as the full impact of the decision was realised. I believe it was a fantastic moment for the country.” Although some low level planning had already taken place within the BBC as part of the London bid, the real effort didn’t begin until the Beijing Games of 2008 were over. “Those Olympics were the biggest outside broadcast we had ever mounted and there was enough to occupy our attentions. But once that was completed we devoted ourselves to 2012.” He says that the Beijing Games had many gargantuan features, but the BBC is aiming for something quite different — surrounding the actual sport with cultural and other events. While the Olympics is a majority event with 75% of the population planning to watch the sporting activities, there is a need to involve the rest of the viewing audience. “We are going to be looking at the surrounding stories, news, the torch relay and the culture. We will be providing something for everyone — you will not have to love sport to enjoy the occasion.” The BBC will provide coverage of activities under the title of the Cultural Olympiad. These include offering Shakespeare productions, a music festival in east London and Promenade concerts from the Royal Albert Hall. “The opening ceremony for the games will be special, but for those who are not too interested in that event, there will be the opportunity of seeing Daniel Barenboim conducting Beethoven’s Ninth. That will make the night special for those viewers.” Full story page 12
McDonnell and Davis in Racing UK’s new gallery, with the pre-production Karrera switcher
Timeline for turnaround Fast Turnaround TV As tapeless workflows spread to every area of broadcasting, one tapeless specialist has used the opportunity to move from sport into general programming as it builds new post and playout facilities. David Fox reports Timeline TV is “an OB company that’s moved into facilities,” according to its Commercial Director Stephen Davis. It has recently built a new multi-channel playout centre for Racing UK, which went on air on 28 February at Ealing Studios in west London, and will open its third post facility (at MediaCity UK) in April. Since its establishment in 2006, Timeline has expanded from providing tapeless server systems for outside broadcasts to flyaway production units, RF and comms, as well as developing post houses in central and west London. It was originally set up to provide EVS systems for sports and has “delivered the biggest EVS solutions outside of EVS.” It is now taking the tapeless workflow expertise it has developed in
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sport and applying it to other forms of programming, including news events and documentaries. “The tapeless workflow is at the core of what we deliver, but we’ve grown the business either side of it to offer full production facilities,” says Davis. “We found that people didn’t know what to do with the media” that accumulates in covering events, so it offered services to synchronise media and edits. This led into working on the BBC’s Formula 1 coverage, for which Timeline TV now holds 2,500 hours of archive. It has a SAN in Ealing for the pre-show edits, then takes any changes on a drive to the OB, where the editors can immediately pick up again and finish editing, adding extra material from the track, and can then finish any remaining pieces back in Ealing afterwards. It has fibre lines to the BBC for delivery. It also worked on the Cricket World Cup, for which it built the facilities to suit the six-week event, with 37 live network programmes broadcast on BBC2 from Ealing. Full story page 14