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TV Bay Questions Editor and Technical Manager at Astley B...

Who are you? (about yourself and Astley Baker Davies)I am Taig McNab, editor and technical manager at Astley Baker Davies. We are a small, multi-award winning animation studio based in central London. What do you do? What does Astley Baker Davies do?We are most famous for our involvement with the Peppa Pig series. Our other shows include Ben & Holl...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 December 2010

Am I a Martian at IBC2010

I have just returned from my annual sojourn at IBC and must confess that I was somewhat bemused by what I saw. I always think that the way to assess the tone of a show is to ask yourself what an average Martian would think about it, if it were doing a spot of pre-earth invasion scouting. Three dimensional headachesThis year, my Martian would have w...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 November 2010

To buy or not to buy that is the question

When it comes to buying or leasing your equipment, should your head be in the clouds or your hands in your pockets? Azule’s Peter Savage investigates... As the theme of this month’s issue is archiving and storage, I thought it would be a good time to take a moment and look at different ways of acquiring the IT based storage and archiving assets on...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 October 2010

Archiving in a Multiplatform Environment

There was a time when broadcasters and media companies worried only about one version of content, destined for one distribution platform. Now, however, the increasing volume, number of versions, and growing complexity of digital media assets has made the management and storage of content a much more challenging undertaking. Media companies today mu...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 October 2010

Digital Archiving in Media Workflows

Why is there a growing need for digital archiving in the broadcast and post-production industry?Across all segments of the media and entertainment industry, the past decade has seen a fundamental transformation, where virtually the entire industry moved from tape or film to digital media. This change required investing in digital equipment and proc...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 October 2010

Shared Storage Comes of Age

Increasingly stored in digital form, together with related metadata, digital media is in the process of transforming both the technology and process of production throughout the broadcast and post production industries. But as every action precipitates a reaction, every advancement precipitates its own particular challenges. The challenges with dig...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 October 2010

Tape is dead. Long live Tape

An area that has been a vital part of television – defining much of ‘how’ and ‘what’ things are done – is recording. At first film was the medium, then in 1956, Ampex invented the video tape recorder with the prime aim of providing delayed programmes across the USA. Soon video tape editing, and other applications rapidly expanded and the 2-inch qua...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 October 2010

Content Control in a Complex Broadcast Environment

Broadcasters and other media companies today acquire, generate and store an unprecedented volume of content to take advantage of new distribution outlets. Enabled by the transition to digital media and file-based workflows, this model presents new opportunities with respect to revenue generation as well as new challenges in terms of establishing ef...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 October 2010

Ensuring the longevity of an archive

The role of the archive has changed dramatically over the last few years. Every broadcaster in the world, regardless of their size, has the tools at their disposal to unlock their assets, digitise and repurpose their content for renewed monetisation and, in some cases, for the benefit of historic value. Tapping into new revenue streams is essential...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 October 2010

Those Who Forget the Past are Doomed to Delete It

Hundreds of thousands of hours of film and video archives are slowly deteriorating in vaults and storage containers around the world. Although numerous projects are underway worldwide to restore, preserve and protect these vast repositories of cultural heritage, it does little good if the rescued material isn’t catalogued, archived and managed. If...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 October 2010

Making the content factory a reality

The expression “content factory” has been around for a while and in a number of contexts. Is this a realistic concept? Can we – producers, facilities, broadcasters – embrace the idea of process in the manufacturing sense, or is making content for television and the new digital platforms too different to making biscuits or cars?We are naturally resi...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 September 2010

Splitting Image

The traditional CRT monitor stack is now all but consigned to the annals of history. Not the vain claim of some clever marketing agency or the opening pitch of a sharp dressed sales rep but more the demise of a technology that is becoming less and less available. While manufacturers still have a few CRT models available in their portfolio we’ve see...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 August 2010

A dream budget

As the coalition government prepares its emergency budget, Peter Savage looks at what is planned and tells us what he thinks the government should do. Apologies to avid readers of this column that there wasn’t one in the last issue. The editors decided on an article on the effects of the general election on our industries and, sod’s law, the deadli...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 July 2010

Enabling the fans

The days when a simple hotdog, a pint of beer, a score board and good lungs were the main ingredients of a great day at a football game are soon to be a thing of the past. Mike Arthur, general manager, sports and live events, at Harris Broadcast Communications, talks to TV-Bay Magazine about the advances in technology which will enable interactive...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 July 2010

Aston ON

In August 2009 leading Spanish real-time graphics manufacturer, Brainstorm Multimedia acquired the Aston 7 character generator from the Softel Group. With over 30 years on the market, Aston is one of the most established brands in the business and has been the gold standard in character generation in the United Kingdom for many years – to the exten...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 June 2010