KitPlus | Articles

Applying the milkshake theory

In last month’s column I sounded off at a few of the crackpot ideas going around at the moment, like connected television. The point, if there was one, was that we seem to be overloaded at the moment with new technologies that exist solely for one of two reasons: that a bunch of engineers found they could do it, and/or a big manufacturer thought th...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 April 2011

Mobile Cameraman Extraordinaire

I had wanted to work in television since my teens and, at 20, started as a trainee assistant cameraman at Mersey Television on 'Brookside' in Liverpool and then joining Thorn-EMI Facilities in London. Thorn-EMI put me in charge of a studio used to shoot links for companies like Children's Channel using very bulky early tubed Betacams. Five years la...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 April 2011

The #BVEXPO Great Experiment

NAB, IBC and Broadcast Video Expo share one thing - they play to a global audience for TV and film production, post-production and distribution. It’s not practical to get along to all the shows so there is an increasing trend to report for that global audience. BV Expo is currently the only show without a dedicated multimedia channel. With somethin...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 April 2011

BBC Academy

Today’s broadcast industry depends on a mobile workforce of skilled professionals. And in the YouTube age where anyone can upload a film, what distinguishes the professional from the amateur? In short - great training!A recent survey of industry freelancers reveals that more than half rank training as one of the most important factors in developing...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 March 2011

Production Spotlight

On Friday 10th September, Fluidmoves Video Productions, filmed a new outfall pipe leaving Shoreham Harbour on the Sussex coast. The 1.8 kilometre pipe was towed out to sea through the open lock gates round to Newhaven Harbour, a distance of 15 nautical miles, on behalf of Southern Water and its contractor 4Delivery. The outfall is part of Southern...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 March 2011

Tape goes West at UWE

Three years ago a convoy of white vans arrived at the Faculty of Arts at the University of West of England in Bristol. An hour later its entire stock of SVHS camcorders, linear editing decks and analog tape were history. In came Adobe Premiere, Final Cut Pro and Panasonic digital camcorders. Now 20 professional tapeless HD camcorders have taken up...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 March 2011

Challenging Loudness

Numerous definitions of the word loudness exist but to understand the relevance of the word in relation to the world of broadcast sound perhaps the statement that loudness is “our perceived impression of the intensity, frequency, and duration of a sound” fits closest. We all watch TV with the remote control close at hand; not just to change channel...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 March 2011

tv-bay questions

Name & Title?Ben Holmes, Owner and Senior EditorWho are you? (about yourself and EditOut)We're a specialist edit company focusing on editing for Outside Broadcast, as well as some corporate work. What do you do? What does EditOut do?My day-to-day work is as a VT and edit supervisor, producing packages for live TV broadcasts. Edit Out supplies Final...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 February 2011

Camp, ash, irritation and embarrassment

I am writing these words in the last days of December and you are reading them in the first days of January, so it seems like a good opportunity to look back on 2010 and see what we toilers in television have learnt. Against the odds there were some good programmes on the box. Astoundingly, ITV delivered a drama series that was just like the good o...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 February 2011

Television, the limits of the possible

When I was a young scribbler in 1970, my then employers allowed me to launch and run on their behalf a magazine called Studio Sound. It was one of my better career moves and survived (mainly thanks to me leaving it in 1974) for about 35 years. Fairly good going for a trade publication. The upside of editing Studio Sound was being invited to a bean-...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 February 2011

Broadcast Batteries, Today and Tomorrow

As consumers, we all have experience of being let down by batteries (think rusty Italian cars in the 1970s!). But thankfully the world of batteries has moved on: the global battery industry is today worth $71 billion and is estimated to be growing at nearly 5% a year. Of this, broadcast batteries make up a tiny fraction but the manufacturers that s...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 February 2011

Bridging the divide between production and post productio...

In the last couple of years we have seen a considerable increase in the adoption of digital film cameras. This is not only fuelled by improvements in the technology and image quality but also by the adoption of 3D filmmaking, which significantly lends itself to the digital arena. Digital cameras have brought some wonderful benefits to the filming c...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 February 2011

Synchronising the Shelf Stackers

The six-episode BBC Series “Shelf Stackers” brings audiences lots of laughs with its witty teenage commentary. Dom Bridges directed and helped edit the popular show as well as automating the synchronisation of audio clips for its dual-system sound productionBridges began his career as a graphic designer, which eventually led him to commercial desig...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 February 2011

TV Bay Questions

Who are you? (about yourself and Online Creative)I am the owner of Brighton based post production facility, Online Creative Ltd. I started the company in 1999 primarily as an edit facility which has since developed further into a production company and training facility. We have recently invested in a fully equipped grading suite to add to the serv...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 January 2011

Getting the basics right

In this column in the last issue of TV-Bay I wrote that, thanks to technology, some jobs in broadcast are now more suited to people who have no broadcast training. It was, in the way of columns at the backs of magazines, more a call for comment than a reasoned argument. As it happened, the same issue also included an article by the admirable Freddi...

Submitted by Kieron Seth#

Published 01 January 2011