Moz Mirbaba
LOS ANGELES—Windowseat Pictures has been the broadcast production partner for the past seven years for the Vans Triple Crown of Surfing—the "Super Bowl" for pro surfers—that takes place annually in Hawaii on Oahu's North Shore. This year we deployed a tapeless production workflow that was streamlined with AJA's Io HD video I/O device and the Ki Pro portable tapeless recorder.
The AJA Io HD brings HD/SD editing to the MacBook Pro and Mac Pro, using Apple's ProRes 422 technology and compatibility with Final Cut Studio and other QuickTime-based applications. Io HD offers a full range of professional digital and analog I/O connectivity, as well as up/down/cross-conversion, all at 10-bit hardware-based quality. The AJA Ki Pro is a portable tapeless video recording device that records high-quality Apple ProRes 422 QuickTime files, providing seamless camera to edit workflows. As it features SD/HD-SDI, HDMI, and analog inputs, users can interface with virtually any type of camera users own or rent.
DEMANDING WORKFLOW
The Windowseat crew spent almost two months in Hawaii capturing every aspect of the competition for live and taped broadcasts. We oversaw a crew of more than 60 people who directed, produced, shot, created graphics packages and edited surfing and lifestyle segments from the six-week-long competition. Much of the material was produced live for Web and mobile, and was also being edited for Time Warner Cable on-demand and Fuel TV programming. This year, we were able to work faster and crank out more great programming than ever before with AJA tools as part of our production arsenal.
By using AJA Io HD, we were able to capture live feeds directly to servers in 1080i Apple ProRes 422. The Io HD is really great, as we could monitor the capture as it was being recorded, and then stop recording during commercials to conveniently save out a separate QuickTime file for each show segment.
AJA's Ki Pro was used to help convert footage captured from a mix of Sony, Panasonic and other high-definition cameras to 1080i Apple ProRes 422. The AJA Ki Pro was also used out in the field, mounted directly between the camera and tripod for recording talking head interviews.
SPEEDS UP EDITING CHORES
On this one project, the AJA gear saved us hours and hours of time in the edit bay, as all of our footage was available immediately in the same 1080 format we needed, and ready to edit right away in Final Cut Pro.
As we shoot this event on multiple beach locations, we also needed all of our gear to be highly portable and able to withstand high winds and sandy locales. We needed our gear to be really reliable and really rugged, and AJA delivered that and much more.
Moz Mirbaba is executive producer and partner at Windowseat Pictures based in Los Angeles. He may be contacted at mm@windowseatpictures.com.
For additional information, contact AJA at 530-274-2048 or visit aja.com.
