BUCHAREST, ROMANIA—Antena TV is a suite of HD channels launched by Intact Media Group, a media platform in Romania seen by more than 10 million viewers nationwide each day.
Antena TV’s Mihai Moga uses FORK for on-air and online distribution. Founded in 1991, the group now consists of six TV stations, two radio stations and a major online presence that includes websites and video-on-demand services.
With so much content needing to be created and distributed both on-air and online simultaneously daily, we have relied on the Primestream FORK platform since 2005 to handle all of our studio automation and content management activities in standard definition (576i).
Now we are relaunching all of our channels in HD (1080/50i) with a major upgrade of our production facilities that includes new software for our FORK system, which supports our production, postproduction, and OTT on-demand services.
UP TO ALL TASKS
Primestream’s FORK system is continuously upgradeable and its asset management tools work in a single, integrated software suite we use across all of our production, post-production and playout operations. We use the FORK Production Suite, FORK MAM and FORK social modules to increase productivity and foster collaboration among our creative staff. Integrated tightly with our ENPS electronic news system, our staff can find material stored on our centralized 600TB XSAN and connected Apple servers, begin editing daily news segments immediately upon ingest, and then send them for playout via the same FORK interface.
FORK can ingest 12 live HD feeds simultaneously or import from the Panasonic P2 cards used in the field and in the studio. This footage is then used by 20 Apple Final Cut Pro X and Adobe Premiere Pro nonlinear editing stations connected to the XSAN via fiber-optic paths before final playout. We can also automatically export each program to our OTT service and have it ready for viewing within minutes. We send live ingesting feeds directly to the FORK Live Assist software in our production control room for playout, while also sending content to air using FORK Master Control Playout.
Primestream integrates with leading manufacturers and off-the-shelf hardware, so we have all the flexibility and control over our workflow that we need. We broadcast 26 channels of live HD programming daily; 13 channels play from the XSAN and 13 from Harmonic MediaGrid. We also utilize Harmonic playout servers, a SAM routing switcher, Snell Kahuna switcher, Evertz, Riedel, Vizrt and a variety of other solutions—all integrated with FORK.
The FORK system also allocates each file to the individual working on a project and has allowed us to design different workflows for the individual needs of our different news and entertainment shows.
ACCESSIBLE FOR ALL
The biggest advantage of FORK is it enables us to integrate many of the tasks associated with production, postproduction, and playout. Any authorized person has full access to all of the elements living on the servers that they need to produce or review a story or entertainment program.
The Primestream FORK system is the most complete media asset management and automation system available. All aspects of our operations have benefitted from the FORK system and will continue to do so into the future.
Mihai Moga has been in broadcast since 1998 and at Antena TV for 11 years. He can be reached atmihai.moga@antenagroup.ro.
For more information, please visitwww.primestream.comor call 305-625-4415.
