OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla.—As a private, family-owned, Oklahoma-based multimedia company, Griffin Communications is committed to keeping Oklahomans safe, informed and entertained, and has been serving our community through our TV and radio stations for more than 55 years.
To continue this legacy of service, we started a project in 2019 to restructure and reinvent our newsrooms to evolve with the ever-changing media landscape by updating our content strategy and evaluating equipment needs. With 40 mobile, multimedia journalists and 25 photographers, we wanted to outfit them with the latest camera equipment that would enable them to easily shoot and create content on-the-go throughout the state.
SUPPORTING OUR JOURNALISTS
When you make a decision to upgrade your newsroom, there are many factors to consider—functionality, techs and specs, competitive price point and compatibility with existing hardware and customer service. These factors, coupled with the trust we already had in Panasonic, gave us the confidence to purchase 40 AG-CX350 handheld cameras and 26 shoulder-mounted AG-PX380G cameras to support our journalists and photographers and our new content workflow.
We are dedicated to providing our journalists with the best technology to produce the best stories. Greg Blackwood and Oscar Pea, our chief photojournalists, were excited to work with the new Panasonic cameras, particularly the CX350s due to the camera’s efficient design. The CX350 allows our mobile, multimedia journalists to gather b-roll and interviews quickly as the camera’s compact size and weight make it easy for our journalists to move around while still capturing quality video.
Along with ease of use, the CX350 also provides live streaming, best-in-class picture quality and a superior digital zoom. These high-performance features, coupled with the intuitive nature of the camera allow our journalists to shoot their own standups and live shots with very little practice, which is key to staying ahead of breaking news and reporting the stories that mean the most to our communities.
CHANGING THE PROCESS
As media companies are constantly faced with budgetary concerns and advancing technology, we took this opportunity with the new cameras to recreate Griffin Communications’ content workflows. By providing Panasonic’s handheld and shoulder-mount cameras to our mobile, multimedia journalists, we can create more content more efficiently. In fact, we doubled the content produced everyday by reimagining and restructuring our newsrooms, staffing and workflows. The Panasonic CX350 and PX380G cameras were the perfect tools to achieve this goal.
In addition to the quality of Panasonic’s broadcast cameras, we’ve also been very pleased with the level of customer support Panasonic has provided us. We’ve never purchased a warranty before, but with the affordability of Panasonic’s extended warranty, we went ahead with it. The warranty has been a huge help. Things happen with equipment when you’re in the field, and we’ve been so pleased with the repairs and responsiveness from the Panasonic team. Not only has customer service been great, but the level of the service is by far matched with the quality of products and technology Panasonic produces.
Todd Spessard is the vice president of Content at Griffin Communications and leads Oklahoma’s largest team of journalists and has helped build a newsroom culture dedicated to excellence. He can be reached at todd.spessard@griffin.news. For more information visit, www.griffin.news.
For additional information, visit na.panasonic.com.
