NY1, New York City’s all-news station, is using an Omneon Spectrum server as an all-encompassing field production system to support its coverage of the U.S. political conventions later this month.
NY1 will use the Spectrum to provide a single storage platform for ingest, editing and final transfer of finished material to its New York headquarters. Material shot in DV25 SD 4:1:1 is ingested to the Spectrum server as file transfers from NY1’s Panasonic P2 cameras and made available immediately to six Apple Final Cut Pro workstations using ProRes 422. Spectrum’s edit-in-place capability allows the workstations to share and edit material residing on the system without transferring or copying files. Completed stories saved on the Spectrum server are formatted as .mov files and then sent as baseband video via fiber to NY1’s Manhattan facility for final transmission and Webcasting.
With users able to access content stored on the Spectrum simultaneously, NY1 expects a 50 percent improvement in workflow efficiency compared to the station’s experiences at past conventions. This will result in more timely updates and more thorough coverage, according to NY1.
“From the technical standpoint, we expect these to be the easiest conventions we’ve ever done,” said Michael Chan, NY1 director of technical operations. “The major reason is the Omneon equipment. For us, the ability to share clips and to secure them—with no tape to misplace—makes a tremendous difference. And as for setup, once the network with the FCP stations has been established, it’s a matter of plugging it in, hooking up the wire, flipping a switch, and it’s done.
Read more about how broadcasters will cover the Democratic and Republican conventions.
