EVANSVILLE, IND.—When news broke of a Greyhound bus driving into the Evansville bus terminal’s awning, WEHT-TV’s TVUPacks were all out covering other stories. So I drove to the bus terminal without any equipment or ENG trucks.
The accident had put the bus line’s schedule several hours behind, which was the story our competitors covered. At the terminal, I met a young man on his way to St. Louis to play basketball for more than 100 college scouts and coaches in hopes of receiving an athletic scholarship. This was his last shot, and the opportunity was slipping through his fingers due to the bus delay. After speaking with my News Director, Bob Freeman, I offered him a ride to St. Louis.
We got him to try-outs, and using the TVU Anywhere app on my iPhone, we covered the story live, with just my phone for acquisition and transmission. Using the TVU Anywhere app (for both Android and iOS) to get a live, high-quality picture allowed us turn an everyday story into a compelling human interest story.
RELIABILITY & QUALITY
For WEHT, the biggest benefits of TVU Anywhere have been the flexibility, ease-of-use and reliability—it’s revolutionized the way we cover breaking news. I’ve been shooting stories on my iPhone for a few years, but sending video back to the station is a lot different than streaming it live in real-time. We evaluated other solutions, and they didn’t provide as good of a picture, and the signal wasn’t reliable enough to maintain the quality on which we pride ourselves. The picture quality from a smartphone using a cellular signal and Wi- Fi with the TVU Anywhere app is incredible. No one ever believes that we shot the footage with an iPhone. It gives us a cellular uplink transmitter in the palm of our hand.
TVU Anywhere allows for video to be captured and transmitted through an iPhone.IN THE FIELD
TVU Anywhere is an important tool in the winter months when we cover more extreme weather. Having a high-quality transmitter in my pocket means I can capture everything from blizzards to tornadoes anywhere, at any time, keeping our viewers safe, protected and informed. It only takes about five minutes to send weather footage back to the studio, but in a tornado, five minutes is a long time; I would much rather stream broadcast-quality video, immediately.
Since deploying TVU Anywhere, we’ve used it to capture live, mobile shots from a rollercoaster speeding at 60 miles per hour on its opening day and to cover real-time developments from the scene of a fire. But it was our use of TVU Anywhere on this human interest story related to the bus accident that garnered the most attention.
If I’m out, whether I’m on a story or not, I always have my smartphone on me, which with TVU Anywhere, means that I also always have a camera to instantly capture and transmit footage from anywhere back to the station.
The TVU Anywhere app is available in iTunes for iOS and Google Play for Android.
Simpson has been the chief photographer at WEHT-TV in Evansville since 1993. He can be contacted atjsimpson@tristatehomepage.com or 812-457-9748.
For more information, please visitwww.tvunetworks.comor call 650-969- 6732.
