17 January 2007
Daystar Television Network, the fastest growing, second largest Christian television network in the world, has selected a Quantel sQ HD/SD integrated production system for its 24-hour program production. Daystar operates more than 50 television stations in the major U.S. markets with production facilities in Dallas, Houston, Denver and Kentucky. It has a potential audience of 128 million viewers in the United States alone and can be seen over 200 countries.
The new sQ system will be housed in the networks Dallas headquarters and supports six sQ Cut, six sQ Edit desktop editing applications and three eQ multi-resolution editing, effects, color correction and deliverables systems.
Daystar chose the Quantel system after a three year evaluation process of all the available systems on the market. Quantels Regional Sales Manager, David Black, said, Quantel and Daystar worked very hard to dramatically increase their workflow production and ability to more quickly get product to air.
The new sQ server will replace the networks tape-based production workflow. Currently the network has been editing on Final Cut Pro and mastering to tape. Daystar plans on using the sQ system primarily as a production editing and storage server with occasional use for production playout. The network plans to go live with the system May 1, 2007.
The Quantel sQ system will benefit Daystars production operation in several areas. The networks primary production, Celebration, is live four days a week, and re-airs in two different timeslots daily. The workflow for Celebration is very much like a newscast, with support footage arriving sometimes minutes to air. The sQ system will give the production team a newsroom workflow while maintaining a high-quality signal path that can handle multiple resolutions and file formats with ease.
Joni is the networks talk show and is completely post produced. The graphical content and template approach to the shows format conforms tightly into the Quantel workflow. The time in post will be significantly reduced, allowing more creativity and scheduling flexibility. Some of the stations EFP for this program is HD, so the eQs seamless multi-resolution operation options are critical.
After an in-depth research process, we chose the Quantel sQ server and associated editors to provide us with the most efficient, high-quality solution to our workflow issues, said Leland Johnson, Daystar systems developer. Specifically, Quantels FrameMagic file management became the primary factor in our decision, as it presented a very cost-effective storage and archive model that fit what we wanted to accomplish.
17 January 2007
Stand No: Autocue will be represented by UBMS on stand: E1-11/D1-11
Autocue, a leading provider of newsroom automation and teleprompting solutions, is showcasing a number of new and existing products at CABSAT 2007 on the UBMS stand; Autocues new partner in the Middle East.
* QNxt: Making its debut in the Middle East, Autocue launches the first IP-based, networked prompting system. The prompting application on the PC connects to a hardware component – the QBox – over an Ethernet link, which can be wired or wireless. This means that the QBox can be controlled locally, or remotely, by the PC over an unlimited distance. In this way, QNxt moves the level of intelligence away from the central control system, and out to the prompter itself, unlocking a host of benefits for the end user, both in the studio and in the field.
Also on display:
Master and Professional Series Prompters: The Master Series is designed to meet the demanding real-time requirements of the top-end broadcast studios. Autocue boasts three unique products in this range: the smallest and largest daylight-readable prompters in the world, and the only top-mounted prompter. The Professional Series is an affordable range of prompters designed for the emerging or non-traditional broadcast markets, including smaller stations, corporate, religious and educational broadcasters.
QSmart: Designed to provide a robust and expandable solution to meet the specific NRCS requirements of smaller market and non-traditional broadcasters. It is priced to match the budget of even the smallest news operation yet provides an enormous range of functionality already proven in much larger organisations around the world.
17 January 2007
Harris Corporation, an international communications and information technology company, will now feature expanded Material Exchange Format (MXF) support in products from its Broadcast Communications Division via a software development kit from the leader in MXF interchange, MOG Solutions. Harris has purchased a group license for the MOG Solutions MXFComponentSuite, which will enable many Harris products to have faster MXF compatibility through unified and optimized workflows. The first Harris product line to incorporate the MOG MXFComponentSuite technology is the family of NEXIO high-definition/standard-definition (HD/SD) video servers.
The MXFComponentSuite is a set of MXF-enabled components that abstract the application layer from the details and complexity of the MXF format using simple application programming interfaces. Enabling high-performance transfers of pictures, audio, metadata and the like across a file-based system, this MXF interchange toolkit will minimize file inconsistencies and provide Harris® NEXIO server users with a reliable and simple means of handling both SD and HD MXF files.
“The NEXIO platform is one of the leading servers on the market today, and we are delighted to work with Harris to implement our software development kit to enhance the MXF interchange capabilities of their expansive, worldwide server client base,” said Vitor Teixeira, vice president of product development and sales, MOG Solutions. “Our MXFComponentSuite combines the best technologies and standards of broadcasting and IT worlds in one unit.”
“This MXF interchange toolkit will provide our NEXIO customers with a ‘media wrapper’ that improves workflow by enabling our servers to better interface with third-party equipment,” said Tim Thorsteinson, president of the Harris Broadcast Communications Division. “Working with MOG Solutions allows us to draw on their skills as leaders in developing MXF-compliant technologies, and enables us to focus on our core competencies the development of enterprise-class, server-based shared storage solutions.”
NEXIO is a scalable, interoperable server foundation. It is a highly integrated family of products that employs open standards to greatly accelerate time-to-air and dramatically reduce the costs associated with content acquisition, production, distribution and media management today and for the long term. As a replacement for videotape recorders, NEXIO servers provide real-time I/O, network interfaces, ingest, playout and FTP capabilities all within a single chassis. The newest sub-brand in the family is NEXIO XS, a line of HD/SD transmission servers featuring integrated, software-based codec technology and software-driven up-, down- and cross-conversion to provide the ultimate in reliability, scalability and format flexibility.
16 January 2007
Joanna Shields, Google’s European MD of Strategic Partnerships and Syndication, has left the search engine for social networking company Bebo.
Shields, who comes from an engineering background, is credited with putting together Google’s deal with the UK’s BSkyB last year and will now head up Bebo’s new international division.
Shields will be based at Bebo’s offices in Carnaby Street, central London.
16 January 2007
Broadcasting Board of Governors Chairman Kenneth Y. Tomlinson has asked President Bush not to put his name in nomination for another term. Tomlinson said he serves at the pleasure of the President and plans to remain in office until his successor is confirmed.
In a letter to President Bush dated January 9, Tomlinson said he is proud of his record of service and appreciated deeply your repeatedly submitting my name to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee for reconfirmation to this position. However, I have concluded that it would be far more constructive to write a book about my experiences rather than to seek to continue government service.
In the letter, Tomlinson cited the role he has played in launching Arabic-language satellite television across the Middle East, daily Persian-language satellite television to Iran, expansion of radio and television to Afghanistan and significantly increasing radio and television transmissions to Cuba.
Tomlinsons chairmanship of the BBG began in 2002. He previously served as Editor-In-Chief of Readers Digest following a 28-year career with the magazine. In 1982, he was appointed by President Reagan and served two years as Director of Voice of America. He later served as a member of the Board for International Broadcasting (which supervised Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty) for eight years beginning in 1986.
16 January 2007
The latest baby of Skype’s founders, The Venice Project, has been rebranded Joost. The peer-to-peer video network has acquired its new Dutch-sounding name as part of the company’s intention to “become synonymous
with the best of TV and the best of the Web”.
Presently beta-testing (the AIB is one of those test beds), Joost will have a new release in the next few weeks. We’re already impressed with the quality of the video delivered to an AIB computer, and we believe that this could mark the start of the future of web-delivered video content in a secure, DRM-compliant way.
