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_460_307_70.jpg "Video engineers may recall tape libraries were like this film storage. Finding something was difficult. Image courtesy Irish Film Institute")
In 2007, it was estimated that the planet had stored 275 zettabytes (or 10 to the 1021) of data - the equivalent of a stack of CDs reaching from earth to beyond the moon! And in a single generation, our planet will add more information than in all of recorded history, some 40 trillion gigabytes of digital information. But, that data is delicate and easily lost.
UHD, 4K, 6K, 8K…the proliferation of high-resolution formats and files, along with the growing number of skillsets that can collaborate on projects, can push storage bandwidth and capacities beyond their limits. With millions of assets available to potentially hundreds of creatives, resource contention across storage and lack of sophisticated media management tools become a major issue. Efficient, reliable and high-availability media storage, normally reserved for enterprise-class applications, is fast becoming the requirement across all levels for production and post.
Anyone who says engineering live field production is a breeze isn’t serious.
While it is easy to mount multiple wireless GoPro cameras around an event area.The real issue becomes how to accurately switch between them. Fortunately, there now is a solution.
Today’s standard industrial IT infrastructure has already overtaken the technology of AES/EBU, MADI and TDM routers in terms of performance, cost and flexibility. The rate of development of IT systems, fuelled as it is by a multi-billion dollar industry many times the size of the broadcast industry, is certain to widen this gap in the future. Over the next few years IT infrastructure will replace current broadcast infrastructure, delivering additional flexibility, better scalability and significantly lower costs.
It is inevitable, that once content becomes separate from the carrier, a transition that has already taken place, data networks will replace baseband.With the transition to digital essentially complete, we now get to reap the benefits, and havoc, that media freed of any physical carrier brings with it.
Broadcasters across the globe are adopting the 1960s slogan ‘Make Love – Not War’ and using its essential message to underpin a revolution in the way they are organising their staff, technology and buildings. A new era of intense internal collaboration is being seen as a key tactic in their efforts to reduce costs, grow audiences and see off new competition. A recent survey by Marquis Media Partners LLP identified scores of TV, radio, print and online companies who have embarked on wholesale building moves and technical refreshes. Most of them are also preaching a gospel of vigorous co-operation between their different teams, departments and divisions in order to maximise the value of their investments.
_460_307_70.jpg "The DYVI production switcher introduces IP switching and connectivity to live production.")
It is no secret that the media industry is moving towards an IP infrastructure. It is not so clear as to how much confusion this transition may cause. Media expert Gary Olson offers some guidance on this important evolution.
