TEWKSBURY, MA, March 1, 2010 – Top broadcasters and production teams from ARD, Eurosport, Pow! Pix and ZDF, among others, relied on industry-leading audio and video solutions from Avid® (NASDAQ:AVID) to create and deliver the features, promotions and HD broadcasts watched by millions of viewers during the Vancouver Winter Games.
Broadcasters and Post Production
Broadcasters and post production teams used a variety of Avid HD news solutions to get HD content to air quickly and meet the challenges of live sports workflows at the Vancouver Winter Games, including:
• Eurosport – Europe's leading sports entertainment group used a time-tested tapeless Avid SD and HD workflow to deliver Vancouver Winter Games coverage, allowing them to focus on delivering creative content rather than the mechanics of data management. The team relied on an Avid Interplay® media asset management system for every step of the workflow, enabling work across geographic boundaries and getting packages to air more quickly. Multiple contributors were able to access and work on media via Interplay’s connection to Avid Unity™ ISIS® shared storage and the Avid iNEWS® newsroom computer system. The workflow also offered the ability to easily create, store and access graphics with Avid Deko® graphics systems.
“When we’re broadcasting a fast-paced sports event like the Winter Olympics, we need the ability to grab, use, store and re-purpose assets within a matter of minutes, not hours,” said Vincent Gérard Hirne, technical director of Eurosport. “With Avid, we have an end-to-end HD workflow that is robust and secure enough to meet the inherent challenges of working with such copious amount of data, particularly in the HD environment.”
• ARD/ZDF – As German public broadcasters officially start offering regular HD content to viewers in Vancouver, the country’s largest stations, ARD and ZDF are using Avid solutions to deliver high-quality HD broadcast content and special programming for major sporting events. During the Vancouver Winter Games, ARD and ZDF edited and broadcast HD content using Avid’s DNxHD 145 codec. Additionally, they used14 Avid AirSpeed servers for ingest/playout; 16 Avid Interplay Assist systems for viewing and logging incoming media and 20 Media Composer systems for editing, titling and color correction; and 192 TB of Unity ISIS and Avid Video Raid for shared and localized storage.
• Pow! Pix, a New York-based post production facility, created various features, promos and teaser segments from the figure skating and short-track speed skating venue at the Vancouver Winter Games. Amassing footage daily from more than six source video formats, Pow! Pix transformed its workflow on location by leveraging AMA (Avid Media Access). This enabled the team to capture more source footage, and ingest and edit camera files immediately while only consuming a third of the storage per minute than the previous XDCAM workflow. Pow! Pix provided 24TB of scalable Unity shared storage to enable collaboration across 11 different video editing seats, including Media Composer Nitris DX and Symphony Nitris DX editing seats, as well as dedicated workstations loaded with Media Composer software for the producers to view and approve content.
Bob Barzyk, owner of Pow! Pix, said, “By expanding our workflow to bring real-time editing capabilities to multiple creative contributors, our team of editors, producers and assistants can assume a more active role in creating content, which is a huge benefit when facing tight network delivery deadlines. The producers can independently view and explore hundreds of hours of footage, using ScriptSync to locate the best clips, while the editors simultaneously create the cut and look of the piece. The content is the most important part of what we do, and Avid solutions make it easier to tell the story.”
To learn more about Avid customers and view Pow! Pix images from the Vancouver Winter Olympics check Avid’s ‘Industry Buzz’ blog.
