For the fourth straight Olympics (winter and summer versions), NBC will use Avid technology.
The peacock network said Avid helped create a "digital SD-HD production pipeline" that expands upon the video-audio output it previously implemented for the 2004 summer Olympics. The deal also represents an unprecedented move in television history, as NBC will be the first U.S. network to broadcast the Olympic winter Games in HD during primetime.
For the games this month, NBC said in a statement it will deploy its largest shared-storage component ever, designed to serve as the heart of its editing and graphics production that will include HD production and broadcasting for the first time in its main network feeds.
NBC's production facility in Torino, Italy, will consist of six Avid Unity ISIS systems and three Avid Unity LANshare (shared storage) systems, totaling more than 100TB of storage. The production center will contain three dozen Media Composer Adrenaline systems including 29 equipped with the Avid DNxcel board for HD capture, real-time editing and output for high-end editorial finishing.
NBC plans to use the Avid DNxHD format to facilitate HD production at 1080i/25 within an Avid-equipped shared storage environment. When fully operational, NBC said it will be equipped to store more than 100TB of HD media (or about 800 hours of HD footage).
