Our New Digital Newsroom!

Over the weekend we "made the switch!"  Here are some pictures of our new cameras and edit systems, installed and ready to go!

Our JVC ProHD cameras record high-defintion video on tiny memory cards, not videotape.  We have about a dozen cameras total.

Most of our reporters will use the smaller, handheld cameras, while Goose and I (as well as the sports guys) have full-size, shoulder mount cameras (thankfully they only weigh half or less than the old tape-based cameras).  The picture quality of all of the cameras is absolutely amazing.

Smile! You're on tv!

This is one of our eight new edit stations. All of the video we shoot with the new cameras is edited using the latest Avid Newscutter software.  Until a few days ago, we had to "capture" the footage from our old videotape cameras in real time into our older Avid computers. That meant if you had 20 minutes of raw video, it took 20 minutes to capture before you could edit.  Now, we just take the memory cards out of the camera and insert them into the computer....the video files are instantly available for editing.

Each of the six general edit stations is located in secluded "edit bays," away from the noise of the newsroom.  Once we've finished editing a news story, it just takes a few mouse clicks to send the video file to one of the computer playback servers located across the building in Master Control.  During the live newscasts, the directors just pushes a button, and the stories are instantly on tv.
And note that while all of our video is shot and edited in 16:9 high definition, we will still air our newscasts in standard definition for the foreseeable future.  Before sending each story to the playback servers, we "downconvert" the video to 4:3 standard definition.

This is the KRBC Producer's edit station, located next to the producer's desk in the newsroom (KTAB has an identical setup).  Along with all the functionality of the standard editors, the producer computers are also hooked up to the station's Routing Switcher system, BetaSP and DVCPRO tape machines, DVD players, and the "video on demand" services from NBC, CBS, and CNN.  This allows us to record anything from anywhere, such as the "national" news stories you see on our newscasts.