Abstract
Tapeless acquisition and efficient post-production
workflows are an aspiration for many production teams,
because of the potential savings in time spent on noncreative
tasks. The marketplace provides solutions using optical
disc and memory-card based acquisition devices, direct
ingest of live feeds into servers, and server-based editing
networks. Increasingly, the interoperability within these
solutions is based on open file formats for material and
associated metadata (e.g. MXF and AAF).
While the functionality
of new systems may be excellent, not every production
team has the necessary budget. Where
production budgets are low, open file formats provide
a new opportunity to integrate commodity IT equipment
with
existing production tools, to achieve some of the workflow
benefits previously only available at high cost.
This paper describes a scratch-built multi-channel ingest
system built by BBC R&D, based on off-the-shelf components
and open-source software. Using standard file formats,
the system has been integrated with existing commercial
editing tools to enable an improved tapeless workflow,
at low cost, for a BBC production team.
The relevant enabling
file formats are examined and a number of design aspects
are discussed. This project
is an example
of how open formats and open source software give users
the means to innovate directly to develop improved
ways of working.
This paper was originally
given in Las Vegas at NAB 2006 on 27th April 2006 along
with a video demonstrating the work which is available:
BBC
R&D Production Automation 2006 video
(AVI
file, 63
Mb) |
