SVG Europe
Timeline’s new
broadcast facility in Ealing is has been hosting Channel 4 and Whisper’s live
coverage of the Paralympics, but the build is part of a wider expansion by the
west London facility group.
Timeline already
has five large galleries and small studios in Ealing for live sport but had
been missing a sizeable studio. Planning for the Ealing Broadcast Centre (EBC)
began last year and was kicked off in earnest last November.
After scouting for
a location nearby, Timeline found a new build with a high ceiling and space for
a lighting grid and green screen set plus edit suites. Building and integration
commenced in April 2021 with the contract for the Paralympics accelerating time
to completion.
“The Paralympics is
a full remote operation where we bring all signals in,” explains
Daniel McDonnell, Timeline CEO. “We’ve outfitted a studio in Leeds
[from where Paralympics Gold Rush is presented by Clare Balding] with eight
cameras controlled from Ealing. On the ground in Tokyo we’ve a remote camera operation
[with host Rosie Jones] plus six roving cameras plus a presenter for additional
coverage.”
Another remote
controlled-from-UK camera is installed in the Team GB athlete’s village.
The new studio in Ealing is used for guests in the London area and daily live show
The Last Leg with Adam Hills, Alex Brooker and Josh Widdicombe. All feeds, plus
20 signals from OBS, are switched at the EBC gallery.
VR studio
The 900 square
metre space is set over three floors, the centrepiece of which is a 185sqm
virtual reality studio with a 4.5 metre high lighting grid, green cyc and a
fully configured multi-camera VR system using Unreal Engine and Brainstorm InfinitySet
delivered in partnership with Moov. A Mo-Sys StarTracker system enables full 3D
VR tracking on all types of cameras for virtual studios.
“We wanted to kit
out the studio for high-end virtual reality using Brainstorm processing and six
cameras,” says McDonnell. “In concert with Moov TV we will design some VR set
building blocks so a production can come here and get a real headstart.
Normally a VR design might take two months of development. We’re also offering,
with Moov, experienced creatives and technicians. The aim is to bring down the
time and expense of working in a VR studio so productions can turn up and go
the next day.”
Physical sets are
also an option via black cyc, but McConnell feels that virtual sets are a great
way for productions to reduce their carbon footprint. There’s no need to build
sets using precious resource or transport it.
Also part of the
EBC are dressing/make-up rooms, production offices, green rooms, full online
edit suites and VO booths. There’s a triple-row production control room and
large VT replay room plus tier-three data centre. Connectivity to all major
hubs includes BT Tower, NEP Connect and Tata. Satellite downlink capability is
also available.
A large car park is
equipped to be able to park an OB truck – which is what Timeline is currently
doing for the Paralympics. Its UHD2 vehicle is connected to the facility “to
give us an extra gallery to work on the programming”, McDonnell says. “It’s a
useful feature, especially in London, and means we can upscale to provide more
facilities if needed.”
After the
Paralympics there are more bookings though it’s too soon to publicise these.
“The proposition does seem to be taking off. We think there’s a shortage of
studios in the UK with good connectivity and live galleries that can do EVS,
graphics and Piero and that this fills the vacancy.”
Currently the
facility is SDI-based, a decision McDonnell puts down to timing. “IP is in our
long-term plan. We will have two more galleries open at the EBC by the end of
this year and plan to expand to another two. At some point on that journey we
will migrate to IP.”
Timeline has also
implemented a large NDI network mainly for monitoring around the facility.
“It’s an IP-based
bridge between an IPTV system and broadcast monitoring for green rooms and
voice over rooms. It enables us to have a very expandable monitoring system
using IP. It also enables us to do software-based multiviewing and timecode
inserts.”
Medialooks software
convertors are used to ingest NDI and Sienna’s broadcast toolkit is used to
make multiviews and timecode inserts running on virtual machines.
“We’ve experimented
and dipped our toes in the NDI world and the latest version is a game changer,”
McDonnell says.
The whole set up is
also capable of hosting live broadcast workflows on-prem or in the cloud.
“We have a large
data centre in our new facility. It’s a key attribute. More and more clients
are remotely producing programmes from their location using virtual machines
and systems in our data centre. For me that counts as cloud broadcast.”
Of course, the
facility can also connect to third-party data centres depending on show and
region to expand its scope globally.
“If you’re doing a
show in the Middle East and need a local hop to Amazon you can still bring the
feeds back here. We have direct connection to Oracle Cloud [employed for its
SailGP production]. One hundred percent it is the direction of travel for the
industry to broadcast in the cloud whether that’s remotely from their own
broadcast centres or using public cloud or a mix of both.”
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