Sky News restructures its processes with ATEM and Smart Videohub

Blackmagic technology allows the British channel's Studio D to have a large control room with workstations for the director, the mixer operator and the sound engineer under the supervision of the technical director.

The British channel Sky News has used the ATEM 2 M/E Production Studio 4K, ATEM 2 M/E Broadcast Panel and Smart Videohub devices from Blackmagic to modify the news broadcast systems in studio D.

A small group of multifaceted professionals uses this study to create 3-minute news trailers that are broadcast through all digital media available on the channel. Likewise, in case more complex projects arise, the studio has the necessary facilities to organize a large control room with workstations for the director, the mixer operator and the sound engineer under the supervision of the technical director.

Martin Stanford, a long-time presenter at the channel, says that the production of news previews used to take a lot of time: "Previously the work involved several hours in the editing room combining shots of the presenters and images related to the news, as well as swathes of text and other information. Thanks to the new structure of the studio, we can create a bulletin in real time, mark entry and exit points, and publish them in all formats for digital devices. This allows us to reduce delivery time, so we now do in a matter of minutes what previously took us more than an hour.”

"Each of the sources, whether coming from elsewhere within the station or from the studio itself, passes through the Smart Videohub matrix switcher and is routed to an assigned channel on the ATEM 2 M/E Production Studio 4K switcher. This includes three of our HD cameras which have been relocated to the studio, and all monitoring equipment within the control room and editing facilities, ensuring a maximum degree of flexibility. Four pre-existing broadcast channels housed in “The Sky News media server is connected to the mixer, as are three channels of external sources that are fed from almost any source from the channel's central switch. Local signals are also sent from a Mac computer and an Apple TV, which allows us to connect devices using AirPlay,” says Stanford.

George Davies, lead engineer on the project and operations director at Sky News, explains the addition of dedicated keyers for the channels corresponding to the three HD cameras. "What we did was assign an ATEM Television Studio switcher to each of the cameras as its own system for overlaying video layers. This way, the operator can access content coming from the cameras where chroma compositing has already been done for the backgrounds," Davies explained. "It's much easier to record interviews and other parts of the production on green backgrounds when you don't have to worry about cameras or additional layers, says Davies.

"For staff unfamiliar with the operation of a control room, the procedure we have implemented in Studio D with the Blackmagic equipment has been very easy to learn and use, while for more experienced technicians, the standard broadcast structure and processes have not presented any degree of difficulty. The Blackmagic ATEM 2 M/E Production Studio 4K switcher offers excellent levels of functionality for its price and the control panel provides a very comfortable family layout for the staff," concluded George.