1. Apple - Final Cut Studio 2 - In Action - Televisa Page 1 sur 2
The Suite Solutions In Action Tutorials Resources Tech Specs
Televisa: The Total Studio Workflow Diagram
By Noah Kadner
It’s a little known fact that many countries send two Standardized Workflow
teams to the Olympic Games, the athletes, whose Televisa needed a workflow that would allow them to
exploits keep many of us awake well beyond our deliver SD and HD content at the same time and
normal TV viewing times, and the television compile complete digital archives of all of their Click to Enlarge
professionals, who stay up much longer than we do programming. “Workflow is the name of the game for
to enable our viewing. us,” says Max Arteaga, Televisa’s Vice President of
Operations. “And the most important goal is creating
For its coverage of the 2008 Beijing Summer Games, a standardized workflow for all of our productions. Company Brief
Mexico-based Televisa — the major distributor of With Apple and Final Cut Studio the entire process is
Olympic content for Mexico and the largest media transparent to the producer, all the work happens in
company in the Spanish-speaking world — sent a HD. At the end of post-production we can do all of Televisa
Major distributor of
team of more than 200 people, including broadcast our down-conversions to standard definition and
Olympic content for
talent, engineers, editors, camera operators, and analog as needed, all within the same system.” Mexico and the
logistics personnel. To support their team, and to largest media
enable 12 hours of daily broadcasts, much of it live, To support that workflow in the Beijing studio, company in the
Spanish-speaking
Televisa shipped 30 tons of equipment, including Televisa devised an integrated Apple Xsan network
world. Learn More
more than 50 cameras, by sea and air. with 30 Mac Pros running Final Cut Studio and 50
Xserves connected via Fibre Channel using a QLogic
Challenge:
“This is the largest Olympics that Televisa has been 9200 Director-class switch, along with another 12 Build a fully
involved in,” says Manuel Ramírez Sánchez, General iMac editing stations connected over standard automated, end-to-
Sports Director for Televisa. “We've been preparing Ethernet. To hold all of the generated footage, end live sports
production studio
for the last two years. We started the day after we got Televisa’s network includes 200 terabytes of storage
onsite in Beijing.
back from the the World Cup in Germany." using Promise Technology Raid arrays. The solution
is designed to handle 22 simultaneous ingest Solution:
And because television teams, unlike athletes, are channels of live footage and support the almost 50 Working with
largely responsible for building their own venues, Final Cut Pro editing workstations, mixed between Simplemente,
Televisa created in Beijing’s International Broadcast offline-quality proxy editing and online editing. The Televisa devised an
open standards-
Center its own end-to-end television station, daily workload is up to 12 hours from each of the 22 based, seamless,
including two live studios, using Apple’s Final Cut channels of incoming footage. end-to-end
Studio and Xsan technology. tapeless workflow
around an
Taking It All In
integrated Xsan
Breaking the Tape Each day the system will process up to 250 hours of infrastructure of
In Beijing, for the first time, Televisa will use a Mac- footage multiplied by the 20 days of Olympics Mac Pros and iMacs
running Final Cut
based, 100 percent digital, tapeless workflow to coverage. In addition to the 22 channels of incoming
Studio 2 to edit
deliver both high definition and standard definition pool footage, Televisa also has camera crews using footage, create
Olympics content simultaneously. “Our people have Panasonic P2 cameras to create special reports and graphics, and
been used to working with linear tapes in the past,” human interest stories with all post-production produce and
package content
says Sánchez. “The challenge is to take advantage of completed within Final Cut Studio.
from 22
the new technology and have people actually see a simultaneous ingest
quality difference on the other end.” stations. The entire
Gallery system is controlled
by Siennaʼs
Final Cut Studio’s open standards-based capabilities OriginOne gateway
greatly facilitated its integration with the third party server, which
hardware and software Televisa chose to incorporate manages the
updating of clips
with its system.
from ingest through
editorial to playout.
“Final Cut Studio has surprised us with its versatility,”
says Elías Rodriguez, Televisa’s Director General of
Operations. “It’s adapted very well to the new Useful Links
workflow we put together, and it’s also a very open
system. At the Athens Games in 2004, 90 percent of
Televisa
our operation was analog with Beta SP tape decks,
and now that’s completely reversed. We worked
closely with our Apple integrator, Simplemente, to
design an expanded workflow built around Final Cut Simplemente
Studio and Xsan. We also use Panasonic DVCPRO HD
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2. Apple - Final Cut Studio 2 - In Action - Televisa Page 2 sur 2
P2 solid-state cameras, and our engineers evaluated
many different solutions to determine that Final Cut
Pro would be the best match. We’ve used a
completely tapeless workflow with Apple in Mexico
before, but never on location and never on this
scale.”
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3. Apple - Final Cut Studio 2 - In Action - Televisa Page 1 sur 2
The Suite Solutions In Action Tutorials Resources Tech Specs
Toolkit
Televisa: The Total Studio
Mac Pro
Two Mac Pros with Gallery Sienna Ingest Control “We took both the Sienna and BUG.tv playout systems iMac
manage 22 Xserve ingest servers running Sienna to Beijing to see to which adapts to our workflow and Final Cut Studio
PictureReady. The entire system is administered by a operators best,” notes Rodriguez. “We also back up Final Cut Server
Sienna OriginOne gateway server, which automates all of our playouts using the EVS servers. We’ll be Xsan, with over 200TB storage
the updating of clips from ingest through editorial to pushing out everything simultaneously in both HD Xserve
playout. Sienna StoryCut allows editors to browse and SD. We used a similar workflow on a much FileMaker Pro
content and drag and drop directly into Final Cut Pro smaller scale recently at the World Cup in Germany Promise Technology
while the content is still being recorded. and it worked out quite well.” QLogic
JLCooper
“The Televisa project is one of the larger systems Setting Records Hi Tech Systems
we’ve been a part of, but it has certainly been the Completed content is archived after airing using four AJA Kona 3 and LHe
smoothest ride so far,” says Mark Gilbert, Gallery’s Sun StorageTek LTO-4 tape drives and 227 cartridge EVS
Director of Product Development. “It's a very large slots, all managed by XenData. XenData is a stub file Gallery SIENNA
system with a huge storage load, so storage is the system, which means that a small portion of each file BUG.tv CLASS-1
part that needs to be most carefully designed and stays on the hard drive, while the majority of the file VMware Fusion
setup.” gets backed up onto LTO-4 tape, enabling expedited XenData
browsing and restoration. Panasonic P2
Televisa also uses EVS ingest servers to receive Sun StorageTek LTO-4
footage directly from the Beijing Olympic The entire archive system appears as a single
Broadcasting company (BOB), the official Chinese mounted drive to all of the machines using the
network for the Games. Up to 30 minutes of footage backup system, including Final Cut Server, Sienna,
can be downloaded each day from the BOB EVS and EVS. “The archive is a new and critical aspect of
systems. Final Cut Server watches the download the system,” says Rodriguez. “We needed it to not
folder, automatically adds chosen clips to the Xsan only integrate with Final Cut Studio and the rest of
volume, and creates browsable proxies. Editors our gear but to also function completely
receive email notifications when new EVS clips are transparently to the operators.”
available. Clips can be dragged into their Final Cut
Pro projects, directly into the Sienna VirtualVTR or Sienna MediaServices controls the archiving of assets
BUG.tv playout servers. from the Sienna database, and it can partially restore
assets already on tape as needed. “Content
In addition to footage, the EVS servers also supply management is really a key aspect of what we do,”
XML metadata that allows the editors to quickly says Arteaga. “Previously we worked primarily on tape
search and catalog material, with markers and now it’s all digital files. This is necessary for us
automatically created in Final Cut Pro. The metadata because we also export a lot of our regular
comes directly from BOB as a catalog of every event, programming to customers in the US, where by law
including scores, fouls, or times. EVS is tightly all content must switch over to digital after February
integrated with Final Cut Pro and capable of reading 2009.”
and writing QuickTime files in several important
formats for Televisa, including ProRes and IMX (50 Bringing It Home
Mbit). Sienna and EVS are also cross-compatible with Televisa’s use of their integrated production system
Sienna, allowing it to control and play out directly to won’t end with the Games in Beijing. All of the
EVS servers. equipment and experience will be brought back to
Mexico and folded into their regular sports coverage
Go to Air operations. “The Olympics are a part of our overall
The system feeds the two live broadcast studios with strategy of total integration both internally and
playout directly to air from a combination of Sienna externally,” says Arteaga. “This is the first time we are
VirtualVTR and BUG.tv CLASS-1 playout solutions. going to use a 100 percent digital and 100 percent
Twelve Apple and four EVS playout servers, split tapeless workflow to cover the Olympics, but in the
between the two studios, transmit the actual end Beijing is just one event. We’re going to integrate
broadcast content. Sienna’s AutomationX playlist the Beijing Apple Team and equipment back into our
software, an integrated newsroom automation system daily broadcasting system in Mexico. That was our
based on QuickTime and tightly integrated with Final most important decision.”
Cut Studio, controls four VirtualVTR machines.
CLASS-1, a software-based playout server running on
Mac OS X, is capable of managing complex multi-
channel operations from a single window. CLASS-1 Pages 1 2
can also play Final Cut Pro files directly without a
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4. Apple - Final Cut Studio 2 - In Action - Televisa Page 2 sur 2
lengthy conversion process, which greatly simplifies
the broadcast workflow.
Find assets fast. Automate workflows. Explore industry-leading technologies. See production visionaries at work.
Or call 1-800-MY-APPLE
Visit an Apple Retail Store
Find your local authorized reseller
Have Apple contact me
http://www.apple.com/finalcutstudio/action/televisa/index2.html 20/08/2008