Major Commercial TV Station Streamlines Graphics Approach

The largest commercial television station in Norway, TV2, has chosen Pixel Power systems to automate its promo, branding and continuity graphics.
The automated workflow system avoids the need for off line editing for promo versioning, voiceovers and general continuity graphics.
The TV2 requirement was for these repetitive and tedious tasks to be handled using graphic templates that are then filled with parts of their in house programme schedule and programme metadata information. Programme names, audio voiceover clips, logos, images, animations and video clips are automatically brought into the high quality templates, saving time and money on further editing.
Pixel Promo, also from Pixel Power, was chosen to gather all the required data from the customer's scheduling and automation systems and to populate the graphic templates according to specific rules and logic specified by the customer. This enables them to display and promote items in range of ways required and across their whole channel lineup. For example, a scheduler will schedule a TV programme for a particular time and Pixel Promo will build the graphics for it, picking up any information required along the way.
Clarity 3000s with the realtime 3D option will be used as the graphics playout systems in transmission. The TV2 channel's creative design concepts require realtime processing of video clips to be animated across the screen in 3D space. One fully featured Clarity 3000 system will create all the master templates that will then be used by Pixel Promo to distribute to the playout unit.
James Gilbert, Joint Managing Director of Pixel Power, said: "We are finding this an increasingly common requirement in the industry these days. Our automated and fully integrated systems are ideal for eliminating manual editing tasks and reducing overall costs for the customer."
TV2, who are based in Bergen, have found that another useful component of Pixel Promo is its Asset Management. Pixel Promo can be linked to TV2's Final Cut server, which holds video and audio assets, and can copy these across as required. This system is especially effective for news and sports channels that may require access to many different programme-specific video clips during a day.
Further information is available at: www.pixelpower.com.
(KMcA/BMcC)