Systems for the application of virtual scenarios have been gaining more and more space and followers who use them for different purposes. Michael Bauer, Director of Technical Marketing at Accom Inc., lets us know his thoughts about the impact this technology has had on today's television production.
TV&V: How have production processes been transformed with the application of new technologies?
Michael Bauer: The use of virtual stage systems influences actors and talent in their comfort and self-confidence will be lost due to the absence of a context environment. This can be solved with the use of real supports such as chairs, a desk, plants, etc., but in general, this is more than a minimal environment that requires some adjustments. Conversely, for some forms of content, talent or presenters never see their stage because they are always looking towards the camera, and therefore, they will have no difficulty adjusting.
For directors and camera operators there may be some small changes since they will be seeing the composition of the image with the close-ups of the talent and the background generated by the virtual stage. It is necessary to pay attention to the potential collision of characters with virtual objects. This is the concern that comes with interactive computer-generated animations.
Writers will only have the benefit of interactive animations and how content can be enriched through this creative tool. Although they must keep the interactivity as something simple or not, they will again collide with the virtual world.
Studio designers will agree much more with the computer artists who build the scenarios and maintain awareness of the fact that a stage must work in real time and thus realize the complexity of the scenes. This in turn, makes the job of studio heads a little simpler.
The work of lighting artists is not easy but it is not hard either, but they must keep in mind an adequate lighting work to achieve a clean Croma Key . This is very important for obvious reasons as well as ensuring that the lighting of the characters is consistent with the virtual scenario. This is extremely important to achieve compelling content.
TV&V: What is your assessment of the impact that virtual systems have had on television production?
Michael Bauer: TV stations have the ability to produce a new look in a production studio. This will result in an increase in your audience, better utilization of the studio, greater production capacity, the ability to show effects that would otherwise be impossible to achieve or prohibitively expensive to do due to the constraints of physical space.
TV&V: What prospects do you see in the future for new virtual technological developments?
Michael Bauer: Trends in technology can be summed up in a few words: fast, better, easy to use, and low cost. According to our position, the main trend is probably NT. With the introduction of new high-performance, low-cost NT-based 3D workstations, workstation managers are finally much more comfortable making the decision to invest in a system that is powerful and flexible for a fraction of the cost of the systems of before. Not many station managers have been fired for investing $100,000 in innovative technology.
TV&V: How has your experience been with this type of technology?
Michael Bauer: The common attitude, in general, was that most of the directors could see the value (monetary and production quality) of the technology of virtual scenarios but many of them felt that the quality of the image was compromised in something and that in approximately $ 500 thousand dollars of initial fee, it made them think that the systems were everything but not guaranteed. With the advent of low prices on the supercomputers that generate the image and detailed adjustments in the software, the initial appreciations are significantly exceeded. This has taken many more years than we expected for the industry to adopt this technology. Now, we are seeing a major shift from companies and producers towards using studio systems or virtual scenarios more frequently. Many spectacular productions have made on-air transmissions over the past year and users are becoming much more sophisticated by using these systems.
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