Grass Valley Group Announces Integrated NewsQ Pro News Playback System
New playback system and shared-storage integration demonstration among highlights of company's Digital News Production solution at IBC 2001
The new product will be featured on the Grass Valley Group's stand at IBC this week.
In addition to the NewsQ Pro announcement, the Grass Valley Group is demonstrating the integration of its Digital News Production Workgroup products—which includes the FeedClip™ interactive feed capture system, NewsEdit nonlinear editor, and NewsQ manual playback system—with the Grass Valley™ Media Area Network™ real-time, shared-storage system. The company is also showcasing key enhancements to its Digital News Production solution, including broad format support, expanded audio capabilities, and integration with its ContentShare™ software platform to further expand the availability of third-party, news-related applications.
"The biggest need of our newsroom customers, especially given current market conditions, is for solutions that deliver workflow and capital efficiencies," said Tim Thorsteinson, president and CEO of the Grass Valley Group. "The new NewsQ Pro playback system and features such as shared-storage integration underscore how our Digital News Production solution is meeting and exceeding those expectations."
NewsQ Pro: Integrated News Playback, MOS Compatibility
A PC-based application, the NewsQ Pro system can control as many as four channels of playout from up to two Profile XP Media Platform systems. Through its intuitive interface, users can view a playlist—complete with headframe, slug, ID, and duration—and control playback via keyboard, mouse, or GPI trigger. Users can also insert, move, or delete an item in a playlist without interrupting playback.
Tuned for workflow efficiency, the NewsQ Pro system can automatically create and adjust playlists from a MOS-compatible newsroom computing system (NRCS). For example, its Assignment List Manager plug-in module lets users of the AP ENPS system create placeholders for clips, manage clip metadata, and link finished or unfinished clips to scripts. The AP ENPS system can then send a playlist to the NewsQ Pro system and update it whenever a script or a rundown changes.
The NewsQ Pro system also features an Assignment List module with links to the AP ENPS system and the NewsEdit nonlinear editor. Running on a NewsEdit system, the module provides a pop-up list of clip placeholders. After finishing a clip, an editor can select the appropriate entry from an assignment list and send the clip. The clip is then automatically transferred to a Profile XP Media Platform system and registered in the NewsQ Pro database. The NewsQ Pro system sends the status of each completed clip to the AP ENPS system, enabling it to update the clip's timing in the rundown and making clip metadata available for user searches.
"The Grass Valley Group's Digital News Production solution and its compatibility with the MOS protocol are great examples of integrated, end-to-end efficiencies needed in competitive newsrooms," said Lee Perryman, deputy director of the broadcast division of The Associated Press and director of Broadcast Technology. "Enabling broadcasters to streamline workflow without compromise and in this case easily extend ENPS via MOS is a truly valuable development."
In addition to automated control, the NewsQ Pro system lets users manually stack a playlist—or switch to manual control in case of an emergency.
Demonstrations Include Shared-Storage Integration
In addition to announcing the NewsQ Pro system, the Grass Valley Group this week is demonstrating the integration of its Digital News Production Workgroup and the Grass Valley Media Area Network system. A no-compromises answer to shared storage, the Media Area Network system simultaneously provides users access to tools that reside on standard Windows NT-based networks—such as editors and gateways—and to broadcast-quality video record and playout from Profile devices.
Other key features of the Grass Valley Group's Digital News Production solution being demonstrated this week include support for native MPEG, DV, and DVCPRO formats and data throughput rates of up to 50 Mb/s; expanded audio, mix, and output channel capabilities; the ability to swap audio clips between tracks; new audio scrub capabilities; and enhanced controls for audio levels and input audio sources.
To further expand the universe of third-party, news-related applications available to its users, the Grass Valley Group is also showcasing the integration of its Digital News Production solution and its ContentShare software platform for information access and exchange—a platform built with standard Internet technologies such as the eXtensible Markup Language (XML), the platform can easily link video with its related text, audio, and graphics assets.
The ContentShare platform, for example, will enable users of Pathfire's NewsTracker video-on-demand service and the Profile XP Media Platform to avoid dubbing content to tape before editing. Instead, editors will be able to move materials from the NewsTracker server directly into a Profile XP Media Platform system as well as a Digital News Production Workgroup system. The interface will simplify newsroom operations, letting multiple users use the same media and, most importantly, improve time to air.
About The Companies
The Associated Press is the world's oldest and largest newsgathering organization, providing text, audio, news photos, graphics, video, and technology to more than 15,000 news outlets worldwide. More than 3,300 television stations, radio stations and networks in more than 50 countries use AP's broadcast news software and systems, including ENPS, AP NewsCenter and AP NewsDesk. Founded in 1848, today's AP employs more than 3,700 staffers in 242 bureaus, and its broadcast division is based in Washington, D.C.
About The Grass Valley Group
The Grass Valley Group knows more about high-quality video than anybody else—especially as video goes digital. The Internet. Digital cinema. Data-enhanced broadcasting. Interactive television. It's a world of Digicasting—one that demands Media Without Bounds™ solutions. Whether online or on the air, the Emmy® award-winning Grass Valley Group, a privately held digital media leader, has the hardware, software, and new media technologies to get content wherever it needs to go.
For the latest Grass Valley Group product information, visit www.grassvalleygroup.com.
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