Kent State University adds LiveU Technology to give students more opportunities to produce live news
By Jim Bask
What happens when Journalism students are willing to produce live reports, but the technology is holding them back?
The Kent State School of Journalism & Mass Communication program features a state-of-the-art studio, home to 17 student-run shows and classroom curriculum. Students within the program gain first-hand experience in all aspects of single camera and live multi-camera production – including shooting, audio recording, editing, writing, directing and producing live television. But live remotes proved to be a bit trickier – the solution was a bit clunky and didn’t allow for the flexibility to go live beyond this campus
The live system featured a capture card and Skype. The students would Skype back to the control room and use a scan converter to get the signal into the studio’s infrastructure.
“It was too difficult to pull off live video outside the studio. Providing a quick news hit was virtually impossible,” noted Daniel LeBeau, Broadcast Engineer, Kent State University.
“We wanted to give our students a more realistic experience. Reporters needed to master the skills to report live and producers needed to learn how to coordinate live shots,” he added.
The tipping point was when the department’s live reports from a Hillary Clinton campus stop during the 2016 Election were basically unusable due to audio delays and image pixilation. Click here to read the full article.