Written by: Audrey Bertin
Our broadcast crew is comprised of twenty-three students, each becoming a highly-trained specialist in a particular field of video. Multiple crews hold control over each section of a broadcast, including field cameras, wide angle, high vantage point cameras, audio (including parabolic, referee, and crowd microphones), graphics, instantaneous replays, highlight packages, camera engineering, and technical directing. A few students even direct the entire broadcast. All this is performed without the help of adults. As a group of students interested in television broadcasting, we are always looking to learn as much as we can from other televised events that differ from a football game.
This August, we were given a tour of the ACL Live studios, and it opened our eyes to another world of high quality live video. We were taken onto the main floor, many of us seeing the stage-and the theater itself for the first time and given the opportunity to see all of the production equipment. We were taught about the many different cameras (including the crane cameras and Mezzanine camera), and were able to ask questions about how they are generally operated and which shots are chosen during live productions. Then, we were brought backstage and toured the production, audio, and video engineering rooms. Much of the equipment felt familiar, though the production was on a much larger scale than our own. It was amazing for us to see just how many moving parts there were and how our jobs filming football transferred to the professional world.