Video’s Role in News Production
The driving force behind such rapid changes to the news industry is simple: a faster, less expensive, and overall more efficient method of gathering visual and audio material for news productions. Instead of dealing constantly with the time and geographical constraints of physically transporting roles of film back to the studio for development prior to airing them on television, ENG allows stations the ability to simultaneously capture and broadcast visual images as well as high quality audio information. ENG takes the form more often than not of what is essentially a single piece camcorder, though it can come in the form of a separate or detachable videocassette recorder as well. The unit allows signals to be fed back to the base (usually the newsroom) by microwave link, from which it can be sent out as a live feed, or an already recorded and edited feed. The
efficiency of this process saves time by not requiring the film to be developed before it can be used as news footage.
