The Associated Press has unveiled AP Video Hub, a global platform for the online delivery of broadcast-quality video news. Jake Young visits AP’s international bureau of global video operations in London to find out how the new service works
THE BETA launch of AP Video Hub gives access to AP’s world news, entertainment, sport and lifestyle video content together with relevant footage from AP’s historic archive. The platform includes a Twitter-based ‘follow’ stories feature, curated topic pages, quick video previews, one-click downloads and realtime search content filters. The aim of Video Hub is to
make it easy for news-centric websites to use and access AP’s video. “We expect AP Video Hub customers to be online
video producers for a newspaper, journalists at a regional news agency and news-centric websites. Their needs and workflow are at the heart of the way AP Video Hub has been conceived,” says Sue Brooks, AP director of Video Transformation. “Features such as the
curated topic pages and ‘follow’ functionality make this an unbeatable and unique proposition. We believe AP Video Hub gives customers the ability to access
AP HD transition
with AmberFin, LiveU THE VIDEO Hub launch forms a key part of AP’s video business transformation programme (covered in TVBEurope’s November issue): to be fully HD by the end of this month. AmberFin and its UK channel partner, ATG Broadcast, delivered AmberFin iCR HD standards converter systems to AP in April. Alongside HD conversion, AmberFin iCR plays an important role in the normalisation of content that AP receives. iCR helps AP to ensure that all media files delivered across the
AP network are fit for purpose for broadcasters to place within their editing and transmission workflows. “We were attracted to AmberFin because of the quality of their file-based HD conversion and also by the company’s heritage in terms of its patent portfolio,” says David Hoad, AP director of Global Video Technology. “Since that initial decision, we’ve found that AmberFin’s technical team is really good at resolving issues. They are incredibly responsive to our needs.”
broadcast-quality video news even if they don’t have the technical infrastructure to handle satellite news feeds. AP Video Hub will enable them to do this as quickly and easily as large broadcasters do already.” Brooks claims Video Hub is
the only platform in the world that offers breaking news content and related archive at the same time, and that news- centric websites are able to add “depth, breadth and context” to their reporting from an enormous resource. “We have
Sue Brooks: “Features such as the curated topic pages and ‘follow’ functionality make this an unbeatable and unique proposition”
material from 1895 all the way to the present day,” says Paul Shanley, AP head of Video Hub Strategy. “To mix archive content with breaking news content is a huge value add for our clients.”
According to Brooks, The newly built HD Master Control Room in the London bureau
As part of the HD upgrade, AP has invested in other new technology such as 23 LiveU units, strategically placed around the world. During the tsunami alert in Indonesia last month, AP dispatched journalists into Jakarta, where one of these units was located.
“What those people will take is the capability to broadcast live from the scene of the story,” says Brooks. “23 LiveU units is very helpful because the more we’ve got, the less money we have to spend transferring
kit around the world.” Jake Young
newspapers are making hours of video programming a day. “They’re using video in really imaginative ways, much more imaginative in some senses than broadcasters are,” she states. Senior Vice President Daisy Veerasingham, who heads AP’s video business internationally, estimates that over the next few years the value of the online video news market across Europe and Asia will continue to grow by up to 13% and 16%, respectively, per year. “AP Video Hub represents a major opportunity for the AP,” she says. “Video news is no longer the sole preserve of terrestrial and satellite broadcasters and AP Video Hub addresses this with an offering for the rapidly growing segment of the media market – online video news.” Charter customers are already using the beta version, and further functionality will be added over the coming months with the full production release scheduled for summer 2012.