April 2014
www.tvbeurope.com
Polsat’s tapeless playout and production system design was brainstormed by a group which included the IT TV team, programmers and software engineers, editors, archive personnel, journalists, the QC department, traffic and even advertising staff
TVBEurope 23 The Workflow
Going tapeless at Telewizja Polsat
In 1992, Polish billionaire Zygmunt Solorz-Zak launched Poland’s first free-to-air commercial satellite TV channel, Polsat. Today, in pay TV the Polsat Group is the largest provider in Poland. After a visit in 2008, Reinhard E Wagner toured the broadcaster again
BACK IN 2008 TVBEurope reported on the installation of the new News Operation Centre at Telewizja Polsat. The Polish broadcaster provides a comprehensive multimedia offering with services that include DTH, mobile television, broadband Internet in HSPA/HSPA+ and LTE and mobile telephony services. The total amount of pay digital television subscribers (as of 30 June, 2013) is well over 3.5 million and broadband Internet service users approach 200,000. In total, the Polsat Group
offers 130 Polish language television channels, including general entertainment, sports, music, lifestyle, news/information, children’s, education and movies. They offer all of Poland’s main terrestrial channels, including POLSAT, TVP1, TVP2, TVN and TV4. In addition, subscribers have access to 37 HD channels as well as VoD/PPV, Catch-up TV, Multiroom, plus TV Mobilna service (based on DVB-T and launched in June 2012) with access to 20 encrypted channels (eight television and 12 radio channels) and to all DTT channels, through various devices (including smartphones, tablets and laptops). Two business segments produce revenue streams with distinct
characteristics: TV broadcasting advertising revenue and retail subscription and related revenue In the broadcasting and
television production segment IT systems are managing advertising airtime, programme broadcasting and relationships with the advertising customers. If any of the IT systems fail, it could affect the operating of the whole business. Loss or failure to maintain the historical reputation of Cyfrowy Polsat and TV Polsat and the value of all brands would adversely affect the business. Naturally, a great deal of attention is paid to reliability. New investments into the
Polsat is Poland’s second biggest TV channel
IT infrastructure and TV production workflows were initiated which resulted in the switch-off of analogue services, the migration from SD to HD standard technology and the introduction of tapeless production workflows. At the end of July 2013, the
Team effort: (l. to r.) Bartosz Paprocki, assistant manager TV technology, Andrzej Szymanski, head of IT TV; Adam Brodziak, director of technology, and T. Artur Cichowicz, director of TV investment
switch-off of analogue broadcasting of all Polsat channels took place, ending the double cost of broadcasting Polsat’s main channels in both analogue and digital. Currently over 30% of all viewers are receiving Polsat via DVB-T, which makes this distribution method very valuable for the broadcaster although it is still SD only.
Going tapeless Adam Brodziak, director of Polsat’s technology division, spoke about Polsat’s move to tapeless production: “The quality of the products and services we offer depends on the services and the quality of third party infrastructure, services and related functions,” says Adam Brodziak. “If these third parties on whom we rely do not meet our performance standards or provide technically flawed products or services, the quality of our products and services as well as our reputation may be harmed.” The company’s decision to depend again on well-know products and services makes sense: After the successful integration of a news production system based on Avid technology back in 2008, the design and planning group at TV Polsat chose to use an Avid solution again. “Why should we use something
else, when we know what we can get” explains Brodziak. “We knew Avid’s strong and weak points but after a long period of cooperation we knew how to solve the difficulties.” The tapeless playout and
production system design was brainstormed by a group which included the IT TV team, programmers and software engineers, operators, editors, archive personnel, journalists, QC department, traffic and even advertising staff. The idea behind it was that all needs should be taken into consideration before going into deep planning. The final design that went into the tender took another six months to be completed. In September 2011, the contract with Avid was signed and the final planning and programming phase of the system started with Avid and Warsaw- based systems integrator Adtv. Phase one was the high-level design with the preparation of all documents, which took another three months, followed by phase two, a six-month period of generating the detailed
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