BUSINESS CONTINUITY: REMOTE PRODUCTION

In the wake of the current global pandemic, is remote production the only saving grace?

- ANISHA GAKHAR

In the wake of the current pandemic situation, many productions had halted for a few months during the initial worldwide lockdowns. The circumstances gave an impetus to the widespread use of remote production, so as to maintain business continuity. A remote production workflow is where content is captured live at a remote location while production is performed at a main studio. With work-from-home becoming the new norm, media companies have had to pivot to a remote work setup so as to keep the content creation up and running, while ensuring quality. Media houses have now adapted to new ways of working—remotely. Production crews have been given detailed trainings so they can learn media formats and the workflows for their creation to support continued production.

In recent months, remote video production workflows have evolved from a nimble alternative to a practical need-of-the-hour, for most producers and streaming companies. Albeit, where on-site, in-person production persists—or has returned—it’s generally implemented with smaller and deliberately distanced crews and often augmented with remote workflow elements.

Enhancing the reach of their content and leveraging monetisation opportunities while reducing the cost of production considerably, are a few noteworthy benefits of employing remote production functionality. By tying together multiple production hubs with the live event venue, utilising labour and equipment across more than one facility becomes possible. This proves especially useful for sports productions, which can then be scaled and multiple events in parallel can be operated without needing a full production set-up on-site—across sites worldwide. As content regionalisation and innovation in media formats take a strong hold across media businesses, remote production might become the default choice for live content producers.