How can we create personalised, role-aware TV programs without a physical studio, repurposing live content for multiple platforms and enabling social XR interaction?
The aim of use case News Broadcast is to examine ways to create a news broadcast in an immersive environment, which will enable new production workflows, environments, and new ways of storytelling in live television.
The control room in a broadcasting environment is a room where numerous professionals work in a shared room to produce and broadcast live television programmes. TRANSMIXR looks at how this traditional methodology can be reimagined and adapted through the use of VR/AR/XR technologies.
The Problem
Traditional news broadcasting is feeling a decline in the viewer’s interest. Through innovative approaches and technologies, such as immersive storytelling and real-time data integration, it aims to make news broadcasting more engaging and responsive to audience preferences.
- Technological Lag: Many newsrooms lack the infrastructure and expertise to integrate advanced technologies, which stymies innovation and adaptation to changing viewer expectations.
- Engagement Challenges: Current broadcasting formats do not fully leverage interactive and immersive technologies, resulting in a disconnect with audiences increasingly drawn to engaging digital experiences.
- Economic Constraints: The high costs associated with updating traditional broadcasting technologies and training staff often limit the ability of news organisations to invest in necessary innovations.
The Solution
Addressing the disconnect between modern audiences and traditional broadcasting, Transmixr integrates immersive technologies to deliver news in a more engaging format:
- Virtual Production Galleries: Supporting diverse broadcasting setups, from fully remote productions in virtual spaces to enhanced live broadcasts with real-time data overlays and interactive elements.
- Enhanced Presentation Tools: Utilizing volumetric video and AR graphics to present news in three dimensions, allowing viewers to “step into” stories for a first-hand understanding.
- Audience Interactivity Features: Empowering viewers to interact with news content through customisable viewing angles, story exploration tools, and real-time feedback mechanisms.
Target Audience
Focused on professionals within the broadcasting sector and the general public interested in innovative news consumption:
- News Production Teams: Journalists, editors, directors, and technical staff exploring XR to enhance real-time reporting and studio productions.
- Media Executives: Decision-makers examining XR to innovate content strategies and expand audience engagement.
- Journalism and Media Studies Students and Educators: Incorporate XR into curriculums to prepare students for future careers in tech-driven media environments.
- General Public: Audiences seeking a more interactive and immersive way to consume news and stay informed.
- Immersive
- Virtual
- Studio
- Broadcast
- Experience
Pre-Pilot
1. Analysing how newsrooms have been using XR and how generative AI is being adopted
Research was conducted by partners with news practitioners who it was deemed would be interested or open to the idea of using XR in a news context. These interviews, conducted with a range of news professionals from different places and areas of expertise.
2. Design workshops
Three design workshops with professional and end users to identify and brainstorm the news requirements of both professionals and audience end users in a XR environment.
3. Definition of use case concepts
Partners discussed several potential use cases for the project’s technology, including current affairs programs with AR and volumetric contributors, election coverage with multiple live inserts, dynamically produced news bulletins, and factual explainers heavily utilizing AR graphics, 360-degree camera content, and reconstructions. While all these applications show great promise, the partners ultimately decided to focus on a use case that offers the most practical immediate benefit for broadcasters while still being innovative and pushing boundaries within the sector.
4. Use Case Elements
First, a virtual control room that replaces the old-fashioned physical production room you’d find in a building. Everything would be managed virtual. Second, all the content will be made in a virtual studio. This studio will be able to create a full virtual reality (VR) experience, and it will also bring in elements like augmented reality (AR), extended reality (XR), 360-degree video, and volumetric content during the production process.
Pilot
1. News Broadcast Concept: Virtual Production Gallery
An XR control room, virtual studio and news broadcast was identified as part of the use case. Virtual Production Gallery for live television events could take one of three approaches: a studio-based gallery – live TV broadcast with operatives all together in one room using VR headsets; a fully remote crew – in separate locations, working together in a virtual gallery; a virtual gallery on location – feeding back into a live programme from an external location.
2. From vision to reality
Post-Pilot
Stay tuned for what we have to offer!