Broadcasters and production houses are rapidly moving towards tapeless media storage work flows. There is a growing trend towards shared storage solutions, particularly in facilities and on projects that require the collaborative input of several people, or technical areas. This course provides an overview of these shared storage systems and their related media networks and media management systems. Some of the technologies discussed are: MADI, generic SAN systems, Avid NEXUS, Final Cut Network, Dolby, Omneon, and EVS.

This course is an in-depth study of the issue of data-rate as it relates to digital video and audio. It explores the many and varied ways in which data rate can be reduced with the constant trade-off between quality and bandwidth. It examines a number of the more widely used data-compression systems, looking at their respective strengths and weaknesses and how these inter-relate to video and audio format choices. The course explores how various codecs enable vast reductions in data rate with relatively low impact upon perceived quality.

File formats and meta-data are investigated in detail and issues of file compatibility and interchange are explored.

Data streaming technologies and standards are explored for a variety of professional and consumer data delivery applications. This will include an introduction to:
Satellite transmission of video and audio programme material
Digital terrestrial transmission (DTT) of video and audio programme material
Internet streaming of video and audio programme material
Transport of data within the broadcast or production facility.