How Video Works, 3rd Edition

18Video Workflows and Computer Networking

Traditionally television required connecting individual purpose-built devices together to build systems for creating and broadcasting content. Cameras connected to video switchers, which connected to recorders. For sound, microphones connected to mixers, which connected to the recorder as well. A show was recorded to removable media, mostly tape, and stored on a shelf. Perhaps later that tape was put on a machine that was connected to a transmitter to send the program home to its audience.

Now, of course, computer-based technology is at the center of everything media professionals do. From the biggest television networks to a single creative soul working alone, video and audio are now handled as computer ...