Live Truckin' with Mike Kirby

A real time, step by step guide into what's involved in setting up a TV news live report.

[@GrooveBoxVideo]

I have a retired 1998 Frontline van with original NTSC gear that I take to car shows and exhibitions. I play this video on a screen inside to show people how these trucks worked. Thanks for the demo.

[@DBR00]

Wow, they have lots of failsafe devices to prevent that antenna from raising when not intended.

[@MinifigNewsguy]

Those "masts" go up to 50' :)

[@celsojoven3525]

Soutwoods citt

[@Nick.Ashton]

The days of outside broadcast trucks are numbered. New technology means a cameraman can go live to air using mobile networks.

[@markarca6360]

Nowadays, they use IP-based systems like LiveU.

[@Szn61]

Say, i can see my house from there! Great video Mike. Susie :-)

[@tost1989]

… and today you can do a 4k livestream with your smartphone and 4G in a few seconds. But interesting to watch. Great video.

[@jacobhauenstein]

maybe, but even on 4g LTE your phone is compressing the 4k into junk. a clean 1080p with minimal compression is more useful than a muddy, compressed, noisy image with artifacting, especially when the news station plans on archiving all footage for future use.

[@glennjamin]

Peer to peer transmission always wins. Should cellular networks fail, these vehicles keep people connected and informed.

[@jasongreen4189]

Hi Mike, Thanks for the video. I just bought an older ENG van.

[@ResilientCounty]

Me too!

[@codymiller182008]

Now a days, they don’t even need to use these trucks anymore.

[@nicolisperguier]

Thanks for your video!

[@motswaps]

Great video 👍🏾

[@chrisw443]

They still use trucks for big events but thats it, when I was at a station in 2016 I had to edit the entire morning news then run out to a location and set this all up before 6am. Mind you they wouldnt let me start until 2am. Four hours to edit half of a 4 hour news show then go do all this stuff on top of it. Small Stations sucked. Now with LiveU, you just turn the cam on then turn the backpack on and your done, and they dont expect you to also edit the entire show if your expected to go out and shoot.

[@michaelbruchas6663]

Hey, Pat Gribbin! In the Receive room.

[@dcwarner]

I was a so called acquisition person, but also master control for two stations doing 2 rollovers in the network news. Plus prep. One tech in the evenings. Me.

[@husseinolivia2548]

Can you help me I have questions about SNG set up?

[@wesleidamas]

mutio bom meu broder obrigado hehehe showww my name weslei damas

[@rkolsen]

Very interesting and fascinating video. Did WESH fully convert to full HD ENG and SNG news gathering? Call me crazy - but it looks like they are in WESH's parking lot. You can see their weather radar tower in the background next to the building and you can see all the other ENG trucks in the parking lot. Here's something I was wondering about, which is related to this video. Is there equipment out their (aside from bonded cellular units like like LiveU) on the market today that allows you to broadcast live video from a moving car or news van using the BAS back haul? Now granite it would be useless in a city because buildings would block the line of sight signal. Plus the mast would have to stay down and the antenna would have to be in a radome to protect it from the wind damage. I'm thinking the equipment that's used in a helicopter would work on the ground.

[@mikekirby7667]

Hi Ryan, All our microwave trucks are HD but the satt trucks have to wait a while. Yup, that's in our employee parking lot.

[@MarkPentler]

There are some systems in use now to do satellite uplink from a moving vehicle. I believe The Weather Channel has some

[@robertgutierrez7983]

LOL Microwave is dead now, Everybody moved to LiveU (4G).

[@SPLPuroOne]

Don’t forget “Satellite Feed”

[@WiemannTV]

Hello Mike ... a short question .. what type of tripod is this?

[@WiemannTV]

i found it ... it's a Sachtler Hot Pod CF 10

[@BenBeaulieuVideos]

What do you mean by "tuned into Winter Park?"

[@clayjones2370]

Most stations with ENG gear have receive sites in several locations because microwave only works line-of-sight. There is likely a tower or building rooftop with an ENG receive antenna in Winter Park. The shot will be tuned in to the nearest receive site or the one with the least obstructed view of the truck's signal.

[@MarkPentler]

Also are they just HD-SDIs?

[@StringerNews1]

More likely triax or SMPTE fiber cable. You wouldn't want to run the camera on its own battery, and have that battery die at a crucial time, or not have return video for the camera op. In areas with RFI it gives you a more reliable path for audio and IFB than wireless also.

[@chrisw443]

Yes thats just an HD SDI cable, its alot easier than running fiber, and those batteries last for days and they always have a few extra. Fiber requires a helluva lot more time to set up.

[@focusmicro]

Today, pulls smart phone out of pocket, opens live streaming app. Job done lol

[@SPLPuroOne]

Yeah, but the compression will make it worse

[@james14joe]

melbourne

[@michaelkingy355]

Dynamic contrast 🤦🏻‍♂️

[@rafsanAhmed93]

that's a longgggg antenna

[@MinifigNewsguy]

Ir's called a "mast". :)

[@arkansasaviation5299]

Just think how those trucks have been replaced by bags

[@MarkPentler]

1:29 PASSWORD? ;-)

[@popmediafilms1]

At 00;04;56;09 a close up of the tune in would give a better idea of how you are adjusting that do you keep pressing until station says its locked and what do you push to lock it in? also at 00;06;50;03 You are reaching to the truck to adjust something. What are you adjusting? a close up of this would help. thanks

[@Montera15]

​@@popmediafilms1 For what he was doing at 65003/431, Probably putting the camera into a preview monitor on the truck that wouldn't go out over the air "so he could see it"... Some trucks also have something on their switchers you have to do so it switches from SD to HD so it could've been that too, it may even be a WESH specific thing other truck operators don't need to know since every news truck is custom made for their station operations, even if it's same or similar technology. For 45609/238, not much to show. All you do is hit PA On, make sure you're on the same channel & offset as the station reciever (the guy at aquisitions) and move the dish around if needed to get the best signal possible; while also making sure you're on the correct asked power setting (which he was changing at that exact time stamp in the top right of the touchscreen)