Welcome T’ Frozen North
Posted by: Rowan in BBC R&D Manchester, tags: BBC, Manchester, R&D, Tech, Work
Manchester greeted me yesterday with howling winds and a few brief showers. Not the best of starts weather-wise after the glorious sunshine that bathed London last week. However I’m now sitting in the Research & Development office of the BBC’s New Broadcasting House in Manchester, getting settled in. How I came to be here was somewhat of an interesting story, and I explained a little here. But what I’m doing over the next 6 months will be even more interesting, and it’s a journey I hope some of you might like to join me on. We have the task of establishing a new Research & Development lab in Manchester ahead of the BBC’s move to Salford Quays. Setting up a new broadcast and media research lab isn’t something that happens often, so just how we go about it will be full of creative and technical challenges.
BBC R&D have been responsible for (or at least involved in) many of the broadcast world’s most influential inventions, from colour TV to Nicam stereo, from Ceefax to Freeview. Going forward we’re working on everything from next-generation digital TV platforms to improved HD production workflows, from the technical challenges of being the host broadcaster of London 2012 to 3D television. The established base in Kingswood Warren will be closing next year, with a move to a new location in the South East in the planning stages. But we have also made a commitment to building a lab in Salford when the MediaCity development opens. However even before then we want to get a lab up-and-running in the North West, so plans are underway to enable some staff to move to the existing BBC Manchester site in addition to the handful of us that are here already.
So just how do you start a new broadcast research facility? What equipment do we need? What type of spaces? What acoustic requirements are there, what cooling is needed, what networking is necessary; the list goes on… More to the point, what will we need in 3 years time? Or 5 or 10? You can be sure that the reasearch we’re doing then won’t be the same as the work we have now. How do we produce a space which fulfils our needs now and yet is flexible enough to sustain our requirements in the future?
So many questions to answer, so little time. It’ll be a fun piece of work, so if you’re interested, join me for the ride…
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