First, Cut a Hole in the Box

Wired has an article about a "television studio in a box" that I found fairly amazing. I teach a television studio class, and we use a fairly expensive setup including a large switcher, audio mixing console, monitors, etc. to do switching (live editing) on three-camera setups. So it's impressive to see the equivalent in a small package at a sane price.

TV Studio in a Box Enables Long-Tail Television

"We had to take a process that normally has 5 to 30 people creating a show and make it easy enough for one person to run, [someone] who has never run a TV show before," explained Philips. Indeed, the TriCaster allows a single operator to mix multiple cameras (higher-end models support more cameras) interspersed with graphics, pre-recorded clips, real-time effects and more than 300 three-dimensional transitions. The box outputs to the web, television stations or big screens in churches and sporting arenas.

NewTek's entry-level TriCaster, with support for three cameras, costs $4,000. That may seem like a lot, but considering that it can be used in place of a mobile production vehicle, four grand is small potatoes, relatively speaking.