Following major disruption to the content creation industry in 2023, brought about in most part by the Hollywood strikes, those working in the production sector will be hoping 2024 is a lot more settled.
But what trends will have an impact on content creation in the next 12 months?
TVBEurope hears from a number of key stakeholders as to how they see production evolving over the coming year.
Andy Rayner, CTO, Appear
There will be a further enabling of higher value production for lower tier events, making multicamera coverage cost-viable with full software cloud-based production and hybrid PTZ/operated cameras.
We’ll see a continuing move towards a complete software workflow for media production processing, enabled by better resilience models in software workflows and lower latency architectures.
There will be an increasing focus on more sustainable infrastructure, driven by more and more customers mandating specific sustainable attributes.
There will be an increasing acceptance of the workflows that are possible in a distributed production architecture, with production creatives learning to live with the increased latency of wide-area network-connected production.
The viability of 5G connectivity for broadcast production will mean this technology will be used for real, rather than just proof of concepts.
Michael Cioni, Co-founder and CEO, Strada
I predict 2024 to be a year of caution as Hollywood slowly ramps back up from a near dead-stop to producing new content. There will certainly be huge excitement in the air with tens of thousands of people willing and ready to work, but it will likely be met by a reduction in overall content compared to 2021. The pandemic + strikes + streaming business models made two of the last four years extremely challenging and this likely means 2024 will not produce more content than what was created in 2022. But that’s not all bad news, because a more conservative spend on content creation may mean better content overall.
Matt Cimaglia, co-founder and CEO of Alteon
There are two key trends on the horizon: decentralised media marketplaces and virtual production studios. These trends hint at a wave of decentralisation that could redefine content ownership, distribution and production. Virtual studios, wherein creators can collaborate and work on media from anywhere, will be propelled by advancements in AR and VR that could unlock new dimensions in content creation. At Alteon, we’re specifically looking to implement these trends to help steer the media and entertainment industry towards uncharted territories of innovation and collaboration.
Penny Westlake, senior director for Europe, Interra Systems
As complex automation becomes more mainstream in production and output processes, we see this carrying over into other areas as well. For example, the advanced use of metadata has the potential to bring increased speed and efficiency to live productions. We also expect augmented and assistive AI and ML technology to become much more focused, with organisations defining exactly where and when it should be used.
Augmented operations will enable the scaling of automated processes, allowing human effort to be reserved for areas requiring high levels of decision-making and skill. One area where it will be particularly useful is in localisation. Here, very advanced standards and systems for generating and managing the ancillary data associated with audio and video are becoming available.
While the expectation is that 2024 will be a year of recovery from disruption for many, and production levels will be high due to catch-up from 2023, many organisations will be considering taking greater steps towards new production models if these align with their business needs. We also expect to see more discussion on broadcast and media cryptography and content protection, which dovetails into an ethics discussion, and the countering of deep fakes. On the technology side, we can expect to see more analysis of how and where AI and ML fit into day-to-day requirements, and where they do not. In organisational terms, there will be increased discussion concerning business ethics.
Vlado Koylazov, head of innovation at Chaos
In 2024, AI tools are poised to maintain their position as technology trendsetters, with a continued focus on workflow enhancements and speed improvements. These tools will not only optimise existing processes but may also enable entirely new possibilities in filmmaking. What was once considered unattainable may become feasible, pushing the boundaries of creativity and storytelling.
We anticipate the increased adoption of Neural Radiance Fields (NeRFs) as a novel type of dataset. This technology is expected to play a growing role in 3D datasets, potentially reshaping the way we capture and represent spatial information in digital environments.
We will also see a shift in our approach to digital humans. This shift could potentially unlock new opportunities, such as adapting voices for various languages, seamlessly de-aging characters for flashback sequences, and exploring innovative applications for digital human representations. The evolving capabilities of AI may lead to novel and versatile uses of digital humans in the media and entertainment industry.
Jeff Clark, managing director, Verso Live
This is already an ongoing trend, but the need for more sustainable TV production will move from an industry discussion to action for many. This will be an increasingly important driver for innovation, with more productions wanting to be carbon-neutral. At Verso Live, our goal is to ship the least possible amount of physical equipment and be more agile when delivering broadcast graphics. That ends up requiring less of everything: less space, less power, less cabling, fewer lighter kits, fewer machines, and, ultimately, it also helps customers with cost and footprint.
Kieran Phillips, CJP Broadcast System Solutions
The skills gap is a real crisis for the media industry, and it is down to all of us to play our part. Having excellent university courses is only viable if young people in secondary education are aware of the opportunity and steer their school careers appropriately. We can all play our part in this by welcoming young people into our businesses, so they understand the exciting and stimulating careers that are available.
We have been talking about sustainability for a while now, but climate change is undeniable, and the threat of legal constraints is just supporting the moral imperative on all of us to reduce our carbon footprint.
This is an interesting point for virtual production. On the one hand, conjuring up imaginative worlds in a studio saves a great deal of travel to distant locations. But on the other hand, final pixel shooting means large LED volumes, which means more power consumed in the studio. I think the coming months will see the manufacturers of LED panels coming up with new designs featuring lower power consumption, helping us all reach our sustainability targets.
Yogesh Salian, director client services, Skandha Media Services
A media company’s ability to scale, not only the number of live streams, but also the resources, is a model that we’ll see taking off across the industry. Physically moving teams to cover multiple events simultaneously – and moving from site to site can be problematic in many ways, including logistically, technically and economically.
With a service-based model, with no capital expenses, it’s possible to run an event from anywhere that has an internet connection. We’ve had large customers who’ve used a temporary co-working space to cover an event, which can then be shut down when the event is finished. Using a cloud playout service provider to spin up and then spin down channels is a very economical way of running a live event production – and we’re sure this will be adopted more and more as we head into 2024.
Sustainability is going to be an even bigger trend in 2024.
Paris 2024 is a progressive example of this and is bound to influence other large multi-sport event productions. The IOC is setting new sustainability standards for major sporting events by encouraging energy conservation, innovation and creativity. The Olympic and Paralympic Games will be powered by 100 per cent renewable energy – mainly clean electricity, but also biogas. In line with the IOC’s philosophy of lower-impact Games that adapt to the needs of the host cities and their residents, Paris 2024 is minimising new construction. Some 95 per cent of venues will be pre-existing facilities – refurbished and modernised, where necessary – or temporary structures.
Lesley Marr, business development and sustainability director for NXTGENbps
I hope we will see an increased focus on reducing the environmental impact of broadcasting operations, as well as production practices. Some of the theory, goals and initiatives will really take a grip and be delivered upon.
AI will continue to play a significant role in content production. This includes automated video editing, text-to-speech, and even AI-generated scripts. AI algorithms will become more sophisticated on the content recommendation side, as well as helping broadcasters with compliance and other tasks.
VR and AR technologies will enable remote collaboration and reporting, reducing the need for on-site personnel and equipment.
More virtual sets, allowing broadcasters to adapt their studios much faster to different themes or locations without costly physical changes.
Companies will set more aggressive sustainability goals.
Gary Palmer, CEO, Electric Sheep
The industry’s progression towards enhanced workflow efficiency is likely to accelerate. With the resolution of production halts like strikes, we expect to see a significant rise in content creation, reminiscent of the boom that followed the Covid-19 pandemic. The industry will likely lean into advanced productivity tools designed to fast-track the more laborious aspects of post production. These innovations will be essential in handling the fresh wave of content, helping studios to rapidly process and bring new stories to audiences globally.
In 2024, the industry may face heightened expectations around production timelines. There will be a pressing demand to produce and release content quickly to fill the gaps created by this year’s production slowdowns. This rush to market could lead to the adoption of even more streamlined production technologies and a greater emphasis on real-time content creation. Additionally, we anticipate the emergence of a trend where media from diverse regions gain mainstream prominence. Following the footsteps of Spanish content in the US and UK markets, 2024 could see a broader acceptance and appetite for international media, influencing both the creation and distribution of entertainment worldwide.
