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TV production spaces

Nov 1, 2008 12:00 PM, By Antonio Argibay, AIA

The first article in this two-part series helps you plan TV production areas.

CBS’ “The Early Show” features a street-front studio created by production designer Jack Morton/PDG lead designers Jim Fenhagen and Larry Hartman. Photo courtesy TOMI Studio.

The television production space, commonly referred to as the studio, is still the primary location for content capture in the television industry. The purpose of this two-part article series is to explain the relationship that the studio has to the other spaces that are necessary for a successful production and to establish technical design criteria for the TV studio you need.

This first article prepares you for the most important aspect of designing a studio — the formative thinking referred to as planning. In addition, it will also discuss architectural systems. Next month's article will cover electrical systems, and ventilation and fire suppression systems. Both articles will contain information to help you understand the relationships among all the systems involved — systems that make a space function as intended.

Why build production spaces?

For designers and architects, the primary question is, “Why build a studio for content capture at all, when, today, more and more content is captured outside the conventional studio environment?” Using this question as a starting point to determine the requirements for the studio space you are considering is critical to successful planning. You will be surprised by the variety of reasons people have, some as banal as wanting to have a space that looks like a television studio in order to retain funding. Others may want to create speculative, flexible space because they happen to own a large space with high ceilings, or there may be a need to accommodate a new production with specific requirements. Then there's the obvious — the need to plan a production studio that will streamline the production process and provide the most efficient workplace for the type of production you envision.

The process

The planning process for spaces should always begin with a mission statement, success criteria or a charter — some device that can be used to evaluate all of the steps in the process to ensure that they are consistent and moving toward the final goals.

The second document you need is an architectural program. This document outlines the quantitative (dimensions and areas of all the required spaces and a circulation factor of between 25 percent and 35 percent) and the qualitative aspects and requirements. It should address functionality in terms of the type of production foreseen. Asking questions is one method of getting criteria established. For example, how many sets will be located in the space? What are the hours of operation? How much flexibility is required to accommodate the show's format? How often will the set change?

TV production facilities vs. TV studios

Figure 1. This flow diagram shows the people vs. stuff concept, where the flow of people needs to be separated from the flow of things that feed the TV studio space.
Click to enlarge

The TV studio itself is part of a larger organism — the television production facility. While a TV studio is the primary source of content capture, its existence and functionality are totally dependent on its relationships to the adjacent support spaces.

The most critical aspect of planning those relationships is the control of circulation. Having evaluated many facilities over the years, Meridian Design has observed that the flow of people — talent, support and technical — has to be separate from the flow of things that feed the TV studio space — things like scenery, lifts and other equipment. We call this people vs. stuff. (See Figure 1.)

The people side

This important aspect of planning has to be modified to fit your production needs. For example, a soap opera's production flow is much more demanding in terms of scenery movement than that of a news operation, even though both are daily occurrences. The size of your existing or planned facility is also important and must be taken into account. The concept, however, stays the same; only the scale of the application differs.

Staying with the people spaces, let's consider organizational categories that will help define proximities. In the diagram for the spaces to be occupied, there are two categories: technical and support.

The technical spaces are defined as those required for the personnel and equipment needed to capture the production's images and audio. These spaces typically include video control, audio control, graphics, equipment racks rooms and other similar spaces, all of which are critical aspects of production, even if provided in a mobile unit.