HD Facility Profile: HDNet
When it comes to clarity, Mark Cuban’s your man. In 2001 he and video production specialist Philip Garvin started HDNet, the first national TV network to broadcast entirely in 1080i HD video. The network turns out a plethora of programming — sports, news, nature shows, sitcoms and feature films — using Macs and Final Cut Pro in its space-age studio in Denver, Colorado. The network has also joined forces with director Steven Soderbergh to produce six HD movies for simultaneous release in theaters, on cable TV and DVD.
“It was obvious to me that HDTVs were going to follow the price-performance curve of PCs,” says Cuban. “That meant to me that once they matched analog in price, analog would go away. Combine that with the fact that quite a bit of content doesn’t convert well to HD. Which meant that it was going to be more difficult than people expected for traditional cable networks to go HD. To me it was a huge opportunity to be the first to create networks geared to HDTVs.”
On the Road
Any sports fan knows HD is the next best thing to having season tickets. That’s why one of Cuban’s first tasks was to create mobile HD capture and broadcast units for live games, matches and races. Dubbed HD-1 and HD-2, these units house cameras, editing equipment, digital satellite transmitters and crews to operate them, and can motor to nearly any sports event in the United States, Canada or Mexico. They cover NHL games, Major League Soccer games, NASCAR Grand National Division Racing, NCAA football and basketball games. The network also has its own horse race, called the HDNet Horse Racing Challenge, and its own Boxing league, HDNet Boxing.
But sports aren’t the only live events worthy of high-def video. HDNet has distributed Sony HDV cameras to 35 news bureaus across the globe and has its own news crews, who, equipped with Panasonic DVC-PRO HD cams, can capture, edit and transmit HD footage. For all of it, HDNet uses Final Cut Pro and Adobe After Effects running on Power Mac G5s and PowerBook G4s.
“We love the simplicity and flexibility of Apple,” says Cuban. “The operating system was designed for media. Add Final Cut Pro to a laptop and what used to be the domain of the rich and famous is now for anyone. We love being able to take it on the road and edit in almost real time on-site.”
“The systems are reliable, low cost and they accept Sony HDV and Panasonic DVC-PRO HD,” says Garvin.
In the Studio
From HDNet’s nerve center in Denver, content gets transmitted via satellite to cable networks Adelphia Communications, Charter Communications, DIRECTV, DISH Network, Insight Communications, Mediacom Communications, Time Warner Cable and a few National Cable Television Cooperative cable affiliate networks. That’s heaps of HD content being zapped to millions of TV sets across the nation. It begs the question: How can the network produce enough programming?
HDNet has a bevy of its own shows, including the news show “HDNet World Report,” the music show “True Music,” swimwear smash hit “Bikini Destinations,” the “Get Out!” travel show and many more. The network also has movies from Paramount, Warner Brothers, Sony and other studios. Very few mainstream movies have been shot in HD, however, so the network has 35mm film stock scanned for digital display.
HDNet programming is shot with either Sony 900S or Panasonic DVC-PRO HD cameras and edited with Final Cut Pro on Power Mac G5s. And Adobe After Effects is used to add graphics and extra pizzazz. “Final Cut works really well, and it keeps getting better,” says Garvin. “It’s cost-efficient and we haven’t found much that it can’t do. The multi-cam feature works really well, especially for our concert series, where we’ll shoot multiple angles and ISOs. We also do a lot of chroma key and green screen work with the program.”
Whatever’s on HDNet, Cuban makes sure it’s high quality. “It’s a completely new and improved entertainment experience,” he says. “The combination of widescreen, 5.1 surround sound and super high resolution allows entertainment to go in a new direction. That improved experience might just bring people back to their TV sets.”
In the Theater
HDNet has also launched its own movie production company, HDNet Films, which recently struck a deal with Oscar-winning director Steven Soderbergh to make six films. The movies will be distributed through Cuban’s media juggernaut, 2929 Entertainment. The deal puts HDNet in a unique position — it will be able to release the six films in the theater, on cable TV and on DVD all at once. “We think it’s better to give people content how and where and when they want it, rather than make them conform to a marketing scheme that was formulated decades ago,” says Cuban, calling the new release system “day-and-date.”
