As someone born in Hammersmith, West London, London's Olympia exhibition centre was something I passed a lot on the bus - between the roundabout and the elegant houses of Holland Park and Kengsington. First built in 1886, it was extended in the 1920s, and has gone on to host a huge variety of trade fairs..Including for the past few years the Media Production and Technology Show. It's undergoing extensive development to soon become a massive venue with shopping, leisure, a hotel, as well as the existing exhibition spaces.
The 1920s were a time of building an infrastructure for Britain - as well as for British broadcasting. In November 1929, John Logie Baird did the first tests of 'television'. The British Broadcasting Corporation had been set up two years earlier. Now, like the mix of uses at Olympia, the media ecosystem seeks to combine commerce, entertainment, information,,networking and exhibition. Is there a word that combines all of that?
A hundred years on from those roaring twenties, the Olympia Grand Hall is full of television technology that still links to the past - we still mostly point cameras at things to record them - but is also evidence of the profound change the business is going through.
I go to the MPTS to get beyond the slightly rareified ideas-driven atmosphere of the documentary production and public television world in which I've spent most of my career. The hall was chock full of cameras, microphones and sleek looking bits of broadcast kit, all on stands with sales teams looking to scan your badge and get you interested. Branded pens and glossy flyers were much in evidence as a sales tool - LiveU (a live capture and transmission platform) used a robot doc doing handstands (or pawstands) to get our attention.
I gravitated to the panels about production - like the Production State of the Nation in the unscripted sector which kicked off the event on Wednesday morning. Kate Beal of Woodcut, Derren Lawford of Dare Pictures, Matt Richards of AirTV and Dean Webster from Ten66 all spoke frankly about the huge challenges facing the unscripted business - but also clear that the UK industry could rise to those challenges. How to craft hard-hitting documentaries, seen below was a reminder of the editorial work that goes into films like Diddy: In Plain Sight, or Al Fayed - Predator at Harrods. I also explored some of the sports panels on remote production workflows and fan engagement - all useful information for a YouTube-centred idea I'm developing. And to the very popular AI sessions, which looked at how every part of the produciton and distribution chain was about to be disrupted/improved/threatened (take your pick).
Seeing what technology is out there certainly gives you ideas for new ventures - particularly with the low barrier to entry for Cloud-based services and some of the 'prosumer' or smartphone-based kit available. Finding the people who can help me navigate all this tech is a bit harder, but an event like this helps in giving you the vocabulary to ask the right questions.
In the end, the people selling tech are still dependent on producers of all shapes creating and commissioning content or services to make use of it. Now with organisations and companies knowing that they have to get into video at all levels - engagement, education, commerce - the definition of 'producer' has changed. Hopefully people in the traditional production community can connect with these new producers and creators.
I know that we need to adapt, and find new collaborators and new clients. I left feeling a bit daunted by what I needed to learn about the ever changing media ecosystem, but stimulated by the possibilities.. If you went, I'd love to know what you made of it.
A few stands I visited
Motion capture and XR studios in London and Gateshead Target3D
Story generation engine Charismatic
Generative AI video platform LTX Studio
Blackmagic - to download their rather amazing free camera app for my smartphone
