Cutting Edge and San Francisco Giants Host AT&T Park Tech Tour

Media executives and content creators from as far away as New York got a first-hand look at the San Francisco Giants media production workflow at Cutting Edge’s Tech Tour event at AT&T Park.  Thanks to the Giants, attendees were able to see the inner workings of how the team edits, stores, and leverages media content across a number of distribution platforms.

A highlight of the evening was the inside story of the Legacy Project – a bold initiative to preserve more than 25,000 hours of the Giants historical film and videotape archives by digitizing the content before it was no longer able to be played back.  Brad Martens, the Giants Manager of Media Systems and Workflow gave an overview of the project, which was timed to coincide with the 60th anniversary of the team’s move to the Bay Area.

Giants Executive Producer Anica Chavez spoke about the value of the team’s rich historical film and videotape collection, and how the Giants front office management became convinced that preserving the media was an urgent priority.

Senior Manager of Productions Alyssa Royce showed examples of the videos her group has produced using historical footage – underscoring the value of digitizing assets that would otherwise have remained locked away in a storeroom.

Cutting Edge Chief Technology Officer Sig Knapstad spoke about multi-tiered media storage solutions and how they fit into an overarching asset management strategy.  Sig was the chief technology architect of the Giants video infrastructure, and established the production workflows used by editors and media managers every day.  He also showed Tech Tour attendees how Cutting Edge has helped sports organizations including the Giants, Oakland As, and Denver Broncos create flexible, cost-effective, and reliable production workflows.  PADEM Media Group Chief Executive Allan McLennan spoke about developments in media distribution and consumption, over-the-top distribution trends, and how sports organizations are leveraging near-zero latency video over the Internet to reach fans and business partners.  Avid’s Richard Duke took attendees through the latest developments in remote editorial workflows, highlighted innovations in cloud-enabled content creation, and spoke about how Artificial Intelligence is transforming asset management workflows.

Attendees got the rare opportunity to actually go to the field to observe batting practice, meet Giants players, and snap selfies.  The event also featured an exclusive tour of the Giants scoreboard control room and editorial suites.  This behind-the-scenes glimpse showed how Cutting Edge brought together a range of innovative production technologies to create a reliable and efficient production workflow.

The evening culminated with dinner, drinks, and watching the Giants vs. the San Diego Padres from an executive suite overlooking the ballpark.  Cutting Edge thanks the San Francisco Giants for their hospitality and willingness to allow our clients and guests to tour the team’s technical operation.  Special thanks also go to event sponsor Avid Technology, which provides the Giants video editing, storage, and asset management infrastructure.  Tech Tour co-sponsors also included Spectra Logic, makers of the Giants archive library systems, and Iron Mountain Entertainment Services, the organization responsible for digitizing the team’s media collection.

For more photos from the Tech Tour event, check out the Cutting Edge Facebook page.

Tech Tour Presentations

The Legacy Project: Preserving the Past

San Francisco Giants executives reveal the inside story of the Legacy Project, a bold initiative to digitize more than 25,000 hours of the team’s historical film and videotape archives.