Automated Media
Tom Ryan, Rutgers University

Ryan and Rutgers have developed a (cheap) method for automating the production of classroom audio and video recording. The school's previous system had several problems: costly staffing for nights and weekends, poor audio, and no method for easily converting media from one format to another. When developing a new system, they needed an inexpensive solution because New Jersey was in the midst of a severe budget crisis.

They had the following hardware (network camera) requirements:
1) Data/Power over single cable
2) Internal microphone on camera BUT with external connection
3) High quality video
4) Lightweight
5) Reliable, leader in video hardware
6) Synchronized audio and video

Ryan chose: AXIS 230 MPEG-2 Camera

This camera (approximately $1500 each) is an all-in-one box that requires no other equipment (and thus eliminates additional hardware costs).

As for the project's software requirements:
1) Automated recording
2) Automated post processing
3) Including open/end credits
4) Ability to generate podcasts
5) Course management system integration
6) DVD generation

Ryan chose: Apple's free Darwin Streaming Server and a combination of other free tools he has collectively dubbed Completely Automated Media System (CAMS)

Darwin handles the web-streaming of the completed AV files, while CAMS is a four-part system for actually creating those AV files: Scheduling, Capturing, Processing, and Posting. Scheduling achieved solely through PHP and MySQL (using phpMyAdmin). Capturing, processing, and post is done all in one step using Wget, a free tool for retrieving files.

Ryan and his team still intend to develop a better scheduler interface, create a computer presenter interface (i.e., an interactive whiteboard, or something similar), and implement some method of Pan-Tilt-Zoom integration.