Workshop in Studio Production

Course Description

Workshop in Studio Production enables students to prepare a studio for a production, create a television program, and post-produce the program for broadcast and internet distribution.

Within the SCNS taxonomy, RTV is the Radio and Television prefix. Daytona State publishes this at 3 credits, offered fall and spring, with a $4.60 lab fee, RTV1000 and RTV1510 as prerequisites and RTV2534 as a corequisite, giving approximately 60 contact hours at the prefix convention.

⚠ RTV2540 and RTV2534 are each other's corequisite — a mutual pairing covering studio and field production in the same term, not a lecture-and-laboratory split. Plan for both together.

The word workshop is accurate. This is a production course rather than a lecture course: students rotate through crew positions and make programmes, and the learning comes from doing every job badly once and then better. Rotating through the whole crew is also what makes someone employable, because a person who has operated audio understands what the director's commands cost.

Daytona State does not publish a lecture and laboratory split for its RTV courses, but the convention across the prefix is consistent: every published RTV course at this institution runs at approximately 20 contact hours per credit (RTV1000 and RTV1510C at 4 credits and 80 hours; RTV2100C and RTV2600C at 3 credits and 60 hours). These are studio and laboratory courses, and the hours reflect substantial hands-on time rather than lecture.

Learning Outcomes

Required Outcomes

• Prepare a studio for production, including set, lighting, and camera positions.
• Rig and focus studio lighting to a lighting plan.
• Set up and test studio audio, including microphones and foldback.
• Configure and test the signal path from camera to recording.
• Operate a studio camera, including framing, focus, and pedestal movement.
• Operate as a floor manager, relaying cues and managing talent.
• Operate a production switcher, executing cuts, dissolves, and keys.
• Operate audio for a live programme and maintain levels.
• Operate graphics and playback systems.
• Operate as a teleprompter operator.
• Direct a studio programme using standard commands.
• Produce a studio programme, including rundown and guest coordination.
• Work to a rundown and hit accurate programme timings.
• Use intercom systems with appropriate discipline.
• Rotate through crew positions and describe each role's responsibilities.
• Troubleshoot common studio faults under time pressure.
• Record a programme cleanly and verify the recording.
• Post-produce a programme for broadcast and internet distribution.
• Prepare deliverables to differing platform specifications.
• Strike a studio safely and return equipment correctly.
• Apply studio safety practice, including electrical and rigging hazards.
• Work collaboratively and communicate effectively as a crew.
• Critically evaluate a completed programme.
• Meet production deadlines reliably.

Optional Outcomes

• Operate advanced switcher features and effects.
• Apply chroma key and virtual set techniques.
• Design studio lighting for differing programme genres.
• Integrate remote and streaming contributions into a studio programme.
• Stream a live programme and configure encoders.
• Build a portfolio of studio-produced programmes.

Major Topics

Required Topics

• Studio preparation
• Lighting rig and focus
• Studio audio setup
• Signal path configuration
• Studio camera operation
• Floor managing
• Switcher operation
• Live audio operation
• Graphics and playback operation
• Teleprompter operation
• Studio directing
• Studio producing
• Rundowns and timing
• Intercom discipline
• Crew position rotation
• Troubleshooting under pressure
• Recording and verification
• Post-production for distribution
• Platform deliverables
• Studio strike
• Studio safety
• Crew collaboration
• Critical evaluation
• Deadline management

Optional Topics

• Advanced switcher features
• Chroma key and virtual sets
• Lighting design by genre
• Remote and streaming contributions
• Live streaming and encoding
• Portfolio development

Resources & Tools

• The programme's own studio, control room, and field kit — by far the most valuable resource here, and the reason to take these courses in person. Book open lab time and use it.
• Television Production Handbook (Zettl) — the standard text for studio and field production.
• Sight, Sound, Motion: Applied Media Aesthetics (Zettl) — why shots work, not just how to get them.
• In the Blink of an Eye (Murch) — short, and the best thing written on why an edit happens where it does.
• Grammar of the Edit and Grammar of the Shot (Bowen) — practical and genuinely useful early on.
• Adobe Premiere Pro, After Effects, and Audition, or DaVinci Resolve — Resolve has a genuinely capable free version, which matters when you are building skills outside lab hours.
• Frame.io, Vimeo, or YouTube for review, delivery, and portfolio hosting.
• NAB Show and SMPTE — where the industry's technical standards and equipment are set out.
• Florida Association of Broadcasters (fab.org) — state industry body, job board, and scholarships.
• NATAS Suncoast Chapter — regional Emmy chapter; student entries are a realistic and well-regarded credential.
• FAA Part 107 study materials (faa.gov) — free, and the certificate is directly marketable.
• Production music libraries and Creative Commons audio — learn to license properly now, because it is unfixable later.

Career Pathways

• Film and video editor — SOC 27-4032.
• Camera operator, television, video, and film — SOC 27-4031.
• Producer or director — SOC 27-2012.
• Broadcast technician / audio-visual technician — SOC 27-4012, 27-4011.
• Sound engineering technician — SOC 27-4014.
• Local television news — the traditional entry route, and still a real one in Florida's many mid-size markets.
• Live sports production — a large and growing Florida sector, from college athletics to professional venues.
• Corporate, marketing, and agency video — where a large share of production work actually is, and frequently the best-paid.
• Houses of worship and non-profits — substantial steady demand for competent live production.
• Government, municipal, and educational channels — stable employment with benefits.
• Theme park and attractions media — a distinctively Central Florida employer.
• Freelance and owner-operator work — common in this field; treat it as running a business.
• Transfer to a bachelor's in telecommunication, digital media, or mass communication — ⚠ confirm which of these courses apply, since technical production credit does not always transfer as major credit.

Special Information

⚠ Learn every position — it is what makes you employable and what makes you good

• Volunteer for the jobs you are worst at. The temptation is to keep taking the camera you are already good at; the value of a workshop course is precisely the positions you would otherwise avoid.
• Audio is the most undervalued and most in-demand position. Few students want it, every production needs it, and a competent audio operator is hired constantly.
• Understanding another role changes how you do yours. A director who has operated a camera gives better commands; a producer who has run audio builds better schedules.
• Small crews mean everyone does several jobs, and that is what most real production work looks like outside the largest facilities.
• Setup and strike are part of the job, not an interruption to it. Students who leave before strike develop a reputation faster than they realise.
• Label and coil cable properly. It sounds trivial; it is the most reliable early signal of whether someone has been trained well.
• Test everything before you need it. A signal path checked at call time is a problem solved; the same problem discovered at recording time is a lost session.
• Keep the studio floor clear and safe. Cable, stands, and set pieces in walkways cause the injuries that actually happen.

⚠ Equipment, safety, and the professional habits that get you hired

• Check the kit before you leave and again before you shoot. Batteries charged, spares packed, cards empty and verified, cables present, and audio monitored — a missing XLR cable ends a shoot as effectively as a dead camera.
• Monitor audio with headphones, always. Bad audio ruins good pictures, audiences forgive weak images and will not forgive unintelligible sound, and you cannot fix in post what you never recorded.
• Lighting and rigging carry real physical risk. Instruments are hot, stands tip, and overhead rigging must be safetied. Sandbag every stand, and never place a stand where a cable can pull it over.
• Electrical loads are finite. Know the circuit you are on; tripping the breaker in a live venue is a serious professional failure.
• Tape and dress every cable run. Trip hazards are the most common on-set injury and the easiest to prevent.
• Aerial work requires an FAA Part 107 Remote Pilot Certificate for any commercial drone operation — a genuinely marketable credential and one many employers now expect.
• Return equipment clean, complete, and on time. Programmes track this, and so do employers; a reputation for careless gear handling follows you.
• Report damage immediately rather than passing a fault to the next crew.

⚠ Media management — the footage you did not back up is the footage you lost

• This is the discipline that separates people who finish projects from people who tell stories about losing them. Cards fail, drives fail, and they fail at the worst possible moment.
• Follow 3-2-1: three copies, on two kinds of media, one of them off-site. A second folder on the same drive is not a backup.
• Offload before you leave the location where practical, and verify the copy before formatting anything. Confirm the file count and the total size, and spot-check playback.
• Format cards in the camera, not on the computer, and only after the footage is verified in two places.
• Name files and folders systematically from the first day — project, date, card number, and scene. Renaming after the fact breaks the link between your edit and your media, which is a painful and entirely avoidable failure.
• Keep the camera originals untouched. Edit from copies or proxies; never let an editing application be the only thing that knows where your footage is.
• Log as you go. Notes made on the shoot day cost minutes; reconstructing them from four hours of rushes costs a weekend.
• Label and rotate cards so a full card is never mistaken for an empty one — a reversed card is how footage disappears.

⚠⚠ Copyright, music licensing, and releases — the trap that ends student projects

• You cannot use commercial music. Not thirty seconds of it, not "for a class project," not with a credit line. This is the single most common serious error in student video work, and it is the one that gets a portfolio piece taken down permanently.
• Fair use is a legal defence, not a permission. It is decided case by case, after the fact, by a court — it is not a box you may tick in advance, and relying on it for background music is not a defensible position.
• "Royalty-free" does not mean free. It means a single up-front fee rather than per-use royalties, and the licence still has terms — read what it permits, especially for commercial or broadcast use.
• YouTube's Content ID will find it, automatically and permanently. A muted or blocked video is a portfolio piece you no longer have.
• Get a signed appearance release from every identifiable person on camera — keep a stack of blank forms in the kit bag, because you will need one at a moment you did not plan for.
• Minors require a parent or guardian signature. No exceptions, and this matters constantly in community and school-based shooting.
• Location permission is separate from people permission. Private property needs the owner's consent; many public spaces require a permit for a tripod or a crew.
• Clear the background too. Artwork, logos, posters, and playing music in a shot are all someone's property.
• Use properly licensed libraries — production music libraries, Creative Commons with attribution honoured exactly as the licence requires, or music a composer has given you written permission to use.
• Keep your paperwork with your footage. Releases and licences you cannot produce are releases you do not have. Rule 11 applies — verify current requirements before distributing anything.

⚠ In this field the reel is the credential, not the transcript

• Hiring in production is portfolio-driven. Employers want ninety seconds of your best work and evidence you can be relied on — the degree opens the conversation, the reel gets the job.
• Treat every course project as a portfolio candidate, which means clearing the music and the releases at the time, not the week you apply for work.
• Keep it short and lead with the strongest shot. A reel is judged in the first fifteen seconds, and padding actively hurts.
• Show your actual role honestly. Misrepresenting what you did on a crew project is found out quickly in a small industry.
• Say yes to crew positions on other people's projects. Credits, contacts, and competence all come from the same place, and this industry hires overwhelmingly by referral.
• Reliability is the actual differentiator. People who arrive early, handle gear carefully, and stay pleasant at hour eleven get called back; the ones with better taste and worse habits do not.
• Local news, live sports, houses of worship, corporate video, and municipal channels all hire steadily in Florida and are where most first jobs actually are — not at the networks.

How Florida course levels affect transfer

The first digit of an SCNS number denotes the year of offering, not transferability. Courses at the 1000 and 2000 levels transfer transparently between Florida public institutions, and 3000 to 4000 is unproblematic since both are upper division. The boundary that actually matters is 2000 to 3000, where lower-division credit generally cannot satisfy an upper-division requirement — relevant here because several Florida universities offer upper-division telecommunication and digital media degrees that these courses feed into.

RTV2540 is 3 credits and approximately 60 contact hours with a $4.60 lab fee, offered fall and spring at Daytona State, with RTV1000 and RTV1510 as prerequisites and RTV2534 as a corequisite — the two are taken together.

Assessment is typically crew performance across rotated positions plus finished programmes. See this repository's RTV2534 guide for its paired field counterpart, and RTV1670 for directing.