Faces from early CNN

I headed off to Atlanta on Delta (blah, delayed 3 hours, seat in the waaaay back) to work on a pilot for a TV show about, and named, "Excellent Women." Ex-CNN'er Bobbie Battista was once of the principals responsible for the production. It took me a few seconds to tie the face to the name though. I was a big CNN junky back in the days when Bobbie, Goodnow, Russell and the others headed a network known for pretty serious news coverage rather than the magazine format one finds there today. I think I probably gave up on CNN on 9/11, it seemed then that their staff cutbacks and format tweaks had left a network incapable of responding to such an event effectively.

We shot a single show, 5 cameras to 6 DVC Pro decks, Gil Gillum did his usual bang-up job of directing (and in this case TD'ing too). I mixed on a Midas Verona which is my favorite small-format console but not exactly designed for broadcast production work (the direct outs are post-fader). Lots of DAs & splitters later we had stereo program and tons o' iso channels on the 12 bit/4 channel DV setting. I used my trusty Behringer 2496 Finalizer to process the mix, the sound stage was somewhat noisy but I think the product was acceptable.

Back at Hartsfield, of course there was CNN Airport News, now that's a processed audio feed!