WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED FROM PRODUCING HYBRID EVENTS?

Hello, this is Les Goldberg, and welcome to The Road Ahead. The Road Ahead podcast is dedicated to the future of the live events business, bringing together industry experts. Hello, production world. This is Les Goldberg and The Road Ahead. Today, I have two amazing guests. I have James Boress, and he is a broadcast live events video director. And I have Dave Nuckolls, who's the owner and executive producer for Dave Nuckolls Productions, DNP. Guys, welcome to the show. Thanks, Les. Good to be here. Hi, it's good to be here. Guys, today we are talking about the world of hybrid experiences, and we have been doing them kind of since the post-COVID world. And we want to talk about today what we've learned, and we've done lots of them. Both of you guys are people that participate in hybrid events, video direction, and whether it's a live audience, a remote audience. And I really kind of want to get your opinions on where we're at in this world of hybrid. So I'm going to throw the first question to Dave Nuckolls. Dave, could you kind of tell me, how do you describe a hybrid event or hybrid experience? What does that mean to you? Well, as you mentioned, COVID really has brought that term to light. We've always kind of been doing them. The notion is that there is an experience that's happening live. So whether you're in an arena or a ballroom or a big convention space, you've got the live component. But then you can also reach people remotely. With COVID, it became a necessity to do more of the remote because people weren't meeting live. What people like the Microsofts and the SalesForces of the world have found is that there was really a good opportunity to reach more people by focusing and really enhancing that remote experience. So a lot of companies are saying, it's definitely here to stay. How do we make it great? How do we have the two different experiences both be great? But that's what the hybrid event really is now, is two different shows with lots of intersection points to get the maximum reach for your customers. Okay, James, give me your thoughts. The hybrid experience, the hybrid event experience, what are your thoughts? Has Dave covered it or do you have other cool things to add? Well, Dave did a very good job. For me, it's a live event, whether it's in a vogue arena, a large convention space, whether it's a corporate job, whether it's an entertainment gig with headline talent, what have you, but it's also simultaneously broadcast. But it is two distinct audiences for a single live event. Gosh, a lot of corporate shows have been doing their big corporate meetings and webcasting at the same time, even prior to Coke. So let me ask you a follow up question and get your thoughts on this. Should the content vary from the live experience that's happening in a ballroom, a convention center, to the screens for that live audience, to the remote experience? Do you see them as unique experiences? And do you see the content the same, different? Or do they share the same content or some version of that? What are your thoughts? I have from a directorial and compositional and camera directing point of view, I have quite a few opinions on that. One, I think that production companies that create the content for these events, you know, the primary focus of the live event and the broadcast seems to be secondary. The one thing that troubles me is a lot of these large corporate events, especially, have such a wide screen. In order to get that information out to the broadcast, you have to have such a wide shot that it becomes so letterboxed. I mean, it's hard to appreciate. It's hard to see detail. Sometimes it's very good to have a second director. The second director can put the speaker, if there's a heavy content, heavy graphic content, they can put them in a box and put the 16:9 content, which needs to be produced in a 16:9 format for the broadcast. Since people at home are watching on 16:9 aspect ratio, just as a side adjunct to just a compositional thing. A lot of rock shows, a lot of concerts and a lot of headline and a lot of scenic designers, because the LED is really a scenic element, have started to put the IMAG elements in a very narrow aspect ratio, almost like a vertical format of an iPhone. OK, so your IMAG becomes very static, almost on the front line, on a headline artist. And some of the delay screens, even within the venue, are 16:9. So compositionally, it's very difficult, I think, to present who gets sacrificed. Basically, if you compose for that narrow aspect ratio, your 16:9 composition, well, in a word, is poor. OK, I gotcha. So let me ask this follow up question to Dave. As James, James Boress has given us this insight. What are your thoughts? Is there a separate curated event experience for remote audience? And he keeps talking about, you know, the composition and the aspect ratio and using the real estate and those super widescreen aspect ratio images and not looking good on broadcast. Do you do separate broadcast graphics, Dave? What are your thoughts? Absolutely. Yeah, James made some really, really good points, covered a lot of really good stuff there. I just want to ramp up a few things that he said and expand a little bit. I look at these as two completely different shows with some crossover. So he's right. It is a television show on the broadcast side. When you go live until you shut down at the end of the day, you've got to have compelling content being fed the entire time. So it's two different teams. You've got the broadcast team. They're worried about their own graphics, their own music, their own transitions, their hosts, anything that they're that they're going to put on out on the broadcast is a completely different group of folks with somewhat of a different mission. Obviously, it's for the same client, but a different mission for how they're catering to the remote audience. The overlap is when you look in on the live experience. So the live team is worried about, you know, audio, stage and lighting, projection, LED, anything that is in the arena and what that experience is for the 8000, 10000, 25000 guests that are there. So the collaboration is huge. I think the most successful shows that I've worked on recently is when you let each team kind of do their own thing and you just recognize when that transition is going to happen. For example, when keynote happens, let's say at 10 o'clock, you flip over and you just let the keynote team do their thing. So you take their their master switch feed and that's what you broadcast. James is exactly right. Formats are crazy. And so you have to take all that into account. You can have boxes. You can do big little boxes where you take, you know, whatever size screen it is that they're that they're using at that time and put it on some sort of a graphical overlay for the broadcast. But all that is worked out in advance. You know that, you know, if you have to do that, it's things like downstream keen, the bug and lower thirds and all those kind of things need to be weighed into it. But if you have two different teams focused on their individual missions, you have a lot better recipe for success. And the ones that I've done recently that I consider to be very successful have kind of been approached from that point of view. I absolutely agree. And especially audio wise, you need a full split audio from from the live event so that you can mix it for the broadcast portion. Absolutely. OK, so. So, guys, this is a question to I'll throw it to both of you. Whoever wants to opine first, maybe Dave, can you measure the remote audience that's watching this? Is there any way to actually get real time feedback? Or how do you know the people that are watching it other than the large, voluminous numbers of people that have logged in? How do you get feedback from that? Do you is it surveys? Is it the length of duration they've logged on? Is it you know, is that the way to get feedback from that? Is there any interactivity? Yeah, it's all about metrics these days, isn't it? You always got to know, you know, was it worth it and how many people watched and how many people, you know, all that stuff. So what we've done is we've really worked in a lot of engagement tools into the broadcast. Twitter is an obvious one, or I guess we should say X now. But, you know, are people tweeting about what you're doing? We have created some content that is unique to the broadcast that that people really have enjoyed things like we'll make funny commercials or fake commercials or we'll have the hosts interview guests that really help to enhance some of the messages that were in the keynote, for example. Just a lot of different things to which the audience can react to. So they can you know, they'll tweet and say, wow, that guest was amazing or that that mashup video that they created on the broadcast was so funny or whatever it is. So that's one immediate way to find out is kind of what is the the amount of tweets, what is the amount of of comments that you're getting just in the social media space? We put a hashtag up a lot so that people know that they can interact and that they can participate. We would always try to recognize those people. So if somebody would tweet and you'd say, hey, less from Orlando says, then they know that 100000 people just heard their name, saw their Twitter handle. And so they are encouraged to do that as well. So there are a lot of other metrics related to the players where they do know how many people are on at a given time. They can tell, you know, kind of the activity of those folks. You know, how long did they stay on? Did they stay till the end? That's always the challenge is, you know, how do you make it compelling enough with teases and coming ups and all those kind of things so that people feel compelled to stay because there's just so many distractions, so many ways to to find other things to do when you're watching from home and you've got, you know, your regular lives going on sometimes, too. So but yeah, there are ways through the player that metrics that you can you can use. And that measurable component is certainly important to the clients I've found. James, do you think I agree with Dave? And have you found any other things that you've done for engagement for remote audiences? The issue in a lot of the shows that I'm hired for is that there is a single director directing three, three different shows. An IMAG show, a line cut show. That's very difficult. That's just very difficult. You've got to have a TV. You've got to have a TV and camera operators that, you know, you've worked with a lot when possible, when the budget will allow. And then and then the broadcast is mainly the line cut with some 69 composed graphics for for high for high level content. As far as having two directors, just to retrace for a minute that, you know, if there's a panel discussion, basically the second the broadcast director takes the same cut that the live the live show director is doing, because especially if we're if we're in a 16:9 aspect ratio in in the venue. So the so that the broadcast director is really working with. Taking taking the line cut for the majority of the show, and then when they need to, they can they can put in a, you know, if there's a if there's a widescreen video that's also been produced in 16:9, it's playing in sync role from the high res. And we take the 16:9 and the broadcast director can do that. As far as feedback on audience size and such. Typically, I'm not involved in that at all, but mainly the the feedback that I've heard kind of surreptitiously from the producers is how many how many folks logged in. Got it. Well, you know, the number of eyeballs that watched the show is very important. And the time that they were logged in. I want to switch this to a different subject. If you were preparing to do and on this discussion, let's say we have someone directing a live show and let's say someone was dedicated to directing the remote show. How do you begin to prepare for those two different shows? And I'll throw this to Dave first to say what you how would you approach this for a client? Well, not to be repetitious, but but as I mentioned earlier, when you prepare the two different shows is complete different shows. If you focus only on the broadcast, the notion is what is on the screen all the time. I always it just makes me crazy when I sit in initial meetings and they'll say, well, we'll put up a holding slide during this time. Holding slides are just an invitation for people to walk away from their computers and you may not get them back. There's just too many distractions at home. So I've been very fortunate to work with some clients recently where they get that. And we have our own production, our own pre-production budget. And so we create a lot of content. We do look at those crossover moments like keynotes, perhaps some breakouts that we go to as moments, big chunks of time that we know that's what we're going to do. But then what do you do all that other time? Because you want people to just stay, stay with you, you know, all day long for the entire broadcast. So we will create pre-produced packages. We will do like one on ones on tips and on tricks on things for using the software, whatever the client happens to be. We will do pre-interviews. Now, things don't you don't want to be too long. Of course, you want to keep people's attention, but we'll do interviews. I've mentioned the hosts several times. If you can have hosts interview people that can. Well, maybe they were part of the keynote and you can have them expand a bit on on what it is that that they they announced in the keynote. Or you can have other experts comment on features that were announced, things like that. You can have people walking by. They're just so excited that you that you ask them about their excitement and such. The pre-production stuff that you really asked about. We'll do things like we'll have what we'll create montages of people saying just where they're from, how many years they've been to the conference, what they're excited about, what their favorite feature is. And we always have those packages that we can toss to. If the hosts get a little bit stymied on on what they should say next or they've kind of gone through all their questions or whatever it is, they can say, we'll be right back after this, just like a regular TV show. And it's good, compelling content that we've produced that we can use. The last thing I'll just mention real quick is we have a quick turn team on site. And so what they do is they actually go out with a camera and interview people or take in the sights and sounds and then. Come back and kind of crash together kind of a broadcast news style editing where they'll crash together packages and then those are available. So the hosts could toss to and say, you know, registration was crazy this morning. Take a look, you know, and we'll usually start with like a drone shot and different things. And so it really brings the remote viewer into the conference and they feel engaged. They feel like they're there. And we always like those comments. The best is when people say, I feel like I was there. There was so much, you know, great video and such that made me feel like I was actually on location. So we do spend a fair amount of time pre-producing packages to help fill that time with good, compelling content. Got it. OK, James, do you ever have any remote participation? We're doing these hybrid events and sometimes there's a remote audience other than maybe a guest speaker who's not live. Do you ever have anyone call in or be part of the production and they're not being in the environment you're in? Is that something you experience? During the pandemic, particularly, there were some shows that were all remote. Oh, for sure. For sure. Yeah. Just before Thanksgiving of 2020. Oh, yeah. We just lived with remote presenters. But today, are you still experiencing that? Hardly ever. You know, what we'll have is we'll have some, like, if, for instance, if, say, if the secretary of transportation or whatever had, you know, was online, we'd bring them in. Typically, we used to do this with satellite, but now it's, you know, they call in on Zoom. It's processed as another source on the switcher. Sure. So you're still dealing with some remote presenters? Well, yes. Some remote presenters. Well, for instance, Elton John. I do a show for Elton John's AIDS Foundation every year for the Academy Awards. It's a big party in West Hollywood that raises millions of dollars for his AIDS Foundation. And this last year, he was on his concert tour, his farewell concert tour. So he would come in remote. Sure. There's some real drawbacks there. The one thing that you see on news all the time when remotes come in is lip sync is so far out, you just want to tear your eyes out. Let's not do that. Let's not do that today. Hey, Dave, have you had that experience recently with some of the hybrid events bringing people in remotely like James was talking about? Yeah, absolutely. And I will tell you that the rule that I always try to use is why are we doing it? There has to be a reason why you go live. If there's not a really good, compelling reason, then don't do it. Then do it on a tape delay. Turn the package around. There's just a lot more control technically. As James mentioned, being out of sync is a huge one. Obviously, the internet can drop. There can be buffering, lots of different reasons. But if for some reason, I've worked with clients where they like to bounce around. It's like, hey, let's go to London. Let's go to Berlin and it really shows that they are doing that. It's almost like when you watch the Super Bowl and they'll show that military shot when they see themselves on the screen and they cheer. I mean, that's cool. That's fun. What we've done recently, and I think you still get the same effect, is we have the various watch parties, as they call them, send in a little bit of tape. We put those together. We crash together. You can then use graphics and stuff. You can say, looking in on the remote viewer, it does feel fairly live, but you don't have the technical problems that you could have. If you're going to go live, I think you got to have a real good reason to go live. Otherwise, I'll really push for a quick turn or a taped piece anytime that the client would accept that. I really agree with that 100%. My basic rule as a director is, especially cutting cameras and such, shooting music or any other time, is if it's not motivated, don't do it. Oh, for sure. Let me move on to my final question and I'll throw this to you, James, first. Are hybrid events here to stay for the future and have we learned a lot doing them for these remote audiences? What is your thought? I think that they are here to stay, especially in large corporate events and also for training events for pharmaceutical salespeople and that kind of business. I hope that it settles down where the production design of the live event can coordinate with what's needed for the broadcast. I think that that is the biggest challenge. That is the cohesion. We need cohesion. Exactly. I believe they're here to stay because they can expand their audience. Let's say you're doing a major corporation like Amazon, for instance. I think that in the long run, it costs less for the end client and for the production companies to reach a huge audience. I completely agree with you. I feel like that remote audience is scalable and people don't have to get on airplanes and maybe not everyone qualifies. It also allows you to work different time zones. Dave, why don't you bring us home and tell us what your thoughts are about the future of hybrid events in this world we live in now? What do you see the future to look like? Well, I sure hope it continues. I've never been busier. It's been a nice, sweet spot for me because my two components of my career have been live events and broadcast events. Doing both well, which we seem to have been doing recently, which has been exciting, has really been a lot of fun. I do think that they're here to stay because, as Jim was suggesting, you have a tremendous reach that you wouldn't otherwise have. If you can have 8,000 people in an arena, that's great for those 8,000 people. But if you can have 100,000 people that you can get the message out to, just think of how many more advocates you have for that product and how many more people have been exposed to whatever that content is. I think the word is that the companies have really realized that hybrid events are so much more effective than just doing one or the other, and so I do think they're here to stay. Of course, we'll have to see what AI does in the future and how that affects things. It's going to be interesting. I've been really reading an awful lot about how AI is being used in production and such, so it'll be interesting to see how that changes things, if it does. But boy, I sure hope that the hybrid events are here to stay for a long time because I think they're very effective. I would tell you both that you are 100% correct. We're not going to give up on our remote audience. Live shows are back and ballrooms, event spaces are limited to how many people can fit, and you can do overflow rooms. So if I'm predicting the future, I think we're going to be doing this for quite some time into the future, and I really like the discussion you both had about having a dedicated team for the remote audience versus the live audience. I know James mentioned that sometimes the same director has to cut multiple feeds. I think that's a really challenging environment to do something well, and I look forward to all the great events we're going to do in the future. Guys, thank you so much. I want to thank you, James Boress and Dave Nuckolls, for joining my show today, and this is Les Goldberg and The Road Ahead. Guys, thank you so much. I really appreciate it. Thank you, Les. It was a pleasure. Thank you. Thank you, Les.