I worked this spring in at a tv station mixing the news:
As a rule of thumb if a video is not ready, it doesn’t play right (iNews can sometimes crash), or, like in this case, the live connection is not ready the news realizator* should tell the newsreader that the piece is not ready and he will automatically give pass to the next item in the news list. When the live connection is ready you tell the newsreader during a VTR (a video with a recorded locution) and he will introduce it as soon as the current VTR finishes.
What I see here is that the live connection was ok but it did not air in time because either the mixing technician was not given the order to switch to the live channel, was confused about witch channel was the right one, or the news realizator failed to order the switch.
Switchers are scary for the uninitiated!
No matter what, when a VTR or a live connection goes wrong you don’t switch on the moment it is ready, you wait until the current segment is done. Newsreader can get very confused and auto cue doesn’t help with breaking news.
Control Rooms (where the magic is done) can get very noisy when the news realizator, the news editor and the sound technician (who are essential to live connections) are arguing.But don’t get me wrong, its a fun job when everything goes according to plan, very satisfying.
*I don’t know the technical name in English, it’s the person who orders what to do during airing time (witch videos go next, audio, camera movements, transitions between news or segments, etc), but doesn’t decide what news air (that’s news director job) or how are written (that is news editor job)
