The Roland V-02HD Multi Format Video Mixer and the V-1HD⁺ HD Video Switcher are proving to be essential parts of the toolkit for live events, livestreaming and hybrid production. As well as having all the features and functions you might need, these ‘all in one’ solutions offer the portability, flexibility and perhaps more importantly, the reliability, that AV professionals, in particular single operators need. For Stefan Flos, owner of Dutch company SJF Projects and events production company mission2capture, the V-02HD and the V-1HD⁺ have been at the heart of an AV setup that has enabled him to build a successful business in recording and streaming corporate events for the global water industry.

Whether Flos is using the V-02HD on its own, as – in his words - a ‘Swiss Army Knife and a lifesaver’ or together with the V-1HD⁺ to create a small, powerful event production setup, it’s clear that both products are integral to his workflow. Talking about his V-02HD, Flos explains; ‘This little thing is a brilliant invention. For very simple productions I can just do a video with an overlay, and because it’s a three double scaler: 2 scaled inputs, with the scaled output I can use ‘EDIT’ to change the output of the connected device (a laptop) if I want. The V-02HD is something that I can recommend to anybody who is doing this type of production. I use the V-02HD for PowerPoints (inputs and 2 outputs) and send this to screen/beamer and to input 1 (scaler) on the V-1HD⁺ for the PowerPoint overlay – and I can even pass back a video signal to input 2 to send to the projector or screen.

Ticking the (small) boxes
The world of video production has changed dramatically over the past ten years, both in terms of the products available and the quality that can be achieved using relatively inexpensive products. For companies like SJF, every purchase is well considered in terms of cost and how many boxes can that one product tick.

‘Prices are coming down; equipment is getting cheaper and smaller, and I think that is a very good development. You always have to look at what a little box can do, and this can involve a lot of testing’.

For most companies like SJF, it’s a continuous balancing act to find the right product at the right price with the right functions, dealing with a volatile market that, especially now, has many products to choose from. Important functions such as the scalers being capable of connecting VSA sources (not just video resolutions) – something that the V-1HD⁺ can do, but many of its competitors do not offer – become the deal breaker.

‘I am only a small company, but if I buy something I want to have at least two – so the price point needs to be at the right level. There are a lot of other products that are at the same level (as the V-02HD or V-1HD⁺) or in a different league. From that perspective, I keep an eye on a few companies, and Roland is one, to see what they come up with. Sometimes you strike gold like with this little V-02HD – it’s a brilliant thing – so if you look at price and what it can do and the portability of it, it becomes a ‘no brainer’ and you buy it – and you always have it with you.’

‘I always have a minimum of two sets – and this should be easily expandable because most events nowadays have breakout sessions in more than one room. I sometimes have to record in 4 to 6 rooms simultaneously or I have to change to another room and have an extra setup there. That’s where the price and portability are essential but also having more than one unit with a standard approach – this all comes together in the V-1HD⁺ and the V-02HD combo’.

The onboard mixer with output to PA proved to be the important factor in choosing the V-1HD⁺ over other products. It is often the case that small events need integrated audio – a microphone for recording the speaker to send to live/recording and an audio mix output to send to the PA in the room. ‘With the V-1HD⁺ I can do these all myself, be in control and save additional costs for my clients with one small unit. Very convenient for small settings with two microphones to mix (speaker and moderator).’

Sustainability not waste
Flos spent a lot of time in his early career organising events and symposiums for the water-sector, all of which were full of great content that, in his words gets ‘washed away’ with the drinks afterwards. So, he decided to take matters into his own hands to create a more sustainable model around these events, a model that would in short time become his full-time job.

‘Organising events in this way (not recording them) is not sustainable – it’s ineffective to reach a larger audience, so I started to record these events on my own account, because I organised them. I started to look around to see where I could find the equipment or a setup that is tailor made for doing it. I started with Mediasite (a lecture capturing system) – but this was way too expensive for what I wanted to do which was generally ‘on the fly’ mixing and recording video. After looking further, I found VMix (and has been using it for twelve years already) which gives a lot of control and flexibility on a very small footprint.’

As the demand for recordings grew, Flos found that he was travelling around the world and needed to find that ‘all in one’ solution that could travel easily with him.

‘I had the drive to collect all this water-based knowledge, word spread, and I ended up doing lots of recordings, ended up going everywhere such as San Francisco, Berlin, Zurich – I could do that because I had this small system and could carry the equipment around. The international events were the incentive to look for something like the V-02HD / V-1HD⁺ combo because I have to deal with lots of PowerPoints on the fly.’ ‘Whenever I use it, people say afterwards, ‘this was the first time we had an event where nothing went wrong with the PowerPoint’

Although Flos was very much established in providing his event recording services to the water industry before the pandemic, his AV setup adapted easily to the growth in requests and necessity for livestreaming.

‘With the way things are going with Corona lockdown, you need a system that is livestream compatible. I have done everything (including recording) right there on the spot for more than 10 years: support, recording, streaming, and mixing the audio for the room. I call it ‘near real time recording and mixing and this is livestream ready. So Live (streaming) is not a big step for me.’

Trouble free, single operation
It’s also important for Flos that the system is fit for a one-person operation as there is simply no budget for another person, let alone a team. He therefore needs to be able to rely on the equipment to avoid any interruptions, delays, for example from Windows and driver updates prior to a recording.

‘The Roland product provides a miniature fixed solution and a fixed start-up state – I can give it to someone new with an instruction of a few minutes, which buttons to press and they can start. For recording presentations, it is usually a simple overlay and just follow the speaker action plus muting/unmuting an audio input.’

Another aspect of the Roland products that falls into the category of ease of use, is the iPad App control that can be used to mix, change presets, control audio, change the start-up state, add overlays – plus much more. ‘Via the excellent iPad App I can quickly change a preset and go from a 4-3 PowerPoint to a 16-9 PowerPoint with the speaker on the left or the right’. Although the V-1HD⁺ and the V-02HD have different Apps, it is easy to switch between them on location, to change the settings and save the start-up state’.

To connect to a livestream, Flos uses the Video Assist from Blackmagic, because it has a monitor, a recorder and a webcam-output to USB (for Zoom, SKYPE etc) – underpinning his philosophy that anything in the toolkit must do more than one thing to earn its place.

The majority of AV professionals would agree that the ‘heavy lifting’ in terms of the workload for recording events and presentations is in the preparation and organisation, with recording and following a speaker or presenter on the day being the ‘easy’ part. But as with all live events, there is a point – in Flos’ case the start up or the speaker change – where many things have to be done at once. ‘In this one minute, a lot of work has to be done at once – a mic change, a change of PowerPoint, mixing audio when the moderator will speak to introduce the next speaker and thank the previous.’

In this minute a pair or two of extra hands might be useful but is, unaffordable, especially as those hands would be redundant for 95% of the time. And, it is in this minute that a simple, push button device like the V-02HD and V-1HD⁺ is vital for the single operator.

Prepare, plug in and play
Flos is the first to admit that his job is ‘99% preparation and 1% pushing a button’ but still, it’s imperative that he has the tools to hand to deal with the odd curveball.

‘For example, I just got a call about a PowerPoint presentation, but they also have a forum and want to have the output of one camera live on to the screen. That’s not going to be an issue, I just switch HDMI into the V-1HD⁺ and then switch to the camera on the screen. The flexibility is all there – I don’t need to add another item that I might forget! The technology that I rely on has to be 100% - with Roland I can push the button and when I do it starts up just the way I want it.’

The V-1HD⁺ has a powerful four-layer effects engine with a DSK layer that allows you to independently composite a PinP window on a video feed – especially useful for live and online events. Together with the option of a 10 window multi-viewer display that can be applied to one or both HDMI outputs, the ability to cue up camera shots, preview presentations or add still images are all at the fingertips of the user. Eight memory presents to recall visual layouts on cue allow much of the work to be done in the preparation stage, making life much easier on the day.

‘The advantage of the V-1HD⁺ is that it allows for off-screen positioning of the inputs! I can adjust the position of the frame but keep the speaker centre in the camera because I need only a small window beside the presentation. But when I switch to camera view, I want to have the speaker in centre. This is unique to the Roland systems, that it allows me to position the camera input off-screen.

Presentations are either 3:4 or 16:9. The speaker might be standing on the left or right of the stage. By using presets I can pre-prepare for any situation and I can switch from Preset 1 (Left) to Preset 2 (right) or Preset 3 with the camera views. I have presets with audio delay (for recording I need 170 ms delay to synch the output) and presets without delay (for PA direct with 0 ms delay – audio synch on the recording will be done in post). I can set which settings to change with the preset, so the start-up state preset determines the basic setting. If I start-up with delay – I set the presets not to change audio settings. These little options make these small machines a great value: the bliss is in the details.’

Harvesting the potential
The potential value in recording the events is what Flos refers to as ‘event harvesting ‘: 98% of costs is in the event organisation already, recording it is a no brainer. Harvest it! Once it is recorded then you can harvest again and again, as long as you make the content available for the long run.’

‘There is lots of potential once you start recording presentations, symposia, meetings in a structured way. I have used many content harvesting tricks, like linking a PowerPoint presentation to the video with timecodes: click a slide and you get to the point in the video where it is discussed. I have made digital magazines, near real-time proceedings of events etc etc. But it all starts with recording the event: if you don’t record your event, your valuable content is wasted.

‘I have prepared 2-day event with more than 60 presentations and a sandbox session with 10+ speakers in 15 minutes, each with individual PowerPoints, on the fly. This is impossible without the right tools. The V-02HD is essential in this and with the V-1HD⁺ I have the set to cover everything.’

Flos has also set up websites, magazines and even done productions where everything is pre published so at 5pm when the meeting is over, the content of the days recording is already up on the website, and ready to use. In the scientific world, where the proceedings of the meetings have to be written and recorded directly after, the recordings done by Flos can be used instead, saving the client time and money. Some of these recordings still attract 5-10 viewers every week for more than 10 years! That’s value of investment.

‘It’s still an education process for the client. The value of the recorded content and the opportunities for using it is not yet fully understood in this environment. I don’t focus on entertainment; I focus on knowledge sharing for professionals with aim on the Next Generation of knowledge workers. Just making an aftermovie is actually expensive: harvesting your events content with video recording presentations is the right starting point.’

Adding value, not cost
The business case is clear to many – invest in Flos to do a professional job in the beginning and take advantage of the long tail of your own content he recorded for you.

‘It’s all about adding value, not adding cost. That’s why it’s important that I have a smooth and easy production on ‘the day’ which I can achieve by preparing well beforehand. Using the V-02HD and V-1HD⁺ I can prepare, make changes put in the presets and make sure there are no delays – all done at the office in advance, so I don’t have to do it in post.’

For Flos, the V-02HD and the V-1HD⁺ deliver every time on reliability, functionality and portability, enabling him to produce high quality content that continues to provide value to the client way after the event has finished. These small boxes may not take up much space in his flight case, but they certainly plays a big part in his continued success.