Acknowledgments

We owe a great debt of gratitude to the many people who have contributed to the making of this book. Our colleagues in the Broadcast and Electronic Communication Arts Department at San Francisco State University and the Communication Department at Eastern Connecticut State University have provided invaluable assistance.

At San Francisco State University, we would like to thank BECA Department Chair Vinay Shrivastava and faculty colleagues Larry Whitney, John Hewitt, Marty Gonzalez, Jeff Jacoby, John Barsotti, Chris Clemens, Lena Zhang, and Herb Zettl for their lively conversations on matters of production practice and aesthetics. Jeff Rosenstock, Winston Tharp, and Michele French deserve special thanks for the guidance they provided on technical matters.

At Eastern Connecticut State University we extend deep appreciation to Communication Department Chair John Hale and colleague Terry Toles-Patkin for their unwavering support of this project; to Edmond Chibeau for his generous offering of time and script materials; to John Zatowski who shared his audio and broadcast expertise with us; and to Professor Tao Chen, a visual arts expert, for kindly providing us with some of his digital compositing art pieces. The Media Services Department team was particularly helpful, especially its director Nicholas Messina, who provided graphics and equipment setups for photographs, among other things. Paul Melmer, ECSU video engineer was a constant source of technical advice, and Lisa Houghtaling, multimedia specialist and talented editor, was especially helpful. Thanks also to Monica O’Connor for her valuable administrative support.

Special thanks to all of our students whose constant inquiry and motivation drives our quest for academic excellence and video production expertise and to Guadalupe Marquez, Sheena Williams, Keegan Stiles, Aaron Schultz, and Jonathan Duvall who served as models for photographs in the studio and in the field.

We are also indebted to those individuals who offered us the opportunity to visit their facilities and observe their production facilities and processes. We particularly thank Marty Gonzalez, Dave Spahr and Lori Chapman at KRON-TV, San Francisco. Edgardo “Nicky” Rodriguez provided a wealth of information on streaming video and digital video compression, and Fei Fan (Celia) Wang provided valuable assistance with the preparation of many of the photos and illustrations.

Thanks also to those individuals who read earlier drafts of the manuscript and whose comments made it a better book, and in particular to Elisa Herrmann, Sam Houston State University, and Luis Peón-Casanova, University of Nebraska – Lincoln.

We would like to thank our editor, Simon Jacobs, and editorial assistant John Makowski for their oversight of this project, and the members of the design and production team at Routledge/Focal Press for their enthusiasm and attention to detail: production editor Cathy Hurren, project manager Kate Fornadel, copyeditor Christina Faria, and composition by Apex CoVantage.

Finally, we are indebted to our families who have been very supportive and encouraging: thanks to Sofia, whose technical skills were key for the design of models and diagrams, Jaime Jr., and Vanessa, and Susan.

Ronald J. Compesi
Jaime S. Gomez