Draft 1 -- Jan 31, 2008
An invitation to an adventure
San Antonio’s
Public Studio
Collaboratory
Community Media
for the Next Generation
in San Antonio and South Central Texas
Come join us in a voyage to a new world –
and in building the ship that will take us there.
publicstudio.us
(to download latest version of hyperlinked pdf)
What is Public Studio?
Public Studio is a group of veteran communication specialists committed to creating a space to enable talented local people – with an
emphasis on young adults – to produce high quality public radio,
television, and on-line programming by using state-of-the-art yet
affordable technology and broadband internet. Public Studio is embarking on a two year effort to . . .
What is a collaboratory?
We are currently constructing the prototype by gathering
equipment and personnel. Eventually, the Public Studio Collaboratory will feed the growth of San Antonio’s regional information
infrastructure by creating a venue that will unearth and connect the
natural talents and gifts of San Antonio’s people.
We have assembled a prototype for a networked collaboratory
capable of producing broadcast quality television and radio together with companion web sites featuring streaming video and audio.
We are in the process of creating distributed networked teams to
demonstrate the creation of content for public television, radio and
broadband internet.
Above: Ricardo Palomares working with Public Studio’s TriCaster
Pro.
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Who are we, and who will we be?
Currently, Public Studio is staffed by volunteers who share a vision of what is possible when talented and creative people are willing
to collaborate.
The collaborating individuals and organizations include:
Pleas McNeel – Executive Producer
Bryce Milligan – Series Producer, Regional Literature
Steve Bratland – Digital Audio, Music
Tom Devine – Analog Audio and Location Manager, Music
Mary Carmen Rojas – Director of Southwest School Project
James Sanders – Videographer and Audio Specialist, Music
Debbie Walton – Webmaster
John Walton – Digital Media Editor and Technical Specialist
Our advisors include:
Michael “Aussie” Holden (NewTek), Susan Ives (San Antonio Peace
Center), Tim Jenison (NewTek), Dean McCall (SalsaNet), Dan
Skinner (Texas Public Radio), Charles Vaughn (KLRN), Ron Vojner
(Northwest Vista College), Tom Weeks (RackSpace), Paula Owen
(President, Southwest School of Art and Craft), Don White (1080,
formerly MatchFrame), Christopher Wilkins (former conductor,
San Antonio Symphony), and Dennis Medina (Special Collections,
UTSA)
SalsaNet – San Antonio’s oldest Internet organization and is the
South Central Texas Chapter of the Internet Society, a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization. It is comprised of a wide range of talent and
expertise. The SalsaNet Media Lab is assisting in the incubation of
the San Antonio Public Studio Collaboratory prototype.
Our thanks to the many people who have aided in the development of
the ideas that led to Public Studio, including especially Terry Miketen
(deceased), former Dean of the UTSA Health Science Center.
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The quality of life we will have in the future will be based on the
quality and availability of information we have . . . to make decisions . . . to consider possibilities . . . to educate our children . . . to live
our lives. As we grow in our understanding of this “information
age,” one point remains consistently true: The better the information, the more informed our decisions are; the better our access to
the creative wellsprings of all cultures, the richer our own culture
becomes. The challenge is to create a mechanism and system for the
authentic and sustaining development of quality information.
– Pleas McNeel
Current and Proposed Projects
Our first two years of projects fall under the title, “Knowing Home:
Living Here.” These projects constitute an exploration of the shape,
culture and history of the place we live.
Current projects, in production:
A Life in the Arts – A co-learning laboratory in television and
broadband network producion, featuring members of the Cultural
Alliance of San Antonio, including the Southwest School of Art and
Craft, JumpStart Performance Company, BlueStar Art Space, Bihl
Haus Gallery, Children’s Chorus of San Antonio, and Youth Orchestras of San Antonio.
Evolution of a Children’s Book – Authors Carmen Tafolla and
Sharyll Teneyuca, and illustrator Terry Ybáñez, discuss the evolution
of their book, It’s Not Fair! Emma Tenayuca’s Struggle for Justice / ¡No
Es Justo! La Lucha de Emma Tenayuca por la justicia.
Public Studio’s TriCaster
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Upcoming Projects:
A live and interactive webcast of the monthly meeting of the San
Antonio Astronomy Club to demonstrate the use of virtual meetings.
A public discussion of the emerging relations between art and technology, held at KLRN’s Studio A.
Virtual Tours
A Literary Tour of San Antonio – Visit the homes of San Antonio’s
contemporary writers, the places they have written about, the places
made famous by visiting writers of the past, including Sydney Lanier,
O. Henry, Stephen Crane, Oscar Wilde, Robert Frost, and others.
Gallery Tour of San Antonio – Visit galleries and gallery curators
as they discuss San Antonio’s artists and art scene. To be associated
with Internet conversation shows w/call-ins.
Studio Tour of San Antonio – Visit artists in their studios. To be associated with Internet conversation shows w/call-ins.
Conversations with the Community
A conversation between Mary Ann N. Guerra and Carmen Tafolla.
Four San Antonio poets – Carmen Tafolla, John Phillip Santos, Frances Treviño and Bryce Milligan – discuss the role of the San Antonio
River in their own work and in the historic literature of SA.
Archive of local oral and video personal histories – Conversations
with interesting regional persons will share their lives and life lessons. Conversations about the past and future of the neighborhoods
that make up the Alamo Area.
Showcase Series
Using the multi-camera capabilities of NewTek’s TriCaster Pro we
will produce showcase presentations of regional music, poetry, drama, and other arts events.
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Imagine
If we have a deep understanding of the place we live and the people
who live in it, we can use our resources and personal energies more
effectively. Local programming made available through public
broadcasting and on the web can become an important tool as we
create our future. Through the Internet Society, we can engage in
an even larger cultural exchange, reaching almost anywhere on the
planet. We will show them our place and they will show us theirs.
And we will learn from each other.
Public Studio will create a space to help network San Antonio’s
creative community with the intellectual, educational, and political communities, using the web as a medium of interactive communication for
Arts and Culture
Virtual Town Hall Meetings
Neighborhood and Regional “Rich Media” Masterplans
Mentoring Circles
Youth Media Projects
Health and Wellness
San Antonio Success Stories
Interactive Museums
Oral Histories
and more . . .
Christen Saenz shooting at BlueStar Art Space.
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Investment for Progressive Growth
It used to cost an arm and a leg to produce high-quality community media. Today, the marriage of radio and television with
the internet makes it possible for local people to produce local
community programming at a fraction of the cost of only a few
years ago. Public radio and television audiences have come to expect very high production standards both over the air and on the
internet – and the new generation of production equipment and
software makes this possible. We can do it. We can start at the
highest possible level. The technology is here. Working in collaboration with KSTX and KLRN, using affordable state of the art
technology we will produce quality demonstration shows and
rich web sites that will serve as training grounds for the next
generation of media crafts people. We will demonstrate how
to make radio and TV of the highest quality at the lowest price
(really inexpensive) and we will create interactive multimedia
instructional manuals, letting everyone know how we did it, so
they can do it too. We will search out the best ideas in the region and help give them form in the modern mass media. This
is where you come in. We need your help to build:
Not a School – A COLLABORATORY
A Collaboratory starts with discussion and ends with mutually
agreed-upon solutions, i.e., how we use network-rich media to
illuminate the regional planning process. Each Collaboratory
provides a place and a process where a shared vision can be transformed into mass media and shared with the public. Create several Public Studios around the region and together, everyone help
can invent the future.
Public Studio’s experimental collaboratory is designed to serve as
a model for:
• A shared (synchronous and asynchronous) interactive set of
inexpensive tools and methods for the creation and preservation
of information.
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• A decentralized, networked think tank dedicated to the development of advanced information technologies for the collaborative
solution of community issues.
• A shared adventure in the creation and distribution of information and its transformation into knowledge and understanding.
The Collaboratory will
•
Combine the power of networked computers, public databases, the Internet, public radio, and public television to create a
a “smarter” region.
•
Enhance the political decision making process by raising the
level of public dialogue to stimulate socially responsible action.
•
Network learning communities to provide an integrated
virtual workspace so that people can understand issues, provide
input, and create tools for community projects.
•
Document our collaborative process so that average citizens
can go out and do it themselves. We want them to see “how we
did it,” that is, to understand and emulate the process.
Working in collaboration with KSTX and KLRN, using affordable state of the art technology we will produce quality demonstration shows and rich media web
sites that will serve as training grounds for the next
generation of media crafts people. We will demonstrate
how to make radio and TV of the highest quality at the
lowest price (really inexpensive) and we will create interactive multimedia instructional manuals letting everyone know how we did it, so they can do it too. We
will search out the best ideas in the region and help to
give them form in the modern mass media.
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How Do We Proceed?
The Project is heuristic, meaning that we will learn what really works by doing projects. Our “formal” plans are really guides
for exploration and discovery. Public Studio volunteer organizers
have been gathering equipment and experimenting for over two
years to see what is possible. We are now ready to take the next
steps.
Year One
Gather equipment and expertise, focusing on adapting low-cost
production methodologies to the intellectual infosphere of Central Texas – allowing the regional milieu to shape the process and
content.
Access and network local educational communities so that everyone knows what production technologies are already in use and in
development. The goal is to create an environment where groups
of young people from technologically oriented communities can
interrelate with artists and communications professionals.
Train teacher teams by doing “basic” projects. Volunteer local
professionals will help guide the process.
Schedule opportunities to video tape concerts, special events and
community discussions.
Document the production process by creating “cookbooks” (“howto” video manuals) which will stream from our web sites. The
cookbooks will demonstrate how local individuals can create and
distribute their own digital mass media.
Invite professional User Groups like the Adobe/Macromedia
User Group to test the latest advances in the tools they use. We
will provide them the opportunity to test the latest software and
hardware in return for their participation in our projects.
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Year Two
Find a permanent home for the project in a downtown space
within walking distance of KLRN.
Create teams to roam the region looking for content, armed with
multi-camera, professional video equipment, ready to shoot performances, events, meetings – and then turn that footage into
high quality regional programming.
Where Are We Headed?
As the project evolves, groups of young people from the core
teams will be paid professional level wages to continue the work.
We fully expect these young people to take over all aspects of the
project. We will produce quality content and stream it from our
media portal. We will reach out to the World Wide Web, producing content anchored in creative non-violence. We will seek out
intelligent content that embodies generosity and compassion.
We will use the public radio and television models to achieve
sustainability – memberships, enhanced underwriting (advertising), concerts, grants and some revenue from the sale of
downloads and a community online arts and crafts store.
The end product? There is no single end “product,” rather an
evolutionary creative collective that will continue to benefit both
the individuals involved and the community at large.
Proposed Budget
We anticipate a start-up budget of approximately $250,000 to
cover stipends and expenses of the first experimental year of
Public Studio and its associated Collaboratories. Experiments/
demonstrations will help to create models of technologically
adept communities and generate an email list of 40,000-plus
people who are potential donor members. By the end of the first
year, a grants strategy will be in place and grants will have been
submitted.
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Stipends and Expenses
For the first year, Public Studio will be virtual – we will have
no single location, and thus no office or on-site studio expenses.
Professional-level producers, project directors, mentors and consultants will be paid no more than $35 an hour, with a cap of
$2,000 per month per individual. Interns will be paid $15 an hour.
Technicians will be paid the going rate as required.
•
•
•
$134,000 – producers, project directors, mentors and
consultants
$60,000 – Hourly craftsmen – directors, camera
persons – sound and lights – computer
graphics and games developers.
$20,000 – Communications, including high speed
internet for project members, server space for
streaming video, and rental for KLRN studios
for very large projects.
Startup Gear
•
$36,000 – Hi-def cameras, laptop
workstations, monitors, tripods,
camera dollies, lights, monitors,
and stuff we don’t yet know we
need. (We also accept donations
of production gear from the community.)
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How Can I Help?
Visit our website – www.publicstudio.us – to see how you
or your organization can become a founding member of Public
Studio.
For more information, contact Pleas McNeel at
210-826-4591 or [email protected].
Please put “Support Public Studio” in the subject line.
Above: Working with a green screen to create interviews with
background film footage. (Students from Northwest Vista College, working with Public Studio’s TriCaster Pro in lecture hall at Southwest School of
Art & Craft)
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