Improving quality of video interviews over Internet
We have a genuine problem with our video interviews feature. We cannot travel too much to get hold of people live in person. So there are two broad options to carry our video interviews remotely (given the bandwidth constraints on the Internet): either do a phone interview and ask questions on phone while the other person speaks into a webcam and later sends you link to download the video, OR do a video call over clients like ooVoo, record it and then do the necessary edits. I have been testing ooVoo and it does a good job.
The first option is understandably clumsy. The second option produces sub-standard video quality because of the limited bandwidth on the Internet. You get great video quality of your own side but the other person’s recording is grainy as usual. This is a genuine problem for which I have yet to find an answer. The only possible solution I can think of is an added feature on clients like ooVoo.
As part of this added feature that I suggest, when an ooVoo user records a call, the called party should have an option to record the call on his side as well. Upon completion of the call, ooVoo can then synchronize the two recorded video files and knock out the latency-laden parts. This would especially be a great application for Web based TV channels that can remotely do the interviews and yet achieve quality video output on their interviews. You could also be able to share such recorded video calls over your social networking sites and blogs.
Even the traditional broadcast channels won’t be able to resist such a service since it will (1) save them a lot of expenses related to bandwidth arrangements for remote interviews, and (2) the reach can be instant and extensive …. People like BBC will be able to interview any person with access to Internet without having to travel to that person or sending cameramen/anchors around.
