How do I contact Westlake Village Studios?
For specific inquiries not answered on the website, feel free to contact us via email or by phone.
Westlake Village Studios
2 Dole Drive
Westlake Village, CA 91362
Phone: (818) 597-4000
Email: info@wlvstudios.com
Questions can also be submitted via the website inquiry form.
What sets Westlake Village Studios apart from other production studios?
First of all, while other studios are upgrading their existing standard definition (SD) facilities with high definition (HD) capabilities, the Studio was designed and built from the ground up with the latest in HD video production and 5.1 surround sound audio. All rooms within the facility have been specifically designed to support these technologies and will provide the creative, production and operational staffs with un-matched opportunities towards original program and media development.
Secondly, The Studio is located on the Four Seasons Hotel and Spa / California Health and Longevity Institute complex which provide luxurious 5-star accommodations and unmatched health, wellness and medical programs. See www.fourseasons.com/westlake and www.chli.com
In addition, the complex and the surrounding gardens can serve as remote production locations, as there are 28 remote “plug-in” locations throughout the hotel, spa, medical center, gardens, and convention center. A remote Audio and Video system can connect via fiber optics to the control rooms and central equipment room to facilitate all routing, monitoring, communications, and production capabilities. The 15,000 sq. ft. Convention Center ballroom in itself can serve as a full function HD production “studio” as lighting rigging and dimmer functionality is incorporated into the floor space.
The Studio has implemented a high capacity video storage environment to facilitate “tape-less” video file storage, ingest and post production workflow. With the integration of enterprise servers, storage solution, software and services the Studio can eliminate videotape entirely to create an end-to-end digital media workflow and delivery solution with the following capabilities:
- Integration with Final Cut Pro
- Ingest with automatic proxy generation
- Video production automation
- Media asset management
- Workflow management
- Apple-based broadcast video server with VDCP support
- Cut-only editing
- Cross platform support for Mac OS and Windows
- High speed fiber channel infrastructure
- High-end and entry-level master control playout automation
- Archival integration
What is High Definition Television?
HDTV broadcast systems are defined threefold, by:
- The number of lines in the vertical display resolution, which is simply the physical number of columns and rows of pixels (fixed picture-elements) creating the display. (e.g., 1280 rows x 1080 columns for a typical HD 1080i display)Televisions are of the following resolutions:SDTV: 480i (NTSC, 720×480 split into two 240-line fields)
SDTV: 576i (PAL, 720×576 split into two 288-line fields)
EDTV: 480p (NTSC, 720×480)
HDTV: 720p (1280×720)
HDTV: 1080i (1280×1080, 1440×1080, or 1920×1080 split into two 540-line fields)
HDTV: 1080p (1920×1080 progressive scan)
- The scanning system: progressive scanning (p) or interlaced scanning (i). Progressive scanning simply draws a complete image frame (all the lines) per image refresh, whereas interlaced scanning draws a partial image field (every second line) during a first pass, then fills-in the remaining lines during a second pass, per image refresh. Interlaced scanning requires significantly lower signal/data bandwidth, but an interlaced signal loses half of the vertical resolution and suffers “combing” artifacts when showing a moving subject on a progressive display (although the worst effects can be mitigated by suitable image post-processing known as ‘deinterlacing’). As some compensation, however, interlaced mode provides finer time-sampling, giving two (half-resolution) image samples in the same time interval as one (full-resolution) image sample in progressive mode.
- The number of frames per second or fields per second.The 720p60 format is 1280 x 720 pixels progressive scanning with 60 fields per second (120 Hz). The 1080i50 format is 1920 x 1080 pixels (ie 2 MP) interlaced scanning with 50 fields per second. Sometimes interlaced fields are called half-frames, but they are not, because two fields of one frame are temporally shifted. Frame pulldown and segmented frames are special techniques that allow transmitting full frames via an interlaced video stream.For commercial naming of the product, either the frame rate or the field rate is often dropped, e.g. a “1080i television set” label indicates only the image resolution.[10] Often, the rate is inferred from the context, usually assumed to be either 50 or 60 Hz, except for 1080p, which denotes 1080p24, 1080p25, and 1080p30, but may include 1080p50 and 1080p60 in the future.
A frame or field rate can also be specified without a resolution. For example 24p means 24 progressive scan frames per second, and 50i means 25 interlaced frames per second consisting of 50 interlaced fields per second. Most HDTV systems support some standard resolutions and frame or field rates. The most common are noted below.
What is Standard Definition?
Standard Definition usually refers to 480 vertical lines of resolution or more. At the least, HDTV has twice the linear resolution of standard-definition television (SDTV), thus showing greater detail than either analog television or regular DVD.
The overall advantages of HDTV over SDTV are that High-definition television (HDTV) yields a better-quality image than standard television does, because it has a greater number of lines of resolution. The visual information is some 2-5 times sharper because the gaps between the scan lines are narrower or invisible to the naked eye.
What is 5.1 surround sound?
HDTV is capable of “theater-quality” audio because it uses the Dolby Digital (AC-3) format to support “5.1″ surround sound, which applies multichannel technology to encircle the audience (left-surround, right-surround, back-surround), as opposed to “screen channels” (center, [front] left, and [front] right), i.e. ca. 360° horizontal plane, 2D). 5.1 Channel Surround delivers six audio channels from a six channel source: Four channels for speakers at the front-left (L), left center (LC), right center (RC), and right (R); One channel for speaker at the center-center (C); One channel for surround speaker at the rear-monaural surround (S).
Who should I contact with questions regarding use of the studio facilities?
For questions about using the Westlake Village Studios facilities, please contact Gene Warshawsky, VP and General Manager at (818) 597-4009. Also you can use the “Contact” link on this website to fill out the inquiry form and we will properly direct your questions. If you have other questions, you can e-mail us at info@wlvstudios.com.
