I started in the 60's, whilst in my very late teens, lighting for night clubs to pay my way through college, in the days before university was available to every one. I qualified with a full tech in telecoms and went on to get a diploma in studio technical operations and engineering.
My break came by being accepted by the BBC as a junior cameraman, in the days when a cameraman also had to have some technical knowledge. After a couple of years I bent the system and was promoted to a vision control assistant, the CCU end of up to 6 cameras, nothing was auto and matching cameras was a full time job during live TXs. I answered to the vision control supervisor, whom operated the lighting consol and in turn he (no women then) answered to the TM1 (known today as a Lighting Director).
Then in the early 80's video effects for TV was in its infancy, film had been using effects for decades. The BBC developed a system called CSO (colour separation overlay) which was developed further by ultimate and referred to as Chroma Key (known today as green screen though it started using a blue screen due to the engineering limitations of the TV signal). I was lucky to be one of the pioneers and become a Video Effects Supervisor, we built our kit from boxes of electronic trickery, such as the Quantel 5000 and the Ampex ADO, and programmed genlockable computers to perform bespoke effects for TV programmes.
I worked on a number of top BBC programmes including \"Kenny Everet\", \"The Two Ronnies\", \"Kick up the Eighties\", \"Three of a Kind\", \"Dave Allen\", \"Rent-a-Ghost\" and some of the original Dr Who, (this was normally Dave Chapman's show).
Eventually I was rewarded for all my work by being promoted to Technical Manager 2 retitled later as Technical Coordinator (so the Beeb could appear to the government of the day to have reduced the number of managers). In those days this was one of the top studio technical operations job (along with TM1 / lighting director and sound supervisor), any higher was pure office based management. As technical manager, I had the chance to study for professional management qualifications, with the BBC sponsoring the cost. Whilst a Technical Manager I worked on shows including \"Fools & Horses\", \"Just Good Friends\", \"East Ender’s\", \"Children’s BBC\", \"National Lottery Live\", \"Special Events for News and Current Affairs Dept.\", \"Going Live\", \"Budgets & General Elections\".
In the latter years I was permanently working on Children's BBC and as such was also responsible for lighting the studio, to save cost they didn't have a TM1. I became a member of the Society of Television Lighting and Design (STLD) a registered British Professional Institution.
In 1996 I was made redundant from the BBC, the TV bubble had burst, the golden days were over and the BBC was preparing to move to Salford Quays selling TV Centre in London for a luxury housing development. TV jobs were hard to find so I worked for a time in IT, supporting Seagate Technologies Backup Exec for NT software. This is were I learnt about IT networks which later helped me to adapt to video and audio over IT and I climbed the ladder again.
In 1997 Quest Technical services approached me to work on part of the Covent Garden refit and a Broadcast project for Barclays Capital, from there I was poached by Marcom Systems, then one of the UKs largest integrators. I worked on government broadcast and encrypted video communication systems, including video conferencing. Marcom eventually merged with a large Norwegian company called Impact Europe and the name changed to Impact Marcom. In 2009 the group globally became Impact and all the separate divisional names also became Impact.
My role within Impact was as a System Design Consultant / Project Manager, within the UK. I worked on secure communications, such as Broadcast and video conferencing. I was also involved in secure content distribution and designed and commissioned two of the largest TV / media distribution systems using Cabletime Pro Hubs and Evolution IP products, the rest of the time I work on command and control centres.
In 2010 after Impact lost the MoD contract I was considering retirement when I was approached by the Electrosonic Group to join them and help the BDM build up its 'Command and Control Room Solutions' division within the UK. This was a challenge I accepted. I worked for the Electrosonic Group within the 'Command and Control Room Solutions' division designing and integrating Audio Visual, IT and communications systems for the intelligence / national security sector in the UK, USA and NATO, for both military and police.
In January of 2011 I was asked to join the Professional Education and Training Committee (PECT) of Infocomm (now AVIXA), which I accepted and remained a committee member for 2 years, declining the third year as I was planning to retire.
Then in 2013 I decided to retire from full time work and to spend time preparing professional papers and working part time as freelance designer / consultant, through the Electrosonic Group.
In addition to engineering and management qualifications I have certification from CESG for Tempest design and have held British MoD SDA/IDA (JSP480) status, and security clearance for most British and NATO departments. I have held technical partner status with Tandberg (now a division of Cisco) and have attended accredited designer courses with most of the major AV product manufacturer's. I am a member of several professional bodies including AVIXA, having passed the Certified Technology Specialist (CTS) exams (ANSI regulated and accredited), and a retired member of the 'Society of Television Lighting and Design' (STLD).
Whilst working for Impact and in conjunction with Sony I presented a number of seminars on HD design and integration for commercial audio visual installations and I used to regularly produce white papers for clients internal use, on Broadcast and AV.
I practice what I preach, my home is all controlled over IP.
The phone system is SIP. I originally used an IP04 asterisk PABX and registration server, with firmware that I had modified to included the ability to route cold callers to an IVR. In 2017 I upgraded this system, now using a Grandstream UCM SIP PABX, in order to fully integrate with my phones, which have always been Grandstream, and other Unified Communications equipment.
I have a video on demand system, storing all my DVD's/BluRays and videos on an 30 Terabyte (RAID 5) Media Server (expandable to 120Terabyte), then using HD hardware decoders (Win11 TV boxes running Kodi) in the cinema and living rooms with Android Media Boxes in other rooms.
All my audio is also stored on the Media Server (running i-tunes server, squezecentre and a DLNA/UPnP server), together with internet radio it is streamed to Squeeze box decoders and the Win11 / Android TV boxes.
Just for good measure i have a mix of IP and AHD security cameras and I can view them from anyware with an internet connection. The systems are controlled with a mix of protocols running over IP and a bespoke controller. I use a SMB Cisco gateway/router and firewall to connect to the Internet, running multiple VLAN’s to separate the differing home systems and increase security between devices. I have a registered FQDN internet domain for VPN access, as well as this hosted domain.