15 April 2020

COVID Hits the Events Industry Hard

I know I have been slacking on my posts here, but during normal days, I am quite busy with the Events team at Google New York, along with my continuous freelance gig for Barclays Center TV; plus having a social life!

Anyway, life has drastically changed since my last post in November... both with (another) new role for FIRST Events at Google and this whole COVID-19 chaos. 

Firstly, I began working for FIRST Events on-site at Google New York as an Event Production Technician and quickly hit the ground running with lots of hands-on training and being thrown into operating the audio-visual equipment for their live events. Our Production team runs everything from controlling multiple robotic cams and TD/video switching, coordinating presentation decks and unique Google-specific graphics, as well as all the audio from setting up microphones for presenters and live mixing the show! Additionally, we often do some post-production edits to finesse and master the final file before exporting to the client.

As Google drastically expands their New York campus, so does our Event Production team. Once the staffing model was determined for the new expanded campus buildings, the leadership decided to transfer my role down to this campus! With my knowledge in multimedia management and digital signage, my new role will revolve around creating, coordinating, monitoring, and supervising the Digital Signage and Video/LED Walls around the new campus.

Unfortunately, COVID chaos hit us hard and all of our events were cancelled/postponed or moved digital. Due to this change, my new Multimedia/Digital Signage role has been put on hold, as well as gig at Barclays Center being paused - with no in-person events happening in the arena. During this quarantine time, all of my work has become focused in video training/tutorials and online courses; most of these courses revolve around certificate programs for the on-site equipment and specific workflows ranging from our ETC lighting boards, Ross video switchers, Telemetrics/Panasonic robotic cameras, Evertz routers, Shure and Dante audio systems, plus lots of internal Google protocols!