Building a video production Lab - High School - Part one

Building a video production learning lab - Part one - Good Answers start with Good Questions.

This is the first part on building a video production learning Lab for high schools and colleges.
Often I get asked questions regarding building on how,what, how much, etc. I usually respond with not with answers but instead start asking questions. Here are some of the questions you should have answered, before you start.
Selecting the equipment to go in a studio is a challenge especially for high schools with limited resources and limited funding windows. Choices made today have long reaching impact on a program. A camera can cost any where between five hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Which one does the school need? Does the school need one or six cameras? How many and what type of microphones? Lights? Intercom? etc Asking a few simple questions will help narrow down the choices
1) What level of learning and what goals are there for the program. The equipment requirements are less stringent for a elective or club type program than for a vocational program.
2) What type of production scenarios are you going to be teaching? Multi camera news productions require different groups of equipment than teaching narrative film style productions. Teaching a class for students going in corporate environments requires different equipment then those expected to work in a television station. Studio cameras are optimized for the studio should stay in the studio and not used in the field and visa versa. Is the teaching going to be all studio or all field or a mix?
3) What is you budget? Really this question should be asked first since the choices are so vast a simple set up for a elementary announcement class can cost under one thousand dollars while a working professional studio can cost millions. Determining a budget up front allows every one involved to know where the limits are and where choices can be made
Once you answer these questions you can start to limit your search for equipment and other resources. In my next article I discuss the possible answers to question two an how that will affect you decisions.