Venturefest South – Hybrid Event VFS21

Venturefest South is an annual innovation showcase that helps innovative businesses find support, funding and investment. As a long-time sponsor of the event, we were on hand to provide video coverage of the day.

But we needed to do things a little differently for VFS21…

Compared to previous years, a key difference in 2021 was that we live-streamed the event so that viewers could tune in from home. As Venturefest South’s first physical event following the COVID-19 pandemic, the organisers wanted to make sure that the event could reach as many people as possible, including those who might not be able to attend in-person

This approach proved to be hugely successful, with many viewers commenting on how it helped them engage with the event. Our live stream also let viewers dip in and out for the bits that interested them. Without the live stream, those people wouldn’t have engaged with the event at all and would have missed out completely.

From a production perspective, we provided two cameras and a vision mixer for the Knowledge Zone. (We used an audio and presentation feed supplied by the venue.) We also provided an additional camera and live streaming system to capture the opening talks in the atrium. These were fed wirelessly into our main vision mixer and broadcast to the stream.

Throughout the day we interspersed the live presentations with pre-recorded videos from the event sponsors. We also recorded a closing summary with VFS21 Event Director Ed Gould, which was played out at the very end of the day.

In total, we provided a seamless stream from two locations in the venue, plus pre-recorded content, for an entire day. During the event, we filmed a short case study with VFS21 Event Director Ed Gould. Ed explained why live streaming was so important for this year’s event. You can see this above.

Additionally, our Managing Director Rowan Johnson took part in a panel discussion on how the creative industry is driving innovation in the south. It was an exciting discussion which you can watch here.

If you’d like to discuss live streaming your next event or are interested in how video can benefit your business, why not get in touch?