Managing in the Media

Chapter 13

Production

13.1 Summary

An audiovisual production project follows the classically understood model of any project; it has a beginning, a middle and an end. This defines and differentiates a project from a manufacturing process. Somewhat light-heartedly people have referred to the Hollywood film and TV studios as factories, yet each programme or film within that factory still conforms to a project format.

Any activity defined as a project has the control process of quality (q), cost (c) and time (t) imposed upon it. The demands on the production manager are to keep the costs down, maintain the quality and deliver on time. In an ideal world these three elements would be independent variables, but they are interdependent.

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