How the Fox Business DataWizard works

Tom Butts of TV Technology writes Wednesday about the DataWizard, a wall on the Fox Business Network set that brings up business data at the touch.

Butts writes, “According to Ray Lambiase, vice president of graphics for FBN, the displays are used by reporters Liz Claman, Sandra Smith and several other FBN reporters during various times in the afternoons when the markets are open. But it’s what goes into the displays that are key to the network’s efforts to improve viewers’ market knowledge.

“The ‘secret sauce,’ so to speak, is the scripting developed by FBN Senior Applications Specialist Brian Aruti, that, when integrated with the Viz 3.0 rendering engine, allows FBN to parse its market data feed from Thomson in real time to the touchscreen displays. ‘We came up with a concept that makes it possible to take all the data and aggregate it into a single application that would allow talent to access a wide variety of information at any one moment, depending on what the news of the day was,’ Lambiase said.

“Lambiase adds that the new feature changed nothing from a workflow standpoint. ‘The big difference is the talent,’ he said. ‘Because now they can drive these charts and information as they speak and react to it in real-time as it’s changing right in front of them.’

“During the 3-4 minute segments, reporters open with an overview of the market, but it’s after that the fun begins, according to Lambiase. ‘Your first fork in the road is you can just talk about how the Dow is doing,’ he said. ‘And then you can drill down into any market and within each market, look at how the leaders are doing, who the laggards are, so you can literally share the experience with the viewer in that you’re seeing it along with the viewer for the first time.'”

Read more here.