How Adaptive Reuse Transformed a Hospital into a Cutting-Edge Content Studio

As with any adaptive reuse project, the former hospital posed several challenges to the project team tasked with turning it into a modern content production facility, said Peter Provost, president and director of design for Provost Studio.

Provost Studio designed the studio alongside partners Phil Widmer Designs, SH Acoustics and Innovative Environments, while Williams Blackstock Architects served as the Architect of Record, tackling the exterior and base building.

“Aside from the existing space having a big hole in it from the skylight, the space itself was adjacent to a main entry point into the campus,” explained Provost. “We were basically right up against a big thoroughfare for circulation and a pickup for large dumpsters of trash. We didn’t have the option to change where [the production studios] were located in the building, so the team’s acoustic engineer had their work cut out for them. Our broadcast video production team went on a walkthrough at the same time as the architecture and engineering team, so we understood what the challenges were from the very beginning, which ensured that we all talked about what the challenges were and solved them.”

This coordination proved to be highly valuable. The two hubs—the architecture and engineering base building team and the broadcast video production team—communicated constantly to ensure everyone was always on the same page. “Our lighting designer, while he was laying out the electrical and lighting system, we would get the electrical engineer on the call to give them loads and what to anticipate as opposed to doing it afterward or after the system had been designed,” Provost said. “That direct coordination sooner rather than later was really good.”

The high degree of coordination made the project team nimbler, which enabled them to meet the university’s three ultimate asks: flexibility, versatility and ease of setup. The new facility needed to be highly flexible to deliver multiple types of content from spaces that can be transformed quickly and easily.

“They wanted the ability to have standup presentations, do one-on-one discussions and have a desk with a laptop and an instructor with direct instruction,” explained Provost. “Previously, they were doing all that with a green screen.” Now, instructors can choose from a large or small studio, each with a control room, and choose from five studio configurations:

• One-on-one interview with a monitor
• Standup with a monitor
• Standup with a green screen
• Roundtable discussion with a platform
• Roundtable discussion without a platform

Many of the furnishings, such as walls and desks, are on casters so they can be moved out of the way easily when needed.

“They can physically transform the space like a Swiss Army knife,” Provost said.

Producing Quality Content

The three key ideas driving the design of the physical space—flexibility, versatility and ease of setup—carry through to content production. The OTIDE team can take a faculty member’s idea and help optimize the content for a video.

“A lot of times they’ll come in with PowerPoints, and our team will find B-roll or stock photos. We can put them on our green screens and immerse them in something—for example, if they’re in a history class, we can put them on the Great Wall of China,” said Lee Laska, assistant director, Creative Academic Media Services (CAMS), for the University of Alabama. “If it’s a two- to three-person interview, we can do that as well. One of the cameras they installed is a sky cam located in the lighting grid—it worked very well for overhead when we had to do a pig dissection for a biology class. We can do anything from old school physical [learning] so it can go into a virtual environment.”

Translating these traditional classroom experiences into an online environment isn’t an easy task, but the strategic use of the content studio’s technology helps keep learning fun and engaging. “Technology in general has the ability to bring the remote audience closer to the content,” Provost said. “It’s going to enable instructors to communicate in a more visual way… It brings you closer to both the instruction and the content.”

The University of Alabama has prioritized maintaining the quality of UA Online and the content production facility, which is key to its long-term success, Guenther added. Other institutions looking to improve online course quality should understand that a facility like this requires a real commitment from its parent institution.

“You’ve got to give [the facility] those resources it has to have if you really want to do it right,” Guenther said. “There needs to be a commitment to not only build a studio but maintain it and keep it on the cutting edge for the future. We’ve been fortunate to have that. I think there’s an understanding of how important it is to our courses and our program being at a high level.”

Maintaining the facility’s highly modern nature requires not only a financial commitment but a creative one too. Parent institutions and facilities teams should furnish their content studios with an eye on what’s next, enabling them to meet future needs with equipment that can facilitate multiple modes of learning.

“Don’t be afraid to be creative,” Laska urged. “Stay on top of the trends. Relate on that level, because students are very savvy, and you have to be flexible and ready to change.”