“The Tonight Show with Jay Leno” has installed the Apella HDS media server from Video Technics for ingest, management, and playback of high-definition graphics with key, the company said.
The solution for NBC Universal includes an Apella HDS with one input and two output multirate HD SDI channels, a VT Studio Pro Axio LE nonlinear editor (NLE) and the VT Craft edit plug-in for Adobe Premiere Pro, tied together with a fibre-channel SAN capable of supporting real-time access to 10-bit uncompressed video and key.
The new workflow allows the show’s graphics producers to take HD content, edit on the Axio NLE and export the revised content to the Apella HDS for play-out to air with key. Content usually originates from sources using Avid’s DNxHD codec, exported in a QuickTime wrapper, edited with Premiere Pro CS3 or AfterEffects on the Matrox Axio, and then natively exported to the Apella for play-out using the VT Craft edit plug-in. The Apella HDS supports multiple formats and native codecs, and has been certified by SAN Solutions for data throughput as high as uncompressed 4:2:2:4 within their storage infrastructures.
Video Technics CEO Mark Rivers said the Apella HDS was selected by “The Tonight Show” because “It is a mature product that provides a file-based interface with most graphics production applications. The Apella HDS is affordable and flexible and can be purposed for news production, master control play-out, or graphics production with high-quality video and key.”
“The Tonight Show” previously used a Matrox DigiSuite product for many years, and the Apella HDS is compatible with the show’s library of standard-definition graphic clips.
Video Technics will be demonstrating its HD workflow at the NAB Show in Booth SU9227.
