Volicon, a Burlington, Mass.-based provider of video monitoring and logging technology, will introduce several new modules for its Observer platform at IBC2009.
Observer captures, stores and indexes broadcast content from multiple channels, offering users simultaneous, 24/7 access to video from their desktop computers. It brings new efficiencies to critical broadcast tasks such as monitoring and troubleshooting transmissions, ensuring compliance, verifying advertising broadcasts, and tracking and analyzing viewer ratings and public relations information.
At IBC, Volicon will introduce the Producer Module, an Observer option that enables broadcasters to capture and repurpose content in a variety of industry formats for outside use. Producer providers operators with an easy-to-use platform for browsing aired content that has been recorded by the Observer and searching for and retrieving the desired video segment down to the individual frame level. The module then transcodes the segment into one of the several industry-standard formats and automatically provides the output to either DVD, Web/FTP or a third party via e-mail.
Also new is the Reconciliation Report Module, a comprehensive discrepancy reporting tool that reconciles data from various sources, such as as-run logs, traffic schedules, and operator sign on/off data. It’s ideal for broadcasters who need to centralize and archive critical data and share information across different departments and facilities.
Volicon’s new Content Matching Module for Observer will also make its debut at the show. This module enables operators to flag and access specific audio cues when they appear in a broadcast. The user supplies a prerecorded segment, which is stored on a server, and whenever the audio appears in a broadcast, the system issues a “content matched” alert with a link that gives the user immediate access to the video in which the segment occurred.
The company will also introduce optional modules for Observer that promise to expand the system’s usefulness, including a module that uses logo-recognition technology to automate commercial identification and tagging in streaming and archived video; integration with video archiving software to create a comprehensive monitoring and storage system that incorporates RAID as well as robotic LTO; and Multilanguage speech-recognition technology to automate speech conversion to annotated text in real time.
Volicon will also demo Observer 5.0, offering a range of new features, including support for Surround Sound Dobly 5.1 and support of bit rates higher than 3.0 Mbps to enable improved monitoring of high-quality HD video. Also at the Volicon stand will be Observer RPM (Remote Program Monitor), Volicon’s solution for MSO’s independent cable operators, IPTV and satellite operators who need to automatically evaluate the quality of their NOC/headend and remote hubsite broadcasts from a central location; the new QoE module for Observer that provides an automated method for analyzing a video image to detect macroblocking; and the new Content Export Module, for helping broadcasters comply with the FCC’s new Form 355, a quarterly report that each station must file to demonstrate its compliance with FCC programming rules, including closed captioning.
Volicon will be in Stand 7.H35.
