RENNES, France—BBright and GlobalM have conducted a technical trial validating Ultra HD interoperability across the entire contribution chain in the cloud, achieving transmission bit rates above 100 Megabits per second—a rate that’s higher than typical satellite contribution paths.

In the joint trial, BBright’s Ultra HD ST 2110 encoder converted an uncompressed IP input into HEVC 4:2:2 10-bit with the highest quality profile. The stream was transmitted using the Secure Reliable Transport (SRT) protocol to the AWS cloud. There, GlobalM’s cloud transport platform provided secure routing, contribution monitoring and signal integrity across the end-to-end workflow, BBright said.

At the output, GlobalM restreamed the Ultra HD signal using SRT to a BBright decoder, which reconstructed the feed as an ST 2110 output. The result confirms the ability of both systems to operate seamlessly in an IP-native, cloud-based Ultra HD environment, the companies said.

“This end-to-end interoperability with GlobalM demonstrates the strength of ST 2110 and HEVC 4:2:2 workflows for high-bitrate Ultra HD contribution,” Guillaume Arthuis, managing director of BBright, said. “It shows that IP-based encoding and cloud transport can now match, and even exceed, traditional satellite links in terms of visual quality, latency and flexibility.”

This interoperability is opening new opportunities for customers seeking to deliver premium Ultra HD live sports coverage over IP and cloud networks. The combined solution enables rights holders and service providers to scale contribution workflows flexibly, ensuring broadcast-grade performance while reducing operational complexity and costs compared to traditional satellite or dedicated fiber infrastructures, the companies said.

“Partnering with BBright illustrates how broadcast-quality encoding and professional cloud contribution can converge,” GlobalM Global Sales Manager George Bery said. “This collaboration validates a new generation of interoperable, IP-based workflows capable of transporting Ultra HD content securely and efficiently in the cloud.”

More information is available on the BBright and GlobalM websites.

Media production is currently undergoing an enormous transformation. Technology is advancing, and cables and connectors are rapidly being replaced by cloud-based solutions. While some media organizations prefer an end-to-end approach, many are instead choosing to use separate vendor solutions for each segment of the workflow. 

Increasingly, companies need flexibility, rather than solutions or services that are proprietary or place rigid definitions on how assets are processed. The availability of solutions that focus on very specific parts of the content supply chain, offer more choice and control over how companies operate. However, if media workflows are compartmentalized in this way, it is critical that solutions do not move into silos, and that all component parts of the workflow interconnect seamlessly. 

Many Parts Make a Whole
We’re living in an age of optimization. So, it is incredibly important that each stage of the media workflow, from production, to ingest, to post-production, and right through to distribution, all operate effectively. This is why many organizations are now choosing to move away from end-to-end solutions, in favor of customizable workflows made up of component parts that are best suited to a specific task. 

Alongside the crucial requirement for each link in the chain to be operating as well as it can be, there is also an overriding need for integration. It is great to take an à la carte approach, but that cannot be at the expense of interoperability – no part of the workflow should be isolated. 

The ingest process is a prime example of how an individual workflow segment significantly impacts the subsequent stages. Ingest is a core component of the media workflow, without it, content does not get from camera to consumer. An effective ingest process makes it quick and easy to ingest raw footage, ready for editing and distribution. It is critical that the quality of the content is preserved and that the content is ingested in full, with no gaps. 

The role of ingest does not end there. A good ingest process can help the rest of the workflow run smoothly and efficiently. For example, if during production the footage can be recorded directly to shared storage, editors can gain access immediately. This prevents subsequent delays to the post-production schedule, as each workflow follows on seamlessly from the next. This way of working enables both master camera record and proxy record, to be undertaken concurrently, so users can access whichever file suits their requirements.

When best practice for content ingest is followed, all of the required media is captured and stored with the appropriate metadata. If the proxies are created at the same time as the master camera record, the files can be tagged with consistent metadata, which avoids confusion. 

This makes it easier for media companies to manage and quickly locate assets later on. A good ingest process will also ensure that assets are organized well from the start. Doing this prevents media businesses from having to structure assets retrospectively, which is time consuming and inefficient. 

API is the Language of Interoperability
When taking an à la carte approach, all components of a media workflow need to connect together seamlessly, through an Application Programming Interface (API). The API enables interaction between solutions, so they can communicate and understand specific requests. 

An API also enables resources and information to be shared, without compromising security, control, and authentication. However, not all APIs are the same. Some may seem comprehensive on the surface, but actually, when you look closer, they are incomplete or incompatible. Other APIs may be complete but not have the required documentation. The difference in quality between APIs can be significant.

For a solution to be fully interoperable and easy to integrate, the API needs to be high-quality, customizable, fully comprehensive, and come with all the right documentation. A flexible API will allow media organizations to deploy a solution in a way that suits them. 

So, how can media organizations ensure they implement a solution with a great API? For effective integration, solutions need a well-constructed RESTful API.  For an API to qualify as a RESTful, it must meet specific architectural requirements. This makes RESTful APIs scalable, faster, more lightweight, and easier to use than a prescribed protocol with restrictive requirements.   

With media organizations increasingly moving operations to the cloud, interoperability is only going to become more important. An issue with API quality has the potential to make or break a workflow. We’re now at the point where companies need to be able to drop a product into their ecosystem, knowing that it will meet their requirements, with minimum effort. 

To achieve this, solutions need to excel at the job they are designed for, and at the same time, offer a fully customizable RESTful API for simple integration. No media solution is an island, so we need interoperability across production and post-production workflows to future-proof our industry.

As more and more broadcasters and video content providers adopt or consider adopting IP for transporting content, the need for a reliable, interoperable transport solution is becoming ever more clear. Broadcast workflows have become increasingly complex over time in part because of the many media businesses vendors involved in the entire media supply chain, and also because not all products and workflows are capable of operating together. 

While the issue of interoperability can be problematic at all stages of the broadcast workflow, the problem is particularly apparent when it comes to transporting content. The actual physical process of sending content from content provider to broadcaster or affiliate is often not straightforward. Different encoders and decoders operating with incompatible transport protocols cause real problems in the industry. 

Industry response
A group of industry experts developed the Reliable Internet Stream Transport (RIST) protocol in 2018, in response to this problem. RIST is an open-source, open-specification transport protocol designed for transporting broadcast grade video over the Internet, while ensuring reliability and security. With the intention of developing a cross industry interoperable standard, any organization can download the protocol information and develop compliant solutions that can be incorporated into their own products at no cost and very few restrictions. 

RIST has been on the scene for several years now, so it seems timely that the RIST Forum, created to drive the adoption of RIST, has recently carried out a survey of media and broadcast professionals across the globe to understand how RIST is being used in practice across the industry.

RIST uses in the real world
Of the media and broadcast professionals surveyed, approximately half confirmed that they were currently using RIST at the time of the survey. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the main users of RIST were fibre and IP network operators, and television broadcasters. The survey highlighted that the protocol is also being used, albeit to a lesser extent, by sports rights owners, teleport owners, by systems integrators and during the video and TV production process.  

The protocol is not being used in isolation; more often than not, it is being used alongside multiple transport protocols such as SRT, RTP, UDP and RTMP. This highlights the fact that RIST can, and is being, combined with other protocols to address the limitations of said protocols. 

According to the survey responses, RIST is being used in a wide range of use cases, from streaming a 24/7 news channel, for content contribution and distribution, as part of cloud-based workflows, and as a backup for contribution delivered by other means. 

Interoperability is critical
With so many different solutions on the market for each stage in the broadcast workflow, all with different price points and functionality, content owners and media companies want to be able to choose the product that best fits the type and value of the content, as well as their operation and business needs.

This preference for an a-la-carte approach to technology puts interoperability right at the top of the list in terms of priority. This is evident in the findings of the survey with 91% of broadcasters surveyed citing multi-vendor interoperability as a key factor when choosing which protocol to use.  

Other considerations when choosing which protocol
As broadcasters operate in an increasingly competitive market, the ability to deliver a reliable and efficient service is paramount. It is no surprise then that alongside interoperability being a key factor when choosing which protocol to use, the broadcasters surveyed stated that seamless redundancy and availability was the next most important consideration, followed by ease of use, then ability of the protocol to operate in degraded networks. 

Increased demand for content
Consumer demand for content, in various formats, appears to be increasing exponentially and supplying this demand is in itself a challenge for the industry. The Internet is an economically viable and flexible medium for transporting content and this makes it sometimes preferable over traditional methods of transfer. 

The Internet as a transport method has proven that it has an important role to play in today’s diverse broadcast industry. Media organizations and broadcasters need interoperability between vendor solutions in order to work efficiently so that they can meet the seemingly insatiable demand for content. 

The (bumpy) road to interoperability
Since the industry started transitioning to using the Internet as a contribution mechanism, much has been penned about the importance of interoperability. While it would be hard to find someone in the industry that didn’t think it was vital, it is harder still to create the perfect conditions for interoperability to exist. Interoperability, by its very nature, requires a level of partnership working and, that can be difficult to achieve in a competitive commercial environment. 

Technology companies naturally want to recoup maximum return on their R&D investments and that can mean making a solution proprietary. The industry-wide journey towards IP in general is set to continue so the importance of interoperability is only going to grow. In order to get the right level of cooperation and open communication to have full interoperability, we need to have a more partnership-led approach involving industry experts working together towards a common goal.

HEBDEN BRIDGE, U.K.—The Joint Task Force on Networked Media (JT-NM) has given Calrec passing marks on its IP interoperability testing and is including the company in its JT-NM Tested Catalog, published last month at IBC 2019 in Amsterdam.

“What the JT-NM is doing—backed by VSF, SMPTE, AMWA and the EBU—is tremendously important in terms of continuing the push to true IP interoperability,” says Pete Walker, senior product manager at Calrec.

“It includes NMOS, which we believe is vital as a standardized mechanism for not only discovery/advertisement of IP technologies connected to a network alongside IP streams, but also connection management from a centralized point.”

The JT-NM’s interoperability testing exams how technologies work together and adhere to SMPTE standards.

Calrec participated in JT-NM testing in August. The company’s products were tested for SMPTE ST2110 and ST2022-7 interoperability.

More information is available on the Calrec website. 

The transition to IP-based media production and transport in our industry is the most transformative development since the move to digital. Internet protocol will lay the foundation for a revolutionary process that will enable faster, more flexible production and a much wider and more diverse array of services and programming.

But in the fast pace world of high-tech, the transition for IP-based video transport within the broadcast community has been slow and, for better or worse, some vendors are moving forward with their own networking protocols. Our industry looks to SMPTE (and related groups, such as AES and VSF) for the standards to guide this transition forward, and while the group is making great progress towards a standard, organizations such as the Alliance for IP Media Solutions (AIMS) are helping to corral manufacturers, media companies and the various alphabet soup of standards bodies towards a future where interoperability will break down the proprietary barriers that have characterized so much of our industry’s history. Less than a year old, AIMS has already attracted more than 50 members, including its founding members Imagine Communications and Grass Valley. (Check out our story, “The Ground Level View of IP-Based Media Transport”)

At the 2016 IBC Show, we saw the latest developments in these efforts with the IBC IP Interoperability Zone, sponsored by AIMS and the IABM and showcasing the work of the JT-NM (the Joint Task Force on Networked Media, a combined initiative of AMWA, EBU, SMPTE and VSF), and the AES on a common roadmap for IP interoperability. The zone included a live production studio, based on the technologies of the JT-NM roadmap that Belgian broadcaster VRT has been using daily on-air since last summer as part of the LiveIP project, a collaboration between VRT, the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and LiveIP’s 12 technology partners.

After the show, I spoke with Mike Cronk, vice president of core technology for Grass Valley and the chairman of the board for AIMS about reaction to the zone. “People were saying, ‘wow, this stuff works,” he said. “There was the live IP demonstration people were doing real television with it. People said, ‘OK, now I see things coming together. I’m going to think more about IP.’”

Cronk said that, in addition to promoting interoperability in the IP world, the main goal for AIMS now is to support the adoption and completion of the SMPTE-2110 transport protocol which will provide the foundation for that interoperability. But he added that AIMS is also helping to fill in the some of the gaps during the standards process.

“I think AIMS has helped bring some unity,” he said. “The good people at SMPTE would’ve still been working probably on the same thing. AIMS can’t claim credit for that at all. We’re just one other piece of the puzzle.”