NEWARK, NJ—Panasonic Video and Audio Systems North America has announced a partnership with NEP Group, integrating Panasonic’s Kairos IP live production system with NEP’s recently announced NEP Platform, a new software orchestration system.

The companies said the integration enables media companies and live events service providers to deploy flexible and scalable production workflows that bridge traditional and IP-native infrastructure without vendor lock-in.

“Media, broadcast, and streaming companies are rapidly shifting to software-defined, IP-based production architecture. Operators face mounting pressure to reduce infrastructure footprint, increase workflow agility, and support hybrid cloud–on-premises models without compromising the frame-accurate reliability live production requires,” said Steve Milley, Vice President, Professional Video and Audio Systems at Panasonic. “Our partnership with NEP marks a meaningful step forward for Kairos’ open-platform vision, giving customers a clear, validated path to IP. With flexible, scalable workflows, Kairos is designed to eliminate the integration challenges that have slowed adoption of software-defined production.”

NEP Platform allows broadcasters to customize and optimize their production environment, saving valuable time and resources. By achieving certified interoperability with Kairos, the two platforms share a unified control and data plane that allows operators to dynamically allocate production resources, trigger Kairos' multiviewer and production switching events, and synchronize metadata from a single interface.

The integration between Panasonic and NEP delivers operational advantages for production teams by streamlining control, scaling flexibility, and reducing deployment time, according to the companies. Operators can manage Kairos production switching, NEP routing, and resource orchestration through a single unified interface, eliminating the need for constant context switching. Additionally, the pre-validated integration was created to significantly reduce system commissioning time, with the goal of a faster, more efficient deployment.

“Through our ongoing partnership with Panasonic, we've been able to bring together best-in-class technologies into a unified, software-driven ecosystem,” said Dan Murphy, VP of NEP Platform. “Integrating NEP Platform with Kairos demonstrates how open, standards-based innovation can simplify complex workflows and deliver the performance and reliability live production demands.”

The collaboration builds on Kairos’ open architecture and established use across broadcast and live production environments worldwide. The platform exposes fully documented APIs through the Kairos Alliance Partners program, enabling third-party integrations and interoperability. Built on standards including SMPTE ST 2110 and NMOS, Kairos supports true software-defined workflows without legacy SDI constraints. The platform also aligns sustainability goals through its COTS-based, software-first approach, designed to reduce power consumption and physical infrastructure requirements.

The companies will showcase a joint demonstration at NAB Show 2026 in Las Vegas from April 19-22 at Panasonic’s booth (#C3509).

The benefit in using IP for live production give broadcasters far more scalability and flexible workflows. But the transition to IP doesn't come without a price. Interoperability, security and cost continue to be among the biggest hurdles. In our latest guide to IP, we take a closer look at how the industry has adopted an IP-based approach over the past decade and how vendors have responded to advances in the technology, particularly in the areas of security, monitoring, control and audio.

Download the Guide here.

With so many alternatives available when it comes to leveraging IP production transport and contribution, deciding on which path to take can feel a bit overwhelming.

Not only are there numerous technical and video quality issues to keep in mind but non-technical factors that in most situations will play an even greater role in which way a media organization ultimately chooses to go.

Money, Money, Money

If money were no object, making decisions about the best IP transport around which to build a video production network would be rather simple. With unlimited funds, bandwidth isn’t really an issue, so why even compress video? Ditto for network management. If money were not an issue, organizations could simply throw more IT personnel at network hiccups, Precision Time Protocol (PTP) clock setup and synchronization maintenance, orchestration and the like.

But for most media organizations most of the time, money is a major factor—whether it’s the revenue-generating potential of the event covered or the production budget associated with those potential earnings.

That’s why those producing the few events at the pinnacle of live television production with massive advertising revenue to support the biggest production budgets, like the Olympics or World Cup, may choose to move uncompressed 1080p HD or even 4K UHD across their SMPTE ST 2110-based production network while a small- to medium-sized TV station with limited financial resources may decide on an NDI network moving an AVC or HEVC compressed video.

As the term implies, “uncompressed” in effect means “untouched.” No effort has been made to reduce the amount of data required. AVC or HEVC on the other hand apply a good deal of compression to reduce the amount of data that must move across the network. So, how much data?

By way of comparison, an uncompressed 1080p 60 HD signal translates into 3000 Megabits per second (or 3Gigabits per second). The same signal compressed using the HEVC codec ranges from 3.5 to 15Mbps, but a nice midpoint is about 10Mbps. Clearly, the bandwidth needed for the latter is far less.

Between these two extremes there are a number of other alternatives, such as IPMX and Dante AV when it comes to IP transport protocols, and JPEG XS and JPEG 2000 when it comes to codecs. Each changes the equation, not simply in terms of how much network bandwidth is necessary but also when it comes to many other technical and non-technical factors, such as latency, workflow, network management and where production personnel will be located.

On top of these decisions, it’s necessary to take on a similar balancing act to select the IP contribution link that best meets a media organization’s needs.

Ross Video has published a new white paper, “How to Select the Right IP Transport,” which examines these and other considerations Media & Entertainment Industry organizations should think about before making a decision about which alternatives best suit their individual needs.

This examination does not seek to recommend one alternative over another but rather to equip readers with the knowledge and background they will need to assess their organization’s requirements and evaluate various options.

Click here to read this new white paper.

Video over IP, in the sense that’s used in film and television, sometimes feels like a newer idea than it really is. That might be because the high-end, uncompressed ST 2110 standard took a while to finalize, or because of its rather forward-looking demands on IT infrastructure, both of which made a quick uptake less feasible than many might have preferred. The compressed alternatives might be a reaction to that—but alternatives inevitably mean choices with profound implications.

“I think the original promise was that if you go IP, you save money” says Axel Kern, senior director, Cloud and Infrastructure Solutions at Lawo. “Pretty quickly the industry confirmed the opposite. Investing in switches is definitely not saving you money [and] you have to deal with the complexity and abstraction of IP.”

More Options Now Available
With that in mind, Kern contends, considering ST 2110 to be a direct replacement for SDI is missing the point. “That wasn’t the original promise—it [offers] higher agility and significantly higher flexibility of doing things. Now, with IBC 2024 coming, there are many options where you can really see flexibility that’s not possible on an SDI backbone.”

Kern suggests that the circumstances of specific installations tend to suggest an approach. “if you’re a truck owner, there is a decision between baseband and IP. If you’re a facility, you have this option to go IP and if it’s a ‘brownfield’ approach, where you take part of your facility… brownfield would allow you to go IP and test it out. Greenfield approaches would go IP full stop. The other topic you have to consider is how much of the gear you’re putting in your truck can be found with purely SDI capabilities.”

Somewhat-compressed alternatives allow facilities to sidestep the need for extremely expensive networks, as Kern says. “We see this when people use NDI or even SRT [Secure Reliable Transport] over the wild internet to connect facilities and do remote production,” he said. “This is the logical consequence of things like NDI, which are still high quality but for a fraction of the bandwidth.”

Involving the public internet makes cloud resources more available, though there’s recently been caution over the sheer bandwidth of video in circumstances where cloud providers charge per unit data leaving the network.

“The egress costs on cloud are sometimes outweighing the inventory cost you would have going your own way,” Kern adds. “Doing a like-for-like in the cloud is not the way forward. What we look for is whether we can make use of the technology the cloud brings us, microservices and software-as-a-service applications which you can spin up on commercial, off the shelf IT gear.”

“We introduced video over IP a long, long, long time before it became a standard,” says Edgar Shane, general manager, Engineering and Product Development for JVC. “We integrated [it] into video cameras well before the infrastructure was ready. Most of the stuff I see on a daily basis today is stuff we’ve been doing for years.”

JVC’s Connected Cam architecture handles video at modest bandwidths, making wireless and public networks a plausible alternative to costlier modes of transport. The software-definability of the camera’s encoder also offered a degree of future-proofing.

“It used to be that you had to have your camera and an IP encoder separately,” Shane says. “So, we integrated IP encoders into the cameras… enabling NDI in those cameras is easy, because we already have the encoder built in. On our cameras today you can select NDI or SRT, which is still needed when you send video over the internet.”

The explosive success of NDI might suggest an industry still cautious about the bandwidth demands of ST 2110, though Shane is clear about the different intent. “[2110] is pretty demanding of IP infrastructure,” he said. “You need to have minimum latency and precise switching… but it’s for a different audience. If you’re routing the whole house for broadcast it absolutely makes sense.”

At the higher end, though, even NDI can begin to demand more than an average office network. “NDI exists in two formats,” Shane says. “There’s full NDI, which is 180 Mbps, then there’s NDI HX2 and HX3 which is only 20-30 Mbps. This is important because customers are using standard gigabit Ethernet and people are saying they can have several cameras. [But ] for full NDI, people are putting in 10-gigabit networks.”

Economies of scale in the IT market seem likely to make ST 2110 steadily easier. But as Shane relates, the brute force approach of more bandwidth is just one solution in a world with ever more CPU horsepower.

“Cameras evolve,” Shane says. “The front end with the lens and sensor evolves less because it’s traditional. Newer sensors have more sensitivity and 4K and beyond, but we’re exploring better codecs. HEVC allows us to send video with lower bitrate and higher quality. We’re also exploring AI, because our latest PTZ cameras feature object tracking. They can recognize human beings and you can select which person out of three, four, five people.”

Sony, too, describes a combined approach. “In broad strokes, IP and 2110 have become pretty common within broadcast, live production,” says Deon LeCointe, director of Networked Solutions at Sony Electronics’ Imaging Products & Solutions. “And that’s not just 2110—we find a lot of our customers are using 2110, NDI... some people have started using SRT.”

LeCointe concurs that costs remain a bugbear at the high end. “From where I sit, 2110 is being sold as a premium over SDI. SDI has been around for decades. The cost to build the chips is lower, the cost to build a product that can support 2110 is higher.” Even so, he predicts, the finances seem likely to ease naturally. “The cost of COTS equipment is coming down… we’re in a space that moves forward much faster than the broadcast industry does.”

“What’s new,” LeCointe says, “is people focusing on how to leverage IP. We can add 5G live production, private 5G or even in the future public IP… there’s a potential for 5G to be leveraged by smaller networks and vendors as well to get from camera to a control room to a broadcast head end.”

Sony’s approach combines purpose-built hardware with software-based solutions—something video over IP was always intended to facilitate. “From a hardware perspective,” LeCointe concludes, “cameras, switchers, and monitors all have 2110. We have been really pushing the envelope on 5G, we introduced our new RPU-7 with the NXL-ME80, which is a little box that can do eight channels of video. Nevion is a software solution that has visibility across your entire media environment, to ensure that media flows get from sources to their destinations.”

Craig Heffernan, UK technical sales director, describes a considered approach. “We looked at how everything had settled in the IP market… and decided that 2110 was the route we wanted to go, in comparison to NDI or an alternative. It lets us do what we do best, which is to put some customization into it. We can have Blackmagic connected technologies but also be open enough to bring in third parties.”

The company’s key innovation is a codec that handles high-resolution, high-frame-rate material on 10-gigabit networks. “We’re compliant in terms of how 2110 works, but within that is the Blackmagic IP10 codec, which for us replaces TICO… we needed to get 2160p at 50 and 60 frames into a 10-gigabit space, with headroom. We wanted it to be entirely lossless and we wanted to keep the Ethernet network costs down.”

Attractive as that is, the advantage of IP has often been manufacturer agnosticism. Heffernan assures us that the company intends to make IP10 a standard. “We’ve released the whitepaper. The nature of the world is we’re happy to be part of the portfolio but we’re not everything to everyone. We want to create a network of OEM and developer support so the interaction between Blackmagic and non-Blackmagic is there for the customer. It’s being discussed with SMPTE.”

Blackmagic’s approach summarizes the ambitions of the industry: Economies of scale are making video over IP more affordable. Task-specific hardware seem on the way out. Flexibility is a watchword.

“Our cameras’ ability to stream back to control via SRT means we get a high quality, reliable connection into the bonded 5G at very low latency and very high quality,” Heffernan concludes. “The cost of satcom, private uplinks and all of those environments could be done away with.” Video over IP, in all its forms, is probably closer than ever to fulfilling its promise. “It’s quicker to deploy, faster to set up, easier to manage.”

MONTREAL—Bahrain TV, the state broadcaster for the Kingdom of Bahrain, has launched the Middle East’s first broadcast IP playout system, enabled by Grass Valley, the company announced today.

Grass Valley worked closely with its Diamond Partner in the region, systems integration leader First Gulf Company (FGC), to redesign Bahrain TV’s new highly complex live IP video production environment. As part of the modernization project, Grass Valley and FGC converted Bahrain TV’s master control suite, making it the first broadcast facility in the region to implement an IP playout system.

A prime source for news and information across Bahrain, Bahrain TV also upgraded its main live news studio with best-in-class IP-capable Grass Valley systems. The UHD news studio now features the latest Kayenne K-Frame switcher, EDIUS X Pro nonlinear editing solution and Sirius 840 576x576 router with integrated mutliviewer capability.

“Grass Valley demonstrated an unwavering commitment to delivering a cutting-edge IP broadcast infrastructure tailored to our evolving needs. In particular, we expect that our modular, scalable Grass Valley IP-based playout system will yield measurable benefits in the years to come,” said Eng. Abdullah Albalooshi, Undersecretary of Technical Affairs at Bahrain TV. “We anticipate significant cost savings by reducing hardware costs associated with traditional broadcast setups. And with our newly streamlined workflow processes and operational efficiencies, we also expect productivity gains by minimizing manual interventions and enabling faster content delivery.”

The IP playout solution features Grass Valley’s IP-capable Masterpiece IP UHD master control system, UCP 3901 video gateways, and a 2 rack-unit MV-821 IP standalone multiviewer, setup for four outputs. The suite also incorporates GV Orbit, configured for the dynamic orchestration of Bahrain TV’s IP broadcast environment.

Other tangible benefits Bahrain TV expects to accrue include the ability to scale easily without the need to make high or large capital investments, Grass said. They also anticipate advertising revenue growth resulting from an improved viewer experience and greater audience engagement.

“We’re very pleased to have actively contributed to this ground-breaking achievement by implementing and commissioning the first IP-based playout system in the region,” says Hany Bartella, Reginal Sales Director at Grass Valley. “The adoption of IP-based live broadcasting by Bahrain TV represents a leap forward in efficiency, scalability and flexibility, while positioning the network as a technological leader in the region.”

WASHINGTON—If you work for a broadcaster, you know that distribution over IP is supplanting SDI as the best practice, both for in-studio and remote activities. IP is simply the “better mousetrap,” with more flexibility than SDI, at costs that are no greater and often less.

One of the interesting benefits of working in an IP production environment is that it is better understood by corporate IT departments than the traditional way of working in an SDI “island” that is strictly the concern of the television engineering staff. At a time when skilled broadcast engineers are retiring in great numbers, the transition to IP production infrastructures could not have come at a better time.

“Live production over IP is a definite reality now,” said Ulrich Voigt, vice president for product management at Vizrt. “It has reached a level most of us did not expect.”

Changing Quickly
Liam Hayter, senior solutions architect for NewTek thinks he knows why the change happened so quickly.

“[It’s] the acceptance of lightweight, high-efficiency, and crucially low-latency software-based compression as an acceptable tool for broadcast,” he said. “Early in the IP transition, there was much chasing of uncompressed zero-latency IP delivery, but this becomes heavy and unwieldy—particularly when globally everyone, in every scenario, needed to work remotely.”

As quickly as the IP production steamroller was upon us, that doesn’t mean it was easy or without growing pains.

“There were several hurdles that needed to be overcome to make this a reality and they have been conquered for the most part,” said Steven Bilow, senior product marketing manager at Telestream. “For example, the nondeterminism of IP switching versus SDI used to be a big roadblock. But now, with technologies like ST 2110 and, especially for widely distributed sites, ST 2022-6, as well as ever-increasing format efficiency with technologies like JPEG-XS, these latencies have largely been overcome.”

The inherent flexibility of IP has users and manufacturers thinking of ways to structure systems to capture and distribute signals in novel ways. Producers and content creators are pushing the technology into situations where SDI dares not go.

“We believe completely in the cloud and IP’s ability to transform live production in a way that dramatically expands who and how video is produced and delivered,” said Paul Shen, CEO of TVU Networks. “It’s what drives us to keep creating—empowering content creators is at the core of everything we do.”

One of TVU’s users is the Confederation of Independent Football Associations (CONIFA), a soccer organization based in Latin America. In June, CONIFA produced and broadcast the Copa América, a professional soccer tournament from the remote Chilean city of Linares, with practically no equipment, minimal personnel and on a shoestring budget.

“With the TVU ecosystem, four or five people in different countries participating in production and transmission, a few pieces of basic equipment, and a couple of smartphones, we were able to stream live to the whole world from one small city in southern Chile,” said Diego Bartolotta, president of CONIFA Americas. “Before the Copa América, I was a bit incredulous that we could achieve a quality broadcast of a professional football game with only interconnected phones. But [this broadcast] totally changed my perspective.”

No Immediate Replacement
Although IP is now widely accepted for broadcast infrastructure, existing SDI cabling does not necessarily need to be replaced immediately. There are a few ways to keep both the IP and SDI gods happy.

“With SDI/IP gateways, there is no immediate need to make SDI equipment obsolete,” said Chris Scheck, marketing content manager for Lawo. Hardly anyone is seriously considering this option, because their CFO wouldn’t like the idea, and because [in some situations] there is still no equivalent IP solution.”

“The idea was always to phase out SDI naturally by no longer purchasing non-IP gear, but even that remains tricky as some tools are still firmly rooted in the SDI domain,” Scheck said. “What will happen, however is that SDI routers will disappear over time, because IP natives like Lawo’s .edge can replace them at a lower cost, while also offering almost unlimited scalability of the number of SDI inputs and outputs.”

At least one vendor sees a healthy SDI universe in the foreseeable future.

“As a big part of our business and an OEM supplier to major broadcast equipment manufacturers, we can confidently say that SDI is quite healthy,” said Francesco Scartozzi, vice president of sales and business development for Matrox Video Broadcast and Media Group. “That’s not to say that the IP is not being adopted, but SDI is still quite prevalent. At the lower end of the broadcast pyramid, SDI is very well suited, whether it’s for 3G SDI and 12G SDI for those moving toward 4K. As a supplier to those vendors, we can see these customers are refreshing all the SDI equipment with newer SDI equipment that now needs to handle not only HD-SDI but also the ability to go 4K.”

Monitor and Measurement
Of course, high-quality broadcasts are not possible without tools to monitor and measure the quality of the signals. As the use of IP production has mushroomed in the past few years, manufacturers of test and measurement gear have been racing to make monitoring and measurement practical, and for it to make sense in a live production environment.

“Point-to-point SDI connections used to be far easier to troubleshoot than IP connections. In some ways they still are,” Bilow said. “But the sophistication of tools, such as Telestream’s Inspect 2110 and PRISM, to allow proactive monitoring and problem identification in large-scale media networks has come so far in the past five years that it’s now possible to identify and diagnose even complex problems in a reasonable amount of time.”

Bridging current SDI systems to the IP world can be done with gear from a variety of vendors. One of the first to come up with a solution was NewTek, which developed its Network Device Interface (NDI) line of interfaces and processors.

“Five years ago, ‘IP’ in broadcast mainly referred to the SMPTE ST 2110 family of standards, which is designed to be used on-prem with mainly physical equipment,” Voight said. “If we look at IP production happening today, we see a clear mix of ST 2110 on-prem and NDI hybrid as on-prem and cloud. 

“We see NDI being used today at almost every large media entity, at least as ‘commodity’ IP production technology and ST 2110 for the high-end infrastructure,” he added. “The pandemic has been a catalyst to adopt NDI as one viable IP technology, as it was the only one supporting cloud, remote and work-from-home scenarios.”

New Options
The people producing content focus on getting good images and sound, and combining them in interesting and entertaining ways. However, even they are discovering that IP gives them options that were never before available—or were hopelessly expensive or complex.

For example, it’s easy to have bidirectional signals in an IP environment. And since IP is literally available everywhere, it is not a huge technical consideration to get a feed from India, Korea, Egypt or Peru. What was once complicated and expensive in a satellite uplink world is far easier and much cheaper with IP.

The Covid pandemic pushed broadcasters to embrace IP production systems and techniques faster than they would have otherwise, but the reality is that the advantages of IP are obvious for at least larger productions. Depending on what you’re doing, it can definitely make sense for smaller productions as well.

One final thought: SpaceX now has a constellation of thousands of satellites that can deliver modestly high-speed IP circuit anywhere in the world, and the company is adding satellites at the rate of 50-100 per month. With the ultimate goal of having tens of thousands of satellites and the capability to deliver upload/download speeds of more than 100 Mbps, this literally means that high-quality video can originate from anywhere in the world. At a moment’s notice.

Think of what clever content creators and video producers can do with that capability. 

NEW YORK and MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.—Flowics, a developer of graphics and interactive content for remote and in-studio production, is partnering with TVU Networks, to provide simpler, more flexible, broadcast-quality instant live graphics from a single interface, the companies announced today. 

The companies have integrated Flowics’ remote control interface with TVU Producer, a cloud-based, multicamera live production platform that enables production teams to store and access their production workflows over the internet instead of locally on a computer hard drive. After user verification, the Flowics interface appears as an active window inside TVU Producer.

"This native integration between TVU Producer and Flowics Graphics is a prime example of the continued improvements we're making to this platform," said Rafael Castillo, vice president and general manager for EMEA and Latin America, TVU Networks. "Because the integration is natively run, Flowics Graphics users get to enjoy the same interface they're familiar with. There is zero retraining or downtime. We're thrilled to expand TVU Producer's capabilities with the power and feature set of Flowics Graphics, particularly its streamlined approach of incorporating social media data into live remote production."

With this integration, graphics operators and producers can now control Flowics Graphics directly from the TVU Producer interface, making it possible to create live graphic overlays with Flowics Graphics and insert them into live productions without having to leave the TVU Producer platform, the companies said.

"This integration with TVU Producer is further proof that Flowics Graphics works seamlessly with different platforms and production environments," said Flowics CEO and Founder Gabriel Baños. "Together, we are simplifying how content production teams, whether digital or linear, make live video production from the cloud, controlling both video and graphics sources from a single dashboard that unifies the interfaces of both tools. The integration also gives TVU Producer users new capabilities and graphic options from the TVU Producer interface."

ST. PETERSBURG, Fla.—CP Communications and its subsidiary Red House Streaming have announced that they’ve gradually evolved their St. Petersburg, Florida headquarters into a specialized broadcast and IP production center and that they've rebranded it as Red House Streaming Production Center.

As part of that effort, the company has now deployed a varied network infrastructure of 1Gb and 10Gb pipes that interface with its two homegrown RHS studios and new RHS-36 truck, allowing the company to seamlessly manage live content coming from and going to any location globally – without leaving the property, and without leaving the IP domain if desired. 

These advances, along with the ability for clients to bring their own production trucks to interface directly with the IP network infrastructure, have inspired CP and RHS to formally rebrand the facility as Red House Streaming Production Center. 

The facility has already hosted several REMI productions, including the Bermuda Track and Field Championships and two ACC Golf Championship events.

“We differ from conventional production centers because we offer a true all-IP production ecosystem,” said Kurt Heitmann, CEO, CP Communications and Red House Streaming. “We offer multiple levels of professional production using traditional studio or control room workflows. Regardless of which production service is used, we acquire in IP, we produce in IP, and we distribute in IP. We can keep it all in IP with our vMix workflows, or also decode content for a traditional SDI workflow onboard RHS-36. We can then encode it back to IP for distribution.”

Heitmann added that the Red House Streaming Production Center uses Internet Protocol compression standards in ways that allow clients to capture, edit, process and deliver programming in their preferred formats. 

“We work in compressed environments, instead of moving uncompressed content around the facility on network cable,” said Heitmann. “Working in compressed environments is what gives our clients the freedom to manage content to and from anywhere globally over IP in a variety of formats, including RTMP, RTSP, SRT and NDI.”

The first 2022 REMI production project from Red House Streaming Production Center was the Bermuda Track and Field Championships for Carr-Hughes Productions (CHP) that aired on NBC Sports. 

This project utilized CHP’s High Rock mobile truck. Red House Streaming engineered a layer 2 network that transported eight video signals with 32 channels of audio, RVON communications, control data for cameras, return video and scoring data to and from Bermuda. 

“Basically, we extended the truck and production center networks to Bermuda,” said Heitmann. “The NBC announcers were in RHS Studio A and the international commentator was in RHS Studio B, and it was as if they were onsite.”

CP’s RHS-36 mobile unit was later brought in for the ACC Women’s Golf Championship, which took place in Pawley’s Island, South Carolina. CP and RHS acquired eight bonded cellular signals from the Reserve Golf Club and natively placed them into the traditional control room workflow onboard RHS-36 back at Red House Streaming Production Center. 

The content was managed and processed on board RHS-36 in a traditional SDI video workflow, which includes a Ross Video Carbonite switcher, Ross Xpression graphics, Evertz Dreamcatcher replay systems and Yamaha audio mixing, before being distributed over IP to the web. A similar project for the Men’s ACC Golf Championship event live from Panama City, Florida followed one week later.

“The ACC Women’s and Men’s Golf Tournaments were the proving ground, as there were six hours of live transmission with eight cameras including an RHS CamSTREAM, a drone and six traditional cameras - all coming into RHS-36 over bonded cellular,” said Heitmann. 

While RHS-36 offers a more traditional control room environment, RHS Studios A and B offer true studio workflow environments for clients that truly want to keep it all in IP. “We are using our vMix studio switching workflows in the two RHS studios, which keep everything in native IP,” he said.

Heitmann added that the company’s new FastReturn system brings another important differentiating layer to the company’s REMI production arsenal. 

FastReturn can ingest any H.264 baseline profile RTMP stream, supporting HD resolution and 128kbit stereo audio with bit rates up to 10 MBps with less than 400ms of latency, and then place live-acquired content from the cloud directly into Red House Streaming Production Center’s IP network. CP and RHS technicians architected the IP network infrastructure for optimized redundancy and failover, and added an enterprise broadband pipe to support future 4K, 8K and similar high-bandwidth productions. 

“We have 1Gb backup pipes for transmission, engineering and other production arms that assure uninterrupted service, and we have a full NOC for monitoring and quality assurance as well as to manage remote talent,” said Heitmann. “It’s all about providing the most flexible and reliable solutions for today’s varied REMI productions, and we can handle it all from Red House Streaming Production Center.”

ALEXANDRIA, Va.—Live production over IP is not exactly a new idea—the SMPTE ST2110 standard for IP video was finalized in its present form in September 2018—but time has allowed manufacturers and producers to figure out the best practices. This means that SDI is now not the only accepted technology for interconnecting equipment for a live production system.

Increasingly, broadcasters and remote truck operators are opting for IP systems to handle the signals in their new facilities.

“IP certainly provides the same levels of reliability and quality as traditional SDI workflows, thanks to significant advances made in IP platforms and IP-based solutions,” said Marco Lopez, general manager for live production at Grass Valley. “IP workflows unlock unprecedented flexibility and scalability, with many world-leading broadcasters already recognizing its transformational potential.”

Lopez pointed out that NBC Sports recently upgraded its Stamford facility with an IP-first infrastructure, while earlier this year several media enterprises delivered live production for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics over IP, including NBC Olympics and Discovery Eurosport.

“But this doesn’t only apply to fixed facility live production,” Lopez said. “We’re seeing the increased adoption of all-IP workflows from multiple mobile production companies, including NEP, Game Creek Video and All Mobile Video.”

STANDARD OF CHOICE
SDI has been the interconnection standard of choice for broadcasters and production trucks, and there is no denying the reliability the made-for-television standard has had over the years.

However, there have been several SDI upheavals as the standard adjusted first from standard definition to 1.5G HD to 3G to 6G, and most recently to 12G connection speeds. Moving up to the next generation of SDI usually meant new cable and connectors, not to mention replacing the gear where the cable and connectors terminated.

“Even though SDI is still being specified for new installs, it is safe to say that IP is the protocol of choice for greenfield projects and broadcasters that want to leverage the advantages of future-proof decentralized, distributed (remote) production, combined with centralized production and processing resources in affordable, off-premise areas,” said Andreas Hilmer, chief marketing officer for Lawo. “On the whole, SDI is today chiefly used for small-sized facilities and small- to medium-sized OB trucks.”

Given the resounding success of continent-wide or even continent-hopping remote production setups for events watched by billions around the globe, Hilmer said that few broadcasters will argue that IP is less reliable than SDI. Most agree that it is more convenient, thanks mainly to reduced cabling efforts. 

“Using SDI-to-IP gateways can turn the migration from SDI to IP into a gradual process, allowing broadcasters to keep using their SDI equipment (cameras, switchers, etc.) until it reaches end-of-life,” Hilmer said.

ALREADY PROVEN
Although IP broadcast standards will probably adjust over time as well, it is starting out with the ability to support 4K live broadcasts, and has already proven itself at several high-profile live events. The current maximum speed with copper cables is 10 GbE (10 Gbps), which requires Category 6 or 6a cables. For faster speeds than that, fiber cables must be used for 25 GbE, 40 GbE and 100 GbE.

In concert with faster data speeds available with IP production systems, there has also been a lot of work in signal compression to reduce the data needs while maintaining image quality.

“4K Ultra HD over IP technology is reliable for live production,” said Ronan Poullaouec, chief technology officer at AVIWEST. “[We have] two new products: the RACK400 4K Ultra HD encoder and the PRO460 4K Ultra HD and 5G transmitter, which are both dedicated to live production. Both these products support 4K UHD and multicamera workflows for up to four HD, fully frame-synced feeds, as well as the latest generation of H.265/HEVC and H.264/AVC compression standards.”

Cameras have jumped on the IP production bandwagon as well. For example, the Grass Valley LDX100 and LDX150 NativeIP cameras connect over a standard SMPTE hybrid fiber cable and also have IP functionality that can provide uncompressed or compressed streams.

You can go live with IP connectivity with much more modest cameras—cell phone cameras, for example.

“The integration of incoming IP feeds from any device anywhere is now seamless and easy to implement with Avid’s MediaCentral|Stream for contribution over bonded cellular, Wi-Fi, 4G/5G, and standard internet,” said Ray Thompson, senior director for partner and industry marketing at Avid. “For media companies using any camera, backpack unit [LiveU, TVU, Sony, Dejero, etc.], encoding device [Teradek, Haivision and more] or mobile device, contribution into the MediaCentral platform production environment is as easy as sending an SRT or RTMP stream.”

IS CLOUD A CHEAPER OPTION?
An interesting possibility to arise in the last couple of years is the option of doing a live production in the cloud. There are services and products that allow for switching, editing and quality control from the cloud, with a minimal layout of equipment.

“Live production in the cloud is bringing a new level of flexibility to different types of playout workflows,” said Jérémy Krein, product manager for live video and graphics solutions at Dalet. “With production tools hosted in the cloud, it is now easier and cheaper to produce a live broadcast directly from the event location. A cloud production environment is also faster to deploy and does not impact the on-premises infrastructure. With such solutions, customers can spin up new channels quickly to deliver specific events.”

Krein pointed out that, with cloud platforms being accessible from anywhere, disaster recovery can be better addressed. If there was a major interruption on-premises, production workflows in the cloud can provide program continuity.

The security of working in the cloud might deter the timid, but Krein stated that the right design will be secure.

“Disruption is always a possibility so it’s important to plan appropriate redundancy and protection,” he said. “A well-planned solution architecture is critical to ensure security in a cloud playout workflow. For added security, cloud infrastructure can be part of a virtual private network, separate from public networks and protecting all network connections via SSL.”

Time and chance may happen to all, but the race generally does favor the swift. Broadcasters that embrace IP production will find it is faster to create, revise and target their offerings.

“Broadcasters should absolutely be planning and using a cloud-based workflow for on-air events,” said Jared Timmins, senior vice president of solutions at TVU Networks. “It’s more reliable, flexible and less labor-intensive than traditional workflows. It also allows for business model experimentation, such as tailoring a channel toward a specific demographic or area of interest. You don’t need to wait years to amortize equipment costs—with a cloud-based workflow you can make new content decisions and monetize content in a way you can’t in a fit-for-purpose world.”

STANDARD FOR LARGE OPERATIONS
Timmins said that live production over IP is not only available today, it is the standard for large-scale operations.

“The cloud is now, not in the future,” he said. “We’ve had solutions that address this for at least two years, with our TVU RPS synchronized multicamera remote production and TVU Producer cloud-based live production tools. Virtualization is so advanced that every large-scale production now uses cloud-based tools to some extent. Who’s touching what equipment for remote production is being completely re-imagined.”

The rapid growth in capabilities of computers and the networks to which they are attached has revolutionized how big productions are structured. At the moment, the savings in time and expense really makes sense for the largest operators. However, tools for small-to-medium program producers will fall, as cloud capacity grows and costs decline.

The Museum of Once-Popular Broadcast Technologies needs to start preparing a space for SDI—probably right next to 1-inch recorders and standalone character generators. 

The Alliance for IP Media Solutions (AIMS) today extended its deadline through Aug. 23 for presentation proposals for its IP Oktoberfest 2021. 

The online event, Sept. 28-30, will offer educational presentations to assist broadcasters and Pro AV professional as they move towards an IP-based ecosystem for media production, AIMS said.

The event will place an emphasis on real-world IP implementations and demonstrate how the SMPTE ST 2110 suite of standards and AMWA NMOS technology stack are improving media workflows. The event also will offer a look at the IPMX set of proposed open standards and specs.

AIMS is seeking proposals for presentations from end users, industry associations, solution providers and technology developers who wish to share their knowledge and perspectives on development of IP-based workflows. Submissions should support the AIMS roadmap, the alliance said.

Presentations will be made live –not pre-recorded—during the three-day event, it said.

More information is available on the AIMS website. 

Chelmsford, Mass. – May 16, 2019 – Broadcast Pix™ will emphasize its IP-based solutions next month at InfoComm 2019 (Booth 2091) in Orlando, Fla., by demonstrating its newest integrated production switcher, BPswitch IX, as well as its new Version 7.5 software with expanded IP control capabilities and its new RCC IP camera control panel.

“IP has quickly become a cornerstone of the professional AV marketplace, and Broadcast Pix has introduced the best solutions for IP-based multi-camera productions,” explained Tony Mastantuono, product manager for Broadcast Pix. “BPswitch IX offers the flexibility to control and switch IP, wireless, and legacy SDI sources spread around large venues, while our latest software upgrade lets Broadcast Pix users switch live productions from across the room or across the country on a mobile device. Plus, our new RCC controller provides the flexibility of a separate camera control unit with a very intuitive user interface.”

BPswitch IX is designed for auditoriums, stadiums, conference rooms, and other facilities equipped with remote cameras that are switched from a central control room. It features six network inputs that support NDI and RTSP cameras and other sources, plus two SDI/HDMI inputs (including one analog input for legacy sources). The native 1080p/60 system seamlessly integrates MPEG-2, H.264, and other streaming formats in the same production, and provides SDI, HDMI, analog, and streaming outputs.

Like other BPswitch models, BPswitch IX includes the NewBlueNTX multi-layer 3D motion graphics CG, which includes hundreds of templates to simplify lower-thirds, bugs, animations, rolls, crawls, and effects. Other built-in workflow tools include eight channels of clips and graphics, three keyers with DVEs, program recording, file-based macros, ClearKey™ chromakey and Virtual Studios virtual sets, and customizable BPview™ multi-view.

With the new Version 7.5 software and optional Broadcast Pix Commander™ touchscreen control platform, all BPswitch models can provide browser-based switching on mobile devices. The upgrade allows remote control of servers and robotic cameras, access to all workflow tools, and full-motion viewing of production elements through a standard internet connection. Broadcast Pix’s BPNet™ IP ecosystem delivers the system’s control-over-IP capabilities securely and with low latency.

Version 7.5 also offers enhanced control for routers, cameras, and streaming CDNs – as well as exciting improvements for its BPfusion CG automation software. The software is included with any new BPswitch system, available as a free upgrade for any system under warranty, or available for $995 for systems no longer under warranty.

Ideal for remote productions, RCC can be used as a dedicated camera controller with any BPswitch integrated production switcher, Broadcast Pix Commander touchscreen control platform, or production switcher from another manufacturer. With its software-defined open architecture, RCC can control a variety of PTZ and broadcast cameras, as well as robotic heads, and mix IP protocols within the same production.

RCC’s seven-inch touchscreen provides intuitive menu navigation and allows customized camera presets, shot name, and more. Plus, its three-axis joystick with adjustable zoom speed and one-touch auto focus allows smooth, precise shot control. RCC includes native IP support for Panasonic and Sony PTZ cameras, with optional support for other cameras and robotic heads.

For a video preview of Broadcast Pix’s IP-based solutions at InfoComm, please visit http://bit.ly/2YuJYRo.

About Broadcast Pix
With a tightly coupled switcher and 3D motion graphics CG, Broadcast Pix provides the most fully integrated live video production systems with patented control and automation technology. From compact units to large-scale, multi-system solutions, every Broadcast Pix features an extensive toolset that makes it easy to optimize and customize your workflows locally and over IP. Plus, its BPNet ecosystem provides secure cloud services and asset management. Founded in 2002, Broadcast Pix has customers in more than 100 countries and is the leader in fully integrated production switchers for government, broadcast, streaming, live event, and visual radio applications. Learn more at www.broadcastpix.com.

Broadcast Pix, Broadcast Pix Commander, BPNet, BPswitch, BPview, and ClearKey are trademarks of Broadcast Pix, Inc. Patented. Switchers are made in USA.

Chelmsford, Mass. – March 13, 2019 – Broadcast Pix™ will introduce the newest model in the BPswitch integrated production switcher product family, BPswitch™ IX, at the 2019 NAB Show (Booth SL4210), which runs April 8-11 in Las Vegas, Nev. Designed for productions that rely on IP-based workflows and remote cameras, BPswitch IX features six network inputs that support NDI and RTSP sources.

To promote the new system, Broadcast Pix will give away a free BPswitch IX with camera control at the 2019 NAB Show. NAB attendees are encouraged to pre-register online for a demo at the Broadcast Pix booth. Once their demo is complete, attendees can enter the contest. One winner will be chosen from eligible entries on April 10 at 4:30 p.m. The winner must be present or have a proxy at the Broadcast Pix booth to win.

BPswitch IX is designed for auditoriums, stadiums, conference rooms, and other facilities equipped with remote cameras that are switched from a central control room. Along with two SDI/HDMI inputs (including one analog input for legacy sources), it can receive up to six IP camera feeds. The native 1080p/60 system seamlessly integrates MPEG-2, H.264, and other streaming formats in the same production, and provides SDI, HDMI, analog, and streaming outputs.

“IP-based PTZ cameras continue to gain popularity in the professional video workspace. They aren’t just for government meetings anymore,” said Tony Mastantuono, product manager for Broadcast Pix. “BPswitch IX is the best switching solution for IP-based multi-camera productions. It gives broadcasters and other video professionals the flexibility to control and switch IP, wireless, and SDI sources across stadiums and other large venues.”

When used with the optional Broadcast Pix Commander™ touchscreen control interface, BPswitch IX allows browser-based control with full-motion video and complete access to all sources and workflow tools using a mobile device and a standard internet connection. Commander’s simplified controls help non-technical personnel easily switch live productions, add titles, insert clips, and control robotic cameras. Broadcast Pix’s BPNet™ IP ecosystem delivers the system’s control-over-IP capabilities securely and with low latency.

Like other BPswitch models, BPswitch IX offers eight channels of clips and graphics, as well as three keyers with DVEs. Plus, the integrated NewBlueNTX multi-layer 3D motion graphics CG includes hundreds of templates to simplify lower-thirds, bugs, animations, rolls, crawls, and effects. Other built-in workflow tools include program recording, clip and graphic stores, file-based macros, ClearKey™ chromakey and Virtual Studios virtual sets, and customizable BPview™ multi-view.

Priced at $9,995, BPswitch is expected to ship in Q3 2019, and will be upgradeable to 4K in the future. For complete details on the BPswitch IX NAB 2019 giveaway, please visit www.broadcastpix.com.

About Broadcast Pix
With a tightly coupled switcher and 3D motion graphics CG, Broadcast Pix provides the most fully integrated live video production systems with patented control and automation technology. From compact units to large-scale, multi-system solutions, every Broadcast Pix features an extensive toolset that makes it easy to optimize and customize your workflows locally and over IP. Plus, its BPNet ecosystem provides secure cloud services and asset management. Founded in 2002, Broadcast Pix has customers in more than 100 countries and is the leader in fully integrated production switchers for government, broadcast, streaming, live event, and visual radio applications. Learn more at www.broadcastpix.com.

Broadcast Pix, Broadcast Pix Commander, BPNet, BPview, BPswitch, and ClearKey are trademarks of Broadcast Pix, Inc. Patented. Switchers are made in USA.

# # #

NEW YORK--Live events production company CP Communications has hired Ken Dillard, a 30-year broadcast veteran as its new vice president of North American sales. Dillard comes to CP from IP-based live video solutions provider TVU Networks, where he served nearly three years as vice president of sales, North America. Before that, he held senior sales management roles at Dejero, Statmon Technologies Group and Harris Corporation, as well as Avid, where he gained insights into the unique needs of news production operations.

Dillard’s first duty is to help its industry partner Mobile Viewpoint, a Netherlands’ based provider of IP transport solutions strengthen its presence in the North American market. Along with providing Mobile Viewpoint products on a standalone basis, CP Communications’ Red House Streaming division will also develop solutions and services powered by Mobile Viewpoint’s products.

“CP Communications has thrived for more than 30 years primarily based on word-of-mouth, growing our business through referrals based on the confidence our customers have in us,” said Kurt Heitmann, CEO of CP Communications. “It’s exciting to think how much further we can take our company with the addition of a sales leader of Ken’s caliber, proactively bringing new problem-solving offerings to our customers while delivering the same level of service they expect from CP Communications. Ken’s established industry relationships and background in bonded cellular, streaming and newsgathering make him the ideal person to build our Mobile Viewpoint business and help our customers bring IP-based media transport into their operations.”

HAMILTON, N.J.—Integrated production systems offer an easy and affordable way for virtually anyone to produce multicamera HD show and even stream live to online viewers.

Since they pack the functionality of a control room—such as multicamera switching, robotic camera control, keying, effects, audio mixing, CG, multiviewers, virtual sets, video playout, encoding and streaming— into a compact, user-friendly system that one person can operate, they’ve taken hold in non-traditional video settings like education, corporate and worship.

INTEGRATING THIRD-PARTY TECHNOLOGY
With powerful new features—like automatic camera switching, IP-driven workflows and seamless integration with Skype and cloud storage—these systems are starting to make inroads in the broadcast space.

One reason that adoption by broadcasters has been slow is that—with end-to-end functionality in one box—they haven’t been able to integrate best-in-class third-party products the way they’ve always done in video control rooms.

Discovery Channel uses Mobile Studios PortaCast HD flypack consoles. But with the introduction of NDI (Network Device Interface) by NewTek at the 2015 IBC Show, third-party integration is now possible with some integrated production systems. NewTek, which offers its flagship TriCaster and other integrated production systems, offers the license for free to any developer who downloads the SDK to make their products NDI-capable.

In doing so, any NDI-enabled device can now see any other NDI-enabled devices that are plugged into a standard Gig-E network, such as graphics systems, replay devices, storage devices, laptops, switchers and cameras. Switchers can select any of these sources as part of a multicamera production. A TriCaster, for example, will be able to choose sources between physically connected cameras and/or other video sources available over IP on a local area network. Companies ranging from AJA and Blackmagic Design to Matrox and Chyron-Hego have announced compatibility with the protocol.

“NDI is bidirectional, so all NDI-enabled sources on the same LAN are equal,” said Scott Carroll, director of public relations for the San Antonio-based company. “They can see and be seen to create interoperability between third-party systems and connect via a single Ethernet cable. Whether they’re next door or miles away, it’s frame-accurate, with less than a frame of latency.

NDI also lets production facilities maximize their SDI investments, such as broadcast cameras, while migrating to an IP workflow, according to Carroll. “We believe that IP workflows are the future of multicamera video production, and with NDI, we’re enabling that reality sooner rather than later.”

INTEROPERABILITY
Australian vendor, vMix, integrates NDI into its 4 and 8 input Go integrated production system. The Go enables switching, processing, recording and streaming of up to 4K-video. This turnkey system integrates built-in graphics, replay, text, DVR, and virtual sets, in a case small enough to fit in the overhead storage on a plane.

“NDI is an open technology that’s leveling the playing field for all of us,” said Eric Pratt, Sales Engineer for US Broadcast, which is the North American Distributor for vMix. “It’s making life easier by enabling interoperability without occupying an I/O connector.”

“Having a single operator control the entire production may not be best for every production,” Pratt says, “NDI lets our users break out various vMix functions, like replay, titling, and graphics, and put them on separate laptops so other operators can run them.”

“Then their graphics, replays or titles show up automatically as a source,” Pratt added. “You don’t have to be using a NewTek device to make this work, any NDI compatible product will integrate. A lot of companies are jumping on the bandwagon, and I expect big buzz about it at NAB.”

OFFERING A CHOICE
James Gilbert, CEO of Pixel Power, points out that integrated production systems limit customers to buying just the tools that have been built-in, so they’re locked in to buying everything from a single vendor.

“If you don’t like the graphics tools that have been built in to the integrated production system, it’s hard to swap that out for something you like more,” Gilbert said. “Broadcasters are used to choosing best-of-breed systems, but if you go down this integrated path, if something isn’t working well for you, you need to make sure there are hooks that allow you to substitute something else into your workflow.”

Offering choices to integrated production users is a key part of Pixel Power’s strategy, according to Gilbert. “We’re making our core graphics technology available as a plug-in that can work within integrated production systems,” he said.

Graphics, including live, multilayered 3D and channel branding, has been Pixel Power’s core competence for nearly 30 years. Its latest software products, Pixel Factory and StreamMaster are suitable for IP file-based workflows. Pixel Factory, which delivers the impact of Clarity, is software that runs on standard IT servers in file-based workflows. StreamMaster, which is integrated playout software with graphics and branding capabilities, can be virtualized on servers at data centers or in the cloud.

Grass Valley Ignite is a software-based integrated production system that allows a single operator to manage a control room full of devices for live newscasts and event programming.REMOTE CONTROL OVER IP
At Broadcast Pix, Product Manager Tony Mastantuono says that operational and labor cost pressures are driving the higher end of the video business to take a closer look at their multiconfigurable Flint and other integrated production systems.

“As our systems get more powerful, economical, and compact, they’re realizing they no longer have to move a 50- foot trailer with a skilled multiperson crew for every event,” Mastantuono said. “They can leave Flint at their master control, and just send a small crew with a flypack to shoot the video and send it back live to the studio. Then Flint can be used to remotely control the production over an IP network, which is one of the ways it helps keep production costs down.”

With its multitiered IP approach, Flint also streams directly to the Internet while simultaneously recording, allows access to media and files from cloud services like Google Drive, Dropbox, and Microsoft One Drive, as well as the ability to incorporate Skype calls and PowerPoint presentations into live productions. The system also offers wireless control via a tablet.

Earlier this month, Broadcast Pix announced that it had joined the ASPEN Alliance, an IP-based protocol backed by Evertz.

VIDEO TO GO
With its PortaCast HD flypack consoles— which house components by such vendors as NewTek, Ross, Panasonic, For-A and Sony—Mobile Studios makes it easy for integrated production systems to be set up quickly.

“We’re seeing growing demand for our systems as people in many vertical markets—such as corporate and education—recognize the importance of producing and distributing their own video content,” said Rich Rubin, president of Mobile Studios, in Deerfield Beach, Fla. “In the age of IP video distribution, even small to mid-sized companies need to use video strategically to promote themselves and their products and services in order to stay relevant and competitive.”

PortaCast Deluxe features a hinged lid that supports multiview monitors, a pullout drawer that provides a switching control surface, a bench that doubles as storage for cables, and built-in storage for up to 22 rack units of components.

The waterproof, shockmounted case can be wheeled over steps or into a van using an optional aluminum PortaRamp for easy transport.

NEW OPPORTUNITIES
Integrated production systems are breaking down barriers and allowing talented video producers—regardless of budget—to enter the live production market, according to Rush Beesley, president of RUSHWORKS, in Dallas.

“When you factor in affordable cameras, lightweight LED lighting panels, green-screen and channel-in-a-box playout, you now have much of what you need to run a robust, 24/7 TV channel for under $75K,” he said.

RUSHWORKS offers VDESK multicamera pan/tilt/zoom (PTZ) production systems with 4, 8 or 12 SDI/analog inputs starting at $7,500. It also offers control of most PTZ cameras, HD/SD production and streaming, remote control using a tablet over a wireless network, and Talk- Take automated video switching intelligence based on active microphone detection.

RUSHWORKS is integrating the Blackmagic Design Micro Studio 4K camera with its next generation PTX pan & tilt head. The solution will be on display at the NAB Show, controlled by VDESK and also by a DMX lighting console.

SOFTWARE-BASED
Continuing the trend towards crew consolidation, Grass Valley Ignite is a software- based integrated production system that allows a single operator to manage a control room full of devices for live newscasts and event programming. When Ignite automation is paired with the GV Stratus Digital Media Platform (DMP), broadcasters have an integrated production workflow for distributing content efficiently across multiple platforms, such as TV, Web and mobile.

“DMP automates the newscast beyond traditional on-air TV, and eliminates the need for human intervention to prepare complex, ad-supported content for multiplatform delivery,” said Ed Casaccia, senior director of product management/digital media and workflows for Grass Valley in Montreal.

“When a news story airs during a live newscast, it may consist of many elements, such as an on-camera intro, field report, Broll with a voice-over, graphics and an on-camera wrap-up,” Casaccia added. “DMP marks the in and out points of that entire news report, treats all of those components as a single segment, and then automates its delivery to the Web and mobile.”

There are also additional processing capabilities, such as the ability to replace embargoed content, like a few seconds of sports action with a suitable alternative, such as a scoreboard graphic. It’s also possible to dynamically insert different ads into the online versions, and even “hyper-localize” the ads based on zip codes or other criteria.