For decades, television operations were designed around predictability. Channels followed relatively fixed schedules, distribution paths were well understood, and programming decisions moved at a deliberate pace. Scheduling systems evolved to support that environment efficiently, optimizing around timing precision, transmission readiness, and operational control.

Today, the foundations of that operating model are being challenged by the economics, scale and fragmentation of modern video distribution.

Media companies are now managing expanding portfolios across linear television, FAST channels, streaming services, VOD platforms, regional feeds, social media and digital video environments in parallel. A single piece of content may exist across multiple business models, geographic markets, and audience segments simultaneously, each governed by distinct rights windows, metadata requirements, monetization strategies, and promotional priorities.

Operational complexity has expanded dramatically, yet many of the workflows supporting programming and scheduling still reflect assumptions from a much simpler broadcasting environment. This growing disconnect is beginning to reshape how the industry thinks about channel and platform operations.

Scheduling Is Evolving From Execution to Continuous Optimization
Much of the industry’s focus over the last decade centered on automation. FAST channel creation, playlist generation, continuity workflows, and multi-platform distribution have all become significantly more efficient as broadcasters and streaming operators scaled their digital operations.

Those advances delivered meaningful operational gains. However, scale alone is no longer the defining challenge.

Modern channel environments are increasingly influenced by live audience behavior, dynamic advertising models, changing consumption patterns, and real-time performance expectations. Programming decisions that were once planned weeks in advance are under pressure to adapt continuously to changing audience demand and monetization opportunities.

Historically, scheduling has always been a strategic discipline balancing editorial objectives, audience expectations, rights constraints, commercial priorities, and operational execution. The expansion of fragmented, multi-platform distribution has significantly increased both the complexity and operational speed of those decisions.

That evolution is particularly visible in FAST and streaming environments, where operators have greater flexibility to adjust schedules, rebalance content lineups, and respond to audience performance far more dynamically than traditional linear models ever allowed.

The operational challenge now centers on how programming environments adapt continuously across fragmented audiences, platforms, and business models while remaining commercially sustainable in an environment where distribution costs are rising, and platform margins can be extremely thin.

Metadata Has Become a Critical Enabler of Scale
Metadata has always been fundamental to media operations. Accurate content, rights, and scheduling information have long been essential to getting content to air, managing libraries, and supporting distribution.

The expansion of multi-platform distribution has dramatically increased the volume, complexity, and operational dependency placed on metadata workflows.

As media companies expand across linear, FAST, streaming, VOD, regional variants, and digital platforms, content information needs to move reliably across a growing number of systems, teams, and operational workflows.

When title information, rights data, and metadata become fragmented or inconsistent, teams spend more time validating, correcting, and coordinating work. That impacts scheduling accuracy, delays distribution, increases compliance risk, and makes it harder to operate efficiently at scale.

This reflects a broader shift across media organizations. Programming operations are becoming more interconnected with audience insight, rights decisions, advertising models, and increasingly personalized content experiences. Reliable metadata is becoming a prerequisite for making those processes work together effectively.

This is one reason richer content understanding is becoming important across scheduling and programming environments.

By combining structured metadata with broader contextual understanding of content, including themes, relationships, audience fit, and editorial relevance, organizations can make more informed programming decisions and reduce the operational effort required to manage large content portfolios.

As scale increases, metadata becomes less about organizing content and more about enabling organizations to operate, adapt, and optimize effectively.

FAST Accelerated a Structural Shift in Operations
FAST channel growth accelerated operational demands that were already emerging across the industry.

The economics of FAST reward speed, flexibility, and scale. Operators are expected to launch channels quickly, maintain fresh programming lineups, adapt to audience behavior, and manage large channel portfolios without proportionally increasing operational overhead.

Traditional scheduling workflows were not designed for that level of responsiveness.

Rules-based automation remains essential for handling repetitive scheduling tasks, but scale now depends on the ability to optimize dynamically across multiple variables simultaneously. Audience behavior, content performance, and advertising objectives all influence programming decisions in real time.

In some environments, programming decisions that once changed quarterly are now being adjusted weekly or daily based on audience performance, rights availability, and monetization priorities.

This is forcing media organizations to rethink the architecture supporting channel and platform operations.

Programming systems are evolving beyond static scheduling engines into adaptive operational environments capable of continuously balancing competing priorities. Audience intelligence, contextual performance data, and monetization opportunities are beginning to shape scheduling logic directly rather than functioning as separate downstream analytics.

The distinction between scheduling, personalization, and audience engagement is becoming less defined.

AI Is Reshaping Operations Through Optimization
Artificial intelligence is already beginning to influence how programming operations scale, although its most practical applications are emerging in areas tied to specific optimization rather than fully autonomous decision-making.

Metadata enrichment, semantic analysis, audience clustering, search, content matching, and scheduling optimization are all benefiting from AI-driven workflows that improve operational speed and precision. These capabilities help programming teams manage growing complexity while surfacing patterns and opportunities that would be difficult to identify manually at scale.

At the same time, programming decisions remain highly contextual. Editorial judgment, brand positioning, regional market nuance, and live event management still require human oversight and strategic direction.

The operational model emerging across the industry is increasingly hybrid in nature, with automation handling repetitive execution, optimization systems processing audience and performance signals at scale, and programming teams focusing more heavily on editorial strategy, curation, oversight, and differentiation.

That balance between operational intelligence and human judgment is likely to define the next phase of channel operations.

Scaling Distribution Was the First Challenge; Scaling Operational Intelligence Is the Next One
The media industry spent the last decade scaling distribution. The next phase of transformation will focus on scaling operational intelligence, enabling organizations to make better programming decisions faster and execute them more efficiently.

As audiences fragment across platforms and consumption models continue to evolve, the organizations that succeed will likely be those capable of responding to audience and business demands more dynamically rather than operating through static scheduling cycles built for a different era.

Channel operations are now shaped by how effectively media organizations can connect audience intelligence, metadata, monetization strategy, and programming workflows into an operating model that improves responsiveness, reduces manual effort, and accelerates speed to market.

Channels and platforms have become relatively straightforward. Managing those environments intelligently, responsively, and profitably at scale is becoming the defining operational challenge of modern media.

The organizations that succeed will not necessarily be those operating the most channels, but those able to adapt programming strategies quickly, scale operations more efficiently, and continuously optimize programming decisions across an increasingly complex distribution landscape.

NEVADA CITY, Calif.—Media workflow technology provider Telestream, has announced major new AI-powered features in its product portfolio, with practical AI enhancements across its Vantage, Vantage Cloud, EDC, Stanza, and Qualify product lines.

Building on the foundation introduced with Vantage AI in 2025, Telestream said it is is advancing its production-ready AI workflows, accelerating localization, strengthening quality control, and introducing new AI-assisted workflow design capabilities that connect and unify enterprise operations across on-premises, cloud, and hybrid environments.

“Last year we introduced Vantage AI as a new foundation for intelligent media workflows,” said Rich Andes, vice president of product management at Telestream. “Today, we’re expanding that foundation with deeper integration across cloud and hybrid deployments, enhanced QC automation, and scalable localization workflows. This is practical AI in action: embedded, explainable, and designed for real-world production environments.”

The latest enhancements reflect a shift from introducing AI features to operationalizing AI across the enterprise, driving measurable workflow impact across ingest, processing, compliance, and delivery.

Telestream reported that its latest AI advancements deliver meaningful operational progress across five core areas:

• AI Caption: Expanded Localization at Scale. AI-powered captioning and translation now support up to 128 languages across Vantage and Stanza workflows, enabling automated speech-to-text, caption generation, and multilingual subtitle delivery in a unified processing chain. These enhancements significantly reduce turnaround time for FAST channels, OTT distribution, and global sports syndication.
• AI Qualify: AI-Assisted QC Embedded in Production Pipelines. Enhancements to Qualify integrate AI-powered lip-sync validation, subtitle alignment checks, and spoken-language verification directly into automated QC workflows. By flagging only exception-based issues for operator review, teams reduce manual inspection time while improving delivery confidence and platform compliance.
• AI Speech: Real-Time Speech Intelligence for Growing Files. Speech-to-text and metadata extraction capabilities now support growing file workflows, enabling real-time tagging and searchable metadata during ingest and processing. This allows news, sports, and live production teams to accelerate time-to-edit and improve content discoverability without waiting for file completion.
• AI Vision: Visual Intelligence Reduces Manual Lifting. AI Vision introduces frame-level visual intelligence across Telestream workflows, automatically transforming video into actionable metadata that extends beyond traditional file properties. Using advanced computer vision, AI Vision identifies objects, logos, lower thirds, safe-area violations, and objectionable content, while generating scene-level descriptions in real time. These capabilities enable describing the scene within a video feed as metadata, logo detection and removal across large content libraries, and ad-break identification and replacement for VOD repurposing. AI Vision reduces manual review time, strengthens compliance workflows, and expands automation for live and file-based production environments.
• AI Media Analyzer: Content-Aware Analysis. AI Media Analyzer advances content inspection from basic technical validation to contextual understanding of what is actually inside a media file. Rather than simply verifying resolution, frame rate, or codec, Media Analyzer detects the nature of the content, segments media into meaningful sections, and generates metadata that reflects scene changes, content types, graphic overlays, and potential compliance risks. This content-aware analysis enables faster review cycles and more accurate downstream workflow triggering. It provides significant operator time savings across ingest, processing, and delivery environments, transforming media assessment into an automated, production-ready capability. This feature is available in Telestream's EDC platform and will be coming soon to Vantage AI.

These enhancements ensure AI capabilities are integrated components that create a trusted production infrastructure.

“AI delivers value when it’s operationalized at scale,” Andes added. “Our customers don’t need more labels or transcripts; they need intelligent automation that reduces turnaround time, improves accuracy, meets compliance, and scales with their infrastructure and workflows. That’s what this next phase of Practical AI delivers.”

As with previous releases, Telestream’s AI capabilities remain secure by design. Customers retain full control of their content, whether deployed on-premises, in private environments, or via managed cloud services. No customer media is used to train shared models, ensuring compliance, auditability, and cost predictability.

In addition to AI workflow enhancements, Telestream also reported that it continues to invest in next-generation format readiness and compliance standards, including support for emerging codecs and audio standards and exploration of C2PA metadata workflows to address growing content authenticity requirements.

To learn more about Telestream’s production-ready AI, visit https://www.telestream.com/vantage-ai/.

HACKENSACK, N.J.—LiveU has launched LiveU Nexus, a new cloud-native universal gateway for digital and IP-based workflows, enabling customers to create even more value from their LiveU EcoSystem setup. LiveU Nexus seamlessly moves IP-video content in and out of different platforms and environments, including SDI, SMPTE 2110 and NDI-based production systems, using existing and new workflows.

The company will demo LiveU Nexus at its stand (7.C19) during the 2025 IBC Show, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam.

Designed to simplify complex IP workflows—especially digital video capturing—LiveU Nexus acts as an efficient and reliable universal gateway for all IP-based feeds within the LiveU EcoSystem. It offers unlimited access to live feeds to and from any systems, letting users bring in, transform, route and output any stream in seconds.

Any types of feeds can be seamlessly connected from anywhere, to anywhere, including LiveU's own LRT (LiveU Reliable Transport), SRT, RTMP, HLS and more to on-premises and cloud-based infrastructure. Producers can pull in live content from Zoom, YouTube and other social media platforms with a simple URL or meeting link—no converters or workarounds required, according to the company.

"Broadcasters are under mounting pressure to integrate a growing number of IP and digital video sources,” said Matt Zajicek, VP Product for LiveU. “LiveU Nexus changes the game, accelerating their digital transformations and future-proofing their digital and IP-video workflows. By cutting technical barriers and costs, production teams can focus on creating great content faster and smarter—while maximizing existing investments. It's already been successfully tested by customers, and we're excited about the potential ahead."

Key features include:

• Protocol conversion – Transforming any IP format to LRT and other leading protocols, LiveU Nexus pushes any live stream into the LiveU EcoSystem or third-party solutions without any additional hardware or converter.
• Digital/social media capturing and routing – includes Zoom meetings, YouTube videos and Facebook Lives into broadcast workflows, and a web browser as an input inside.
• Elastic cloud scalability – built to grow with production demands in the cloud, as workflows evolve.

Resolutions, frame rates, aspect ratio, and codec differences are automatically normalized across the feeds, ensuring every signal is instantly compatible with the downstream tools. In addition, any IP stream can be sent into LiveU's IP cloud solutions, including LiveU Studio for cloud production, LiveU Ingest for recording, or LiveU Matrix for IP distribution, and integrated with an installed base of LiveU receivers, without the need for additional hardware or configurations.

Interoperability is at the heart of the LiveU EcoSystem, according to Zajicek

“By streamlining workflows and deepening integration across the platform, we’re making it easier than ever for storytellers to maximize the value of their video content," he added.

NEVADA City, Calif.—At IBC2025, Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam, Telestream will debut its new Global Ingest strategy, introducing a next-generation ingest architecture that seamlessly unifies live capture, camera card ingest, and file-based workflows.

Built on the Vantage platform, the new workflow capabilities are designed for ultimate flexibility, scalability, and efficiency, supporting on-premises, hybrid, and cloud environments, the company said. Central to the strategy is Telestream’s practical use of AI; rather than generating unstructured “metadata dumps,” Telestream Global Ingest produces structured, system-aware, and standards-compliant metadata at the point of capture. This enables instant interoperability with a wide range of platforms, such as Avid, Iconik, and Mimir, accelerating editorial, archive discovery and distribution while eliminating workflow bottlenecks, according to the company.

“With Global Ingest, we’re transforming a fragmented technical hurdle into a unified entry point for high-speed production and operational efficiency,” said Charlie Dunn, EVP of Product Management at Telestream. “By standardizing ingest on the Vantage platform, we eliminate the need for proprietary vendors and rigid integrations, enabling customers to move content from any source into any editorial or MAM system with speed and precision. We are making ingest a strategic advantage rather than a workflow gap.”

A Unified, Intelligent Ingest Platform
Telestream’s scalable ingest capabilities empower technical teams with precision, flexibility, and speed, no matter the format, source, or operational environment (on-prem, hybrid, or cloud). It supports a wide range of media operations, from high-performance, real-time ingest for live sports and news, to scalable file-based ingest for post-production and media supply chains.

Highlights include:

• Vantage Live Capture – A high-performance ingest engine with unmatched input/output flexibility. Supporting ST 2110, SDI, SRT, NDI, MPEG-TS, and RTMP, it enables centralized ingest from IP, SDI, and even tape-based sources. With support for up to 16 channels in a single RU and deep codec support, Live Capture seamlessly integrates into editorial and MAM systems such as Avid and Adobe.
  
• Live Schedule PRO 2.0 – A high-availability, enterprise-ready scheduling platform with clustered deployment, automation, and failover capabilities. Designed for continuous operation, it’s ideal for live newsrooms, sports broadcasters, and 24/7 ingest environments.
  
• Camera Card Ingest – Telestream’s camera card ingest solution delivers a streamlined user experience with enhanced metadata extraction, multi-destination workflows, and tight Vantage integration. It accelerates turnaround times for editors and supports modern content production at scale.
  
• Review: Proxyless Player for Distributed Teams – A professional-grade playback experience for live and captured media, with real-time 10-bit native playback, scopes, and audio monitoring. Review will support remote editorial collaboration without the need for proxy generation.

Telestream will showcase Global Ingest powered by Vantage at IBC2025, Stand 7.B21.

NEVADA CITY, Calif.—Telestream today unveiled Vantage AI, a platform-wide evolution of artificial intelligence capabilities that enable smarter, faster and more adaptive media workflows from ingest to delivery, and will show it at IBC2025, set for Sept. 12-15 at the RAI Amsterdam Convention Center.

Building on Vantage’s ability to automate complex operations, the AI expansion broadens the scope of what can be automated.

“Many AI tools overwhelm teams with raw transcripts and labels that require manual interpretation before they’re useful,” Charlie Dunn, executive vice president of products at Telestream, said.

“Vantage AI takes a fundamentally different approach,” he said. “We deliver context-aware metadata that’s embedded into workflows and ready to trigger real actions, whether automating subtitles, accelerating search or enabling smarter decisions. It is practical AI that enables our customers to improve their operations and businesses.”

Telestream’s unified approach to AI empowers customers to streamline operations, enrich metadata and enhance QC, while maintaining full control over content, infrastructure and cost predictability. Highlights include:

• AI-Caption, which generates accurate, multilingual subtitles from audio with options for human-refined or fully automated delivery, preserving timing, readability and cultural nuance.
• AI-Speech, which creates rich, searchable metadata through transcription, content summarization and sensitive language detection. This accelerates content discovery across news, sports and post workflows.
• AI-Qualify, which detects lip sync issues, subtitle overlap and spoken language mismatches—problems often missed by rule-based QC systems. Automating these checkpoints with AI eliminates manual checks and improves accuracy across formats and platforms.
• AI-Vision, which detects logos, scene changes and ad break opportunities to automate segmentation and streamline content repackaging. This also helps ensure compliance by identifying visual elements that may require masking or replacement.
• AI-Workflow, which uses natural language prompts to create media processing workflows, accelerating production cycles while reducing errors. The intelligent automation makes media operations more streamlined and dynamic.

Vantage AI also enriches content in Telestream DIVA, automatically generating captions, transcripts, summaries and visual metadata that accelerates archive discovery and automation without the need for third-party tools or siloed processing.

“Security is paramount for our customers. Vantage AI operates securely on-prem or in controlled environments, keeping media assets within the customer’s domain. No customer content is used for training the model,” Dunn said. “This ensures compliance, auditability, and cost control, especially important for broadcasters and live event producers operating at scale.”

Vantage AI is available for deployment today across a range of media workflows, including live production, 24/7 broadcast operations, content repackaging, and other high-volume environments.

See Telestream at IBC2025 Stand 7.B21.

More information is available on the company’s website.

Dalet has released a new update to its Dalet Flex media workflow platform, introducing powerful new capabilities to its flagship platform.

Dalet Flex 2025.6 LTS (long-term support) debuts “Secure Share,” a feature that enables external collaboration without compromising security or control. Users can now generate secure, time-limited links for seamless media exchange, whether sharing single assets, collections, review sessions, or delivery packages, according to Dalet.

The release also introduces Flex Packages—modular, preconfigured functionality bundles grouped into five strategic packs. These packages accelerate time-to-value by enabling AI-powered workflows (Dalet Media Cortex, DeepVA, OpenAI), live production integration, content review and approval, and more. Additional enhancements include a fully Kubernetes-native architecture and expanded language and captioning support in Dalet Cut, allowing media organizations to scale operations and deliver content globally with greater agility

“With its latest updates, Dalet Flex introduces powerful production workflow improvements, blending advanced automation with intuitive, user-friendly enhancements,” Aaron Kroger, director of product marketing and communications at Dalet, said. "The new capabilities underscore our commitment to streamlining processes and boosting efficiency. Features like Secure Share and packaged workflows optimize collaboration, allowing teams to work faster and smarter. The ongoing platform improvements save time and effort, while helping organizations deliver high-quality content more efficiently.”

Key Highlights of Dalet Flex 2025.6 LTS
Designed to integrate seamlessly into any media ecosystem, Dalet Flex 2025.6 introduces new features that enhance workflows for media ingest, strategic content management, and distribution.

• Secure Collaboration: The new Secure Share feature transforms how media teams collaborate with external partners, providing safe and efficient asset sharing. It offers secure access to individual assets, collections and reviews with granular permissions and activity tracking for complete control, eliminating the need to transfer assets between platforms.
• Rapid Deployment: Preconfigured, packaged workflows provide standardized solutions for common requirements, enabling quick adoption and rapid deployment for teams.
• Enhanced Usability and Accessibility: An improved user interface with optimized layouts makes navigation easier, while expanded language support—including Italian, German, Portuguese, Spanish and Hebrew—reduces friction and enhances team efficiency.
• Streamlined Captioning: Dalet Cut now enables seamless creation, translation, and editing of caption files. Paired with FlexMAM’s ability to manage these files as individual assets, this enhancement streamlines editorial workflows.
• Unmatched Scalability: A full Kubernetes architecture ensures maximum scalability, cost efficiency and reliability. Benefits include auto-scaling, self-healing, zero-downtime updates and seamless performance in high-demand environments.
• Optimized Ingest operations: The new Dalet Ingest Portal offers a modern, user-friendly, web-based ingest scheduler, enabling efficient management of live ingest across cloud and on-prem environments through a centralized platform. The Dalet Flex 2025.6 LTS release includes beta access to the portal.

Read Aaron Kroger's blog on how the combination of existing functions and new additions has unlocked a new level of production workflows.

The media industry stands on the precipice of a technological revolution. Over the past year, we’ve seen how Artificial Intelligence (AI) has gone beyond the hype to become a transformative force, reshaping the creation, distribution, and consumption of content.

For media companies, the need to integrate AI into their systems is no longer a choice but a necessity. Below, I outline my top five reasons why this integration needs to begin today.

Practical Strategies for Media Efficiency
AI offers media companies unprecedented opportunities to enhance operational efficiency. From automating repetitive tasks, such as content tagging and video clipping, to streamlining the production of personalized or localized content, the potential for increasing output with fewer resources is immense.

Looking ahead, AI could contribute a $15.7 trillion boost to the global economy, according to PwC, with media and entertainment seeing major cost reductions. Similarly, McKinsey predicts AI could automate 60-70% of tasks, impacting the media industry significantly.

By standardizing metadata tagging with AI-driven computer vision, film and TV studios can implement unified arrangements when onboarding assets from third-party production companies. This vastly improves media searchability, saving marketers time and money while increasing the quality and creativity of their promotional material.

Emotion significantly impacts humans’ ability to retain information. By applying sentiment analysis to ad-supported content, AI introduces a new dimension for targeting. This additional telemetry enhances brand safety for advertisers and drives higher CPMs for publishers.

However, it is by no means a straightforward process. To fully leverage this potential, companies need to commit to a multifaceted approach, including process redesign, employee education, and consistent iterative improvement. These efforts require time and energy. By integrating AI in a scalable way now, even in narrow use cases, companies will be able to get ahead and gain valuable insights. Early adopters will gain a competitive advantage in operational efficiency as AI tools become increasingly advanced.

Keeping Up with a Rapidly Evolving Landscape
The media landscape is evolving at a breakneck pace, driven by technological advancements and changing consumer behaviors. AI is at the forefront of this evolution, with capabilities ranging from content personalization to real-time analytics. Companies that delay adopting AI risk being left behind as competitors leverage these tools to deliver more engaging and personalized experiences to their audiences at a faster speed.

In 2024, there were over 3,000 operational AI startups, each attracting significant venture capital funding. Understanding the myriad of products, their benefits, and capabilities is a daunting task. The rapid pace of AI development means that the longer companies wait, the more they will need to catch up. As AI algorithms evolve, the gap between early adopters and stragglers will widen, making it increasingly difficult to compete. Starting today allows media companies to stay ahead of AI advancements and remain relevant in an ever-changing industry.

Cultivating an AI-Ready Media Workforce

One of the biggest challenges media companies face when integrating AI is the human element. Employees need to become familiar with AI tools and understand how to leverage them effectively. This shift in mindset and skillset doesn’t happen overnight. It requires time, training, and a cultural shift within the organization.

The Enabled ICT Workforce Consortium predicts that more than 90% of ICT jobs will undergo high or moderate transformation by AI. This shift will require reshaping the workforce to incorporate AI, emphasizing the need for immediate action in upskilling employees. By starting the integration process now, companies can gradually improve their workforce, aligning employee expectations with AI’s new capabilities.

This proactive approach will reduce resistance to change and ensure a smoother transition as AI becomes more deeply embedded in daily operations. Additionally, involving staff early on in the AI integration process can foster innovation and encourage the development of new ideas on how AI can enhance media products and services.

The Necessity of Deep AI Integration for Media
The AI market is already flooded with a wide array of tools, each promising to solve different problems or enhance specific aspects of media production and distribution. However, this abundance of tools can also lead to fragmentation, inconsistency, and the use of unsanctioned, private tools by employees, which can pose security risks.

Deeply integrating AI into existing IT infrastructure is crucial for fully realizing AI’s benefits and overcoming the significant challenges associated with scaling AI beyond pilot projects. Without deep integration, organizations may struggle with complexities that prevent widespread AI adoption. BCG reports that only 11% of businesses have successfully integrated AI into multiple areas of their operations.

Deep integration also ensures that AI systems are designed with regulatory and security requirements in mind from the beginning, reducing risks and enhancing compliance through robust monitoring and control mechanisms. This comprehensive approach is essential for managing the complexities of AI deployment and ensuring long-term success.

Building a Future-Proof Strategy to Stay Ahead of the Curve
Finally, integrating AI today is not just about meeting current needs, it’s about future-proofing the business. As AI continues to evolve, the media industry will see the emergence of new use cases, from AI-generated content to advanced predictive analytics that can shape editorial strategies. Companies that have already embedded AI into their core systems will be better positioned to experiment with and adopt these emerging technologies.

For example, in the US, more than 20% of people speak a different language at home other than English (US Census). While catering to diverse, less common languages presents an economic challenge for today’s media companies, AI is changing the landscape.

Media outlets can now use AI in certain cases to generate localized content for these populations at a fraction of traditional costs, effectively reaching an additional 70 million people in the US. Companies that adopt this technology early will gain a significant advantage by having the ability to instantly utilize this technology across their entire content portfolio.

A future-proof AI strategy involves continuous learning and adaptation. Media companies must remain agile, regularly reassessing their AI tools and strategies to ensure they leverage the latest advancements and meet the evolving needs of their audience. This ongoing process will help media companies stay ahead of the curve and maintain their competitive advantage in an increasingly AI-driven world.

AI’s Essential Role in Future Success
The integration of AI is not just a technological upgrade for media companies, it’s a strategic imperative. Considering the opportunities for cost savings, the demands of a rapidly evolving landscape, the importance of a prepared workforce, and the abundance of AI tools available today all point to one clear conclusion: the time to deeply embed AI into media systems is now. By acting today, media companies can position themselves for long-term success in a future where AI will play a central role in every aspect of the industry.

By embedding AI deeply into their operations, media companies not only optimize current processes but also lay the foundation for future innovations. The sooner they start, the greater their chances of thriving in the AI-driven future of media.

MUNICH, Germany—Cinegy has introduced Cinegy Route v22.10 designed to manage media workflows in IP-based infrastructures by providing a centralized director for high volumes of content streams.

The new release offers functional and user-experience enhancements. The company has moved the code base for the latest version to a 64-bit architecture and makes greater use of GPUs in client workstations.

Developed in response to user feedback, Cinegy Route v22.10 also offers stream improvements, including support for encrypted Secure, Reliable Transport (SRT) sources and the ability to play back live HEVC streams in the Cinegy Route preview player, giving any workstation confidence monitoring of any stream under its control. It also provides comprehensive support for secondary events, allowing them to be clean switched in the Cinegy Event Manager under the control of Cinegy Route, the company said.

The company also has transformed the user interface with high DPI mode for Ultra HD screens, which makes fine detail comfortable to view. UX improvements include more logical menu structures, “always on top” mode for the Cinegy Route Browser and new functionality like a mute button in the player view and a double click to open or collapse player windows, it said.

“Our users are building ever more extensive workflows in their IP networks, with large numbers of sources and destinations, transcoding and processing, audio shuffling and mixing and much more. They need a simple, intuitive way to keep track of everything, and with this new version of Cinegy Route, they have all the functionality they need on their workstations in a form which is completely intuitive to use,” said company CEO Daniella Wegner.

Existing license holders may download and use the latest version under their existing user licenses.

More information is available on the company’s website.

New York City, NY – November 25, 2019 –Frame.io, a leading video review and collaboration platform used by over one million filmmakers and media professionals, today announced it has raised a $50 million Series C round to help support its next big push into cloud-enabled motion picture workflows. Frame.io will also use this round of financing to continue its deep investment into airtight security, intuitive UX, and camera-to-cutting room technology. Insight Partners led the round with contributions from all existing major stakeholders, including Accel, FirstMark, SignalFire, and Shasta Ventures. Itai Tsiddon, co-founder of Lightricks, will represent Insight Partners as Frame.io’s newest board member.

“We’re thrilled to be partnering with Insight on this next round of financing. Insight deeply understands the creative space and the changing tides the film and video market will see over the next several years,” said Emery Wells, co-founder and CEO of Frame.io. “2019 has been a year of massive growth and of major milestones for us: we celebrated reaching 100 employees, moved into brand new headquarters in lower Manhattan and, most recently, welcomed industry veteran Michael Cioni to the team. We are driving to create the most innovative approach to video workflows since the emergence of digital 20 years ago.”

Designed and built by video creatives—for video creatives—and launched in 2014, Frame.io is a New York City-based startup dedicated to changing the way video creation works. The web-based platform integrates seamlessly with the industry’s leading NLEs, including Adobe® Premiere® Pro, Avid, Apple® Final Cut Pro® and DaVinci Resolve Studio, enabling video creators to upload and organize media and share projects internally or with clients anywhere in the world. This round of Series C funding brings Frame.io’s total funding to date to $82.2 million.

“Frame.io is well positioned to solve some of the industry’s greatest needs and has consistently delivered a product that its users find indispensable,” said Jeff Lieberman, Managing Director at Insight Partners. “We’re excited to lead their Series C and proud to partner with a company that we believe will help pioneer the next great change in Hollywood and beyond.”

Frame.io is founded on the product-first principle, focusing on designing a tool that customers love to use. As the professional filmmaking process has undergone significant changes, Frame.io has evolved its product to address the demands for agility and speed in video production. With the Series C funding, Frame.io will double its product, design, and engineering teams to expand on those key components. Security efforts, always central to their business model, will remain a primary focus in the ongoing effort to make Frame.io the most trusted video platform in the industry.

Also notable in the push to develop cloud-based workflows for motion pictures and television is the recent appointment of Michael Cioni as Global SVP of Innovation. Cioni will oversee the camera-to-cloud effort from the new Frame.io office opening in Los Angeles in 2020, which will allow the company to better service the Hollywood-based production community.

Since its start, Frame.io has become an integral part of the workflow for large-scale customers like VICE Media, BuzzFeed, Facebook, and Turner Broadcasting, helping them achieve 60 percent greater efficiency. Frame.io customers are 41 percent more likely to hit project deadlines, with 39 percent more videos produced monthly on average, resulting in significant cost savings and revenue increases.

As video creation across all businesses continues to expand exponentially, Frame.io is poised to cement its place as an industry leader. Wells said, “The next decade will open up tremendous opportunities for anyone who’s ready and willing to take advantage of the new video workflows. Frame.io was born out of the real filmmaking DNA that authentically connects us to the industry needs. And we’re innovating to solve the massive workflow challenges that we’ve lived and know that filmmakers face every day.”

Download: Frame.io Series C Funding Press Kit

Request an Executive Briefing with Frame.io

To request an executive press briefing with Emery Wells or Michael Cioni, please contact Megan Linebarger at megan@zazilmediagroup.com.

About Frame.io
Frame.io is the world’s leading cloud-based video collaboration platform, designed to streamline the video creation process by centralizing all media assets—and all feedback—in one secure place that’s easily accessible from anywhere in the world. Frame.io integrates with most major professional video tools, acting as the connective tissue of the entire video ecosystem, no matter the scale. Conceived and designed by video creators, the UI is intuitive and simple for both highly technical professionals and less-technical clients to use with little (or no) training. The world’s leading creators and innovators trust Frame.io every day to help power their video workflows, including Turner Broadcasting, Disney, NASA, Snapchat, BBC, BuzzFeed, TED, Adobe, Udemy, Google, Fox Sports, Media Monks, Ogilvy and VICE Media.

Frame.io’s purpose is to allow all the contributors and participants in the video creation process to collaborate as if they’re all in the same room, no matter their physical location, accelerating workflows and eliminating obstacles to creativity. From script or storyboard to dailies to delivery, Frame.io redefines the modern video workflow.

Frame.io is backed by industry heavyweights including Accel, FirstMark Capital, SignalFire, and Shasta Ventures. Insight Partners recently led their series C of $50M. To learn more please visit http://frame.io. Watch: What is Frame.io?

About Insight Partners
Insight Partners is a leading global venture capital and private equity firm investing in high-growth technology and software companies that are driving transformative change in their industries. Founded in 1995, Insight currently has over $20 billion of assets under management and has cumulatively invested in more than 300 companies worldwide. Our mission is to find, fund, and work successfully with visionary executives, providing them with practical, hands-on growth expertise to foster long-term success. Across our people and our portfolio, we encourage a culture around a core belief: growth equals opportunity. For more information on Insight and all its investments, visit www.insightpartners.com or follow us on Twitter @insightpartners.

Press Contact

Megan Linebarger

Zazil Media Group

(e) megan@zazilmediagroup.com

(p) +1 (617) 480-3674

Paris, France – November 19, 2019 –Dalet, a leading provider of solutions and services for broadcasters and content professionals, announced today that Teleticino and IB3 are revamping their broadcast graphics capabilities with the new Dalet Cube NG solution powered by the Brainstorm real-time graphics engine. An Italian-language television channel based in Switzerland, Teleticino provides news and entertainment programming for the Ticino canton region. IB3, public radio and television channel of the Balearic Islands in Spain, caters to local viewers’ traditional broadcast and digital platforms. A core component of the Dalet Galaxy five platform for news workflows, Dalet Cube NG enables Teleticino and IB3 to create dynamic branding that up-levels visual news narratives across traditional, digital and social channels.

“With news consumption growth across digital channels and audiences craving image-rich news stories, it’s critical that broadcasters have a connected premium graphics workflow that empowers journalists with tools to add engaging visuals that drive a consistent brand whether they are covering a breaking news event for primetime television or bringing viewers on a content journey across social platforms,” comments Jérémy Krein, Dalet Cube NG Product Manager, Dalet. “With graphics creation and delivery at the heart of the story-centric news workflow, Dalet Cube NG enables a seamless multimedia production experience that is a quantum leap ahead of its predecessor in terms of quality, features and performance. And it’s available today for our Dalet Galaxy five customers.”

A major upgrade to the existing Dalet Cube graphics platform, Dalet Cube NG features a redesigned, highly scalable architecture and modern web-based UI. The embedded, high-performance Brainstorm real-time 3D graphics engine expands on-air and file-based graphics capabilities with its support for 4K and user-defined options, added primitives for building 2D and 3D graphics, support for Unicode fonts and languages, and outstanding transition logic.

Natively connected to Dalet Galaxy five, Dalet Cube NG propels fast-paced news workflows offering live changes on playback with advanced support for updating behaviors and conditions. Its simple-to-use toolset and templates foster rapid adoption across the newsroom, enabling broadcasters to scale the production and delivery of visually impactful, on-brand news packages across all traditional and digital channels. As the Dalet Galaxy five media asset management control layer tracks every graphic object, staff, including journalists, can search on any and every graphic element, making it easy to collaborate and repurpose material. The robust Dalet API enables extensible workflows and services that extend the graphics production and delivery capabilities.

Krein elaborates on the need to have a tightly integrated graphics component, “Clients like Teleticino, who already rely on Dalet Galaxy five for editorial management and process orchestration realize the workflow advantages that seamless integration brings. Dalet Cube NG eliminates the shortcomings of a multi-vendor graphics integration, facilitating full access and control over premium graphical elements within a workflow framework they are already familiar with. Further, as an existing customer, Dalet has an understanding of Teleticino specific needs which is combined with years of experience in designing solutions and workflows for global newsmakers. The combination of fully integrated premium graphics designed by a partner who understands your needs backed by decades of experience ensures a best of breed graphics workflow.”

Combined with Dalet Galaxy five, Dalet Cube NG offers a single-vendor solution that eliminates integration and deployment challenges and lowers cost of ownership.

For more information on Dalet Cube NG and other Dalet solutions, please visit https://www.dalet.com/cube

About Dalet Digital Media Systems

Dalet solutions and services enable media organisations to create, manage and distribute content faster and more efficiently, fully maximising the value of assets. Based on an agile foundation, Dalet offers rich collaborative tools empowering end-to-end workflows for news, sports, program preparation, post-production, archives and enterprise content management, radio, education, governments and institutions.

Dalet platforms are scalable and modular. They offer targeted applications with key capabilities to address critical functions of small to large media operations - such as planning, workflow orchestration, ingest, cataloguing, editing, chat & notifications, transcoding, play out automation, multi-platform distribution and analytics.

In July 2019, Dalet announced the acquisition of the Ooyala Flex Media Platform business. An acceleration of the company’s mission, the move brings tremendous value to existing Dalet and Ooyala customers, opening vast opportunities for OTT & digital distribution.

Dalet solutions and services are used around the world at hundreds of content producers and distributors, including public broadcasters (BBC, CBC, France TV, RAI, TV2 Denmark, RFI, Russia Today, RT Malaysia, SBS Australia, VOA), commercial networks and operators (Canal+, FOX, MBC Dubai, Mediacorp, Fox Sports Australia, Turner Asia, Mediaset, Orange, Charter Spectrum, Warner Bros, Sirius XM Radio), sporting organisations (National Rugby League, FIVB, Bundesliga) and government organisations (UK Parliament, NATO, United Nations, Veterans Affairs, NASA).

Dalet is traded on the NYSE-EURONEXT stock exchange (Eurolist C): ISIN: FR0011026749, Bloomberg DLT:FP, Reuters: DALE.PA.

Dalet® is a registered trademark of Dalet Digital Media Systems. All other products and trademarks mentioned herein belong to their respective owners.

For more information on Dalet, visit www.dalet.com.

Press Contact

Alex Molina

Zazil Media Group

(e) alex@zazilmediagroup.com

(p) +1 (617) 834-9600

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Media Asset Management (MAM) systems must undergo a fundamental transformation from simply a repository for audio, video, graphics, animations and associated metadata to an intelligent content factory that enables Media & Entertainment companies to streamline content production and distribution, says Bea Alonso, director, product marketing at Dalet.

“Content owners and distributors face a daunting challenge as their media supply chain is under strain to keep pace with their desire to exploit new markets and distribute content quickly and efficiently,” says Alonso.

Alonso, along with Luc Comeau, market director, MAM, at Dalet, will present their views during a TVTechnology webinar, Nov. 20 at Noon EDT. The hour long event, “How to implement an Intelligent Content Media Platform,” will examine how MAM technology can be leveraged to manage content production and distribution workflows to meet today’s new distribution demands while reducing labor costs and maximizing return on investment (ROI).

A major impediment holding M&E companies back from fully capitalizing on new distribution opportunities is their existing workflows, says Comeau. “Often M&E businesses find themselves with multiple departments acquiring and producing content in different formats, storage that is disconnected and geographically diverse and a lack of searchable metadata. Further, their content import workflows are disjointed, downstream distribution workflows are paltry or non-existent and there is limited visibility into content consumption and distribution.”

MAM technology holds the key to solving these issues by transforming existing workflows into an intelligent content factory tuned to choreograph the distribution of content to multiple platforms—one that leverages component-based workflows to maximize efficiency and ROI for M&E businesses, whether they are distributing their content to other businesses or directly to consumers, says Comeau.

The webinar, moderated by TVTechnology Editor-in-Chief Tom Butts, will also examine the questions of whether there is a business case to be made for investing in multi-platform distribution automation as well as where the ROI is in multiplatform distribution. There also will be the chance for those attending the webinar to have their questions answered.

Registration is currently open for the webinar. Simply click on the link and register.

From content creation to distribution and everything in between, content creators of all sizes require media and entertainment workflows that put top notch media in the hands of consumers.

AWS solutions enable customers to build faster, smarter, and more agile workflows across the entire value chain—reducing constraints, increasing efficiency, and creating opportunities to delight viewers and drive new revenue— across all types of media, including audio, video, text, and images.

Download the eBook, Innovate Quickly, to discover how you can:

• Eliminate traditional capacity and geographic constraints
• Realize the benefits and efficiency of production workflows in VFX, editing, rendering, and asset storage
• Scale storage up and down to better integrate analytics for viewer content personalization
• Enhance broadcast, OTT and D2C and digital publishing distribution
• Experience the value of AWS services – you can watch real-world video case studies from companies such as National Geographic, Untold Studios, Mikros Animation, Universal Music Group, and more

Download Now!

EditShare a technology leader that specializes in collaboration, security, and intelligent storage solutions for media creation and management, announced today that it will showcase the newest version of its software-based automated quality control solution (AQC), QScan, at IBC2019 (stand 7.A35), with Comparative Analysis, an industry-first content testing capability. Enabling video professionals to run quality checks on everything from picture structure to IMF packages and audio loudness right through to Dolby Vision™ HDR compliance and verification, the new QScan update now connects natively to EditShare EFS shared storage solutions as well as expands on its core quality control technology, making it dramatically easier for users to automate comprehensive testing of media files during any point of the creative process.

“With the number and diversity of media distribution targets constantly growing, file compliance is more important than ever. Historically, the AQC process that ensures your files meet compliance guidelines runs during the final stage of a project by an engineer who can configure the test patterns and read the results. While this will flag errors and prevent a bad file hand off, it is not efficient, especially if that error is at the beginning of your production. You will need to unravel and redo a portion of your project. A very time consuming and costly mistake,” states Sunil Mudholkar, vice president of product, EditShare. “With Qscan, an editor, colorist, supervisor or even an assistant can check the file integrity throughout the lifecycle of the file, catching the issues at the point they appear, saving time and money.”

New QScan features and capabilities shown at IBC2019 include:

Comparative Analysis

QScan is now making it easier and faster than ever to analyze all of your digital files. By providing context around the changes made to a file after testing, creatives are able to minimize the amount of time spent confirming that the file is ready for delivery. At a glance, users can see what changes were made to the file compared to the original; the timeline view also gives additional context on when changes were made to the file. With ever-tightening deadlines and fast turn projects, QScan Comparative Analysis helps creatives hand off final projects with confidence, increasing output and efficiency.

Native integration with EditShare EFS Media Spaces:

Workflow just got a whole lot easier! QScan can natively connect with EditShare EFS Media Spaces. It can pull and AQC content directly from a desired project space located on the EFS media engineered node. QScan reports can be delivered back to the same project space, confirming if content passed the desired AAQC settings. Content can be checked at every stage from ingest, audio, editorial, vfx, grading and finishing all without the content leaving the project located on the EFS media-aware node.

Quick Analysis Project

The new Quick Analysis option enables the user to start an analysis just by selecting a pre-designed template and selecting a file (or multiple files). By eliminating steps, there is no need to first create a new project, although that option still exists. Once the user selects a template and file(s), a new "Quick Analysis project" will be created. The project will take its name from the selected template. It’s fast, efficient and provides instant feedback on the integrity of your files.

Loudness Offset:

Audiences have long been frustrated by the sudden loudness of commercials. In the U.S., the CALM Act requires network and cable providers to broadcast commercials at the same volume level as the programming before and after it. Similarly in Europe, EBU R 128 is a guideline for loudness normalization and permitted maximum level of audio signals. Though QScan has always provided loudness checking, in the newest version, users will now be able to select an offset for loudness measurements, helping broadcasters easily adhere to legal regulations.

Mean Audio Phase:

The new Mean Audio Phase feature finds the average of the audio phase across the entire file, providing just one value per audio channel. The user can select what channels to compare when adding the threshold, ensuring the stereo audio file is correctly built for delivery.

Support for OpenEXR and TIFF sequences:

Support for OpenEXR, an open-source high-dynamic-range image file format created by Industrial Light & Magic, expands compliance testing capabilities for VFX facilities. OpenEXR files store high-quality, multi-depth images, can be comprised of lossless or lossy compression, support multiple layers, and hold a high luminance range and color. With QScan, VFX facilities can easily verify that the OpenEXR files are compliant.

DCP package identification and correct display:

Today, many studios distribute content to local theaters via Digital Cinema Packages as opposed to traditional film. Digital Cinema Packages are complex in nature, and are displayed in a visual tree chart similar to IMF packages. QScan’s new visual interface enables users to easily identify key digital files that comprise the Digital Cinema Packages and quickly verify that the correct digital cinema audio, image, and data streams files are stored in a given DCP when it is time for handoff.

Dolby Vision HDR analysis from Sidecars XML files:

For Dolby Vision HDR workflows, QScan now reads sidecar XML files directly. No longer do users have to embed HDR information in the video file. During the workflow, the video file and the sidecar XML both go through all production stages; HDR data is only embedded upon final delivery of the Dolby Vision file in J2K.

Integration with GrayMeta Iris reference player:

It is now possible to take the test results from QScan and visualise them in real-time, with reference player platform Graymeta Iris. Errors detected by QScan are shown in the Iris timeline and can be ranked by their severity.

Attendees to IBC2019 can book a demo to see the latest version of EditShare QScan running as part of the EFS 2020 shared storage and the tightly linked Flow 2020 media asset management workflow.

Remember when we were told we would stop using paper because of computers? When we’d all have flying cars? And how technology in broadcast and media was supposed to make things easier? It seems like none of these promises of the future—made in the past—have come true. Why?

I won’t dive into paper usage or flying cars (I’ll settle today for a good electric car), but media management really should be easier. So why isn’t it?

Is it that we now deal with an ever-increasing amount of media? Is it that today’s media includes a ton of metadata or not enough? Is it that we now have so many formats? The answer is a resounding “yes” to all of these questions… and others.

IT’S A MESS

The majority of today’s “modern” media environments are often inefficient and disorganized, costing you time, money and peace of mind. Assets aren’t properly organized and tracked, probably taking up space on expensive near-line storage (or even sitting in a file room somewhere) and causing delays in production.

Is your facility one where archives are spread across tape and cloud, and locating the files you need is time consuming and cost prohibitive, especially with cloud egress fees when you move the wrong file? At times, do you have so many assets coming in that you can often miss the details your teams need in order to create better content? Are workflows spread across systems that can’t communicate?

That’s not the way it’s supposed to be.

So, what should your media world look like? That’s a question worth answering.

There’s a saying when it comes to media—I don’t know who said it first, but they were right: “Your media is useless if you can’t find what you’re looking for.” And you’ve got more and more media every day.

MAM—media asset management—is supposed to make all your painful media issues disappear. But that hasn’t been the case. So, let’s design a MAM system that deals with all the pain points of handling media today, tomorrow and into the future.

POINTS TO PONDER

Here are some guidelines. You can think of it as a shopping list, or a comparison to what you have today or even a wish list.

Let’s start with the media itself. You need to be able to handle multiple resolutions (from proxy to 4K and potentially higher), as well as a multitude of file wrappers. Whether you convert to an in-house file format is a choice each facility will need to make on their own, the pros and cons are too exhaustive for this article. But what do you do with all that media? Where should it live?

While you might think that the answer depends on if your organization is in one or multiple locations, that’s really not the case. If assets are potential revenue drivers, the safest place is in the cloud, where backups exist. In that way, you can take advantage of cloud-based workflows to better unify and provide the flexibility to work from anywhere, and several other advancements that the MAM can take advantage of, like having a single place to search for everything.

Metadata should be easy to create, from simple names, dates, locations and topics all the way up to entire transcripts, where AI can play a massive role. And that leads us directly into storage that is searchable, efficient and flexible; with a variety of ways to search. If you’re looking for that one piece of footage among thousands (or millions), you need to be able to find it fast. And not everyone is great at coming up with search terms (how many times have you had to reword a Google search to find what you were looking for?). That’s a place for more AI.

Here’s an example: Let’s say that you needed to find every instance of when every senator said a specific phrase, going back to 2016. That would be an insane search, were it not for the transcript included with the metadata. Too many results; limit by party affiliation or timeframe. Not enough; expand the timeframe.

Have the ability to not only archive media—(which is only half of the equation)—but to be able to restore that media intelligently.

Make sure your MAM plays nice with your other systems and workflows. You want a clean process, not roadblocks. It may be hard to believe, but some operations still rely on sneakernet.

Have the right creative tools that seamlessly interface with your MAM so that producers, directors and editors don’t have to think about the process, they only have to think about being creative.

I’ve mentioned AI above, and it deserves an explanation. Today, while AI may seem like something we’re still waiting for (unless you’re Google or Amazon), it’s perfectly suited to work in a MAM. AI is simply any technique that enables a computer to do a rules-based task just as a human would. Add some AI machine learning and AI gets better at doing that task. Add deep learning to machine learning and speech and image recognition becomes commonplace for AI algorithms.

That’s where a MAM should be today. To paraphrase from an old 1970’s TV show: MAM should be better than it was before. Better. Stronger. Faster. But it shouldn’t cost six million dollars.

Namdev Lisman is executive vice president of Primestream.

It’s hard to imagine how much storage is being used and will be required by the Media & Entertainment industry. One authoritative study puts today’s total at nearly 52 Exabytes (1 EB = 1 billion GBs) and predicts almost 192 EB will be required by 2023.

M&E companies must determine how they will affordably scale their storage in an always-on environment to keep pace with this growth, as well as how they will actually find their media assets once they are stored. I’m sure you would also be interested in new ways to store and manage today’s crushing data load while setting yourself up to succeed for the long haul.

This white paper, “To Infinity and Beyond”, examines how a media workflow intelligence platform and scale-out object storage can be leveraged together as a media-aware storage platform that supports highly efficient, centralized media workflows. It also describes:

How M&E enterprises can reduce their overall storage costs and maintain fast access to stored assets in a HyperStore storage environment.

Why scale-out object-based storage is so ideal for nearline media applications supporting existing SAN and NAS production storage.

How Telestream’s Vantage can leverage the extensible metadata schema underlying Cloudian HyperStore and its custom metadata tagging to identify and retrieve media assets from storage without requiring a Media Asset Management (MAM) system.

Click here to download the full white paper.

Chesapeake Systems, the industry’s leading workflow solutions architects and services group for highly advanced technology systems in media and entertainment, announced today that industry veteran Amy Lounsbury has joined the company’s Southwest team. Lounsbury will serve as Director of Business Development for the region.

“Amy brings deep industry expertise and technical understanding to our Los Angeles-based operations,” says CEO Jason Paquin. “Her trend-spotting capabilities, problem solving orientation, and long-term perspective will help our customers take advantage of new technologies, and plan for the future.”

In the newly created role, Lounsbury will focus on guiding media-centric companies in developing efficient, scalable workflow solutions with an eye toward ongoing growth.

Lounsbury joins Chesapeake after four years as an Enterprise Account Manager at Diversified. She is active in the Hollywood Professional Association (HPA), including its Women in Post initiative, and in MESA’s Women in Technology, Hollywood section. She joined the industry 13 years ago during a disruptive and evolutionary time of transition from DVD to streaming and VOD and has been integrally involved in technological changes since that time. Early on, she worked with studios’ home media divisions and their changing distribution methods. Lounsbury’s interest in asset management’s importance to stakeholders was piqued during that time, leading her to help launch DAM conferences in Los Angeles, New York City, and Amsterdam for Media & Entertainment. She ultimately segued into helping clients with technical solutions to creative challenges.

“Over time, I became increasingly interested in analyzing client challenges and finding the best solutions in a constantly evolving landscape,” notes Lounsbury. “I find the process to be intellectually engaging and personally rewarding. Chesapeake’s ability to understand the creative perspective and the business imperative is truly rare, and I’m excited to bring that vision to customers.”

Lounsbury’s appointment follows the hiring of two key personnel for the Northeast region late last year, Peter Price and Chris May. She will work closely with LA-based Senior Systems Engineer Drew Hall and Account Manager Sarah Shechner. 

Cambridge, UK 28 May 2019 : Pixel Power, the global automation, branding and graphics innovator, is working with with Qvest Media, the leading global media systems architect, to bring its playout and automation systems to Qvest.Cloud, a multicloud management platform for media.

“Qvest.Cloud from Qvest Media is an ideal environment for our virtualized approach to automation”, said James Gilbert, CEO of Pixel Power. “For many reasons, broadcasters are keen to adopt hybrid workflows that blend cloud and on-premise hosting of fully integrated systems. That is precisely what Qvest.Cloud brings to the table: it means our clients can create their own bespoke workflows and use whichever cloud providers deliver the right service for them.”

Pixel Power, with its 30-year dedication to the media industry, has used its experience to develop a uniquely powerful and flexible approach to automation. It is built around two key elements: StreamMaster for video and graphics processing, and Gallium for workflow and playout automation. Their functional block architectures mean implementations can be fine-tuned to achieve optimal performance for each specific use case. StreamMaster and Gallium together build solutions which are inherently virtualizable and cloud-agnostic.

As well as fully-featured channel playout, the Pixel Power architecture also allows for powerful functionality such as the automated creation of VOD assets for catch-up channels, and the automated creation of trailers and promos. The company has long offered its automation technology on pay-as-you-go and pay-per-feature licensing models, which fit perfectly with Qvest.Cloud.

Qvest.Cloud radically simplifies the implementation and management of fully virtualized architectures using best-of-breed products. By networking third-party applications into a single, integrated workflow in a multicloud environment, it makes it simple to operate rich solutions from a single dashboard, breaking down the barriers between on-premise installation and private and public clouds.

“Pixel Power playout and automation solutions are designed to take full benefit of the cloud, and therefore fit perfectly in the Qvest.Cloud ecosystem”, said Thomas Müller, CTO at Qvest Media. “Our aim is to offer customers from the broadcast and media industry a platform that is scalable and cost-efficient, with proper ready-to-use packages and custom-tailored enterprise solutions.”

James Gilbert of Pixel Power concluded: “We have always believed that the transition to IP was simply an enabler on the road to tailored, operationally significant and extremely cost-effective solutions for our customers around the world. We are excited to be working with Qvest Media to offer broadcasters and media companies the chance to transition to modern, software-centric technology supporting their own requirements and their own pace of change.”

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About Pixel Power, a Rohde & Schwarz Company

Pixel Power develops software-defined, virtualizable, solutions for broadcast playout, automation, master control, graphics & branding used in linear television channels, OTT and VOD. Our award-winning branding and promotions systems, graphics-enabled master control switchers and sophisticated switchable graphics production systems allow producers to deliver dynamic live and pre-recorded content for any SD, HD, 4k, mobile, online or interactive application.

Pixel Power has 30 years’ experience of engineering prowess and dedication to customer support that has made it the industry’s first choice in graphics, branding and playout. With more than 2500 installations worldwide, customers including market-leading broadcasters such as BBC, Ericsson, ITV, SWR, WDR, TV2 Norway, Danmarks Radio, TV5 Monde, CBC, Disney, Discovery, ESPN, ViaSat and Sky.

Recently acquired by Rohde & Schwarz GmbH, Pixel Power corporate headquarters are in Cambridge UK with regional offices in Grass Valley California and Dubai UAE.

Pixel Power can be contacted online at www.pixelpower.com.


Pixel Power contact:
Name: Ciaran Doran
Title: Exec VP
Email: cdoran@pixelpower.com
Tel: +44 7775 581301

PR Contact:
Name: Jennie Marwick-Evans
Company: Manor Marketing
Email: jennie@manormarketing.tv
Tel: +44 7748 636171

Portland, Oregon, USA – March 27, 2019 – Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS), an Amazon.com company, today announced the Secure Packager and Encoder Key Exchange (SPEKE), an open, extensible API specification developed to streamline integration of Digital Rights Management (DRM) with encoders, transcoders, and origin servers (encryptors).

Until recently, most integrations required a custom API for each DRM solutions provider and each encryptor, which proved costly and time consuming, and often delayed the launch of new services. SPEKE solves these challenges by providing a standardized method for key exchange between encryptors and DRM systems. It also enables customers to use SPEKE-enabled key servers or encryptors in on-premises, cloud, or hybrid infrastructures. SPEKE is designed for both live and on-demand media workflows.

Built on the DASH Industry Forum’s Content Protection Information Exchange Format (CPIX) standard for key exchange, SPEKE provides a universal, secure way for SPEKE-enabled key servers and encryptors to encrypt content. An API specification supports HLS, MSS and DASH packaging as well as standard DRM platforms, including Apple FairPlay Streaming, Microsoft PlayReady, Google Widevine, AES-128, and proprietary DRMs.

Multiple APN partners already have implemented SPEKE, including AWS, Axinom, castLabs, EZDRM, INKA Entworks, Insys Video Technologies, Intertrust Technologies, Irdeto, Kaltura, NAGRA, NEXTSCAPE, Verimatrix, Viaccess-Orca, VUALTO, and WebStream.

“SPEKE is an exciting development for our industry. Building on the CPIX API, it further improves operational efficiencies and reduces both the time and costs involved in launching OTT services,” said Will Law, founding board member and Vice-Chairman, DASH Industry Forum.

“Prior to SPEKE, integration required a custom API tailored to each DRM solutions provider and each individual encoder, transcoder, and packager,” said Michael Callahan, Head of Media Solutions Marketing at AWS Elemental. “This often resulted in delayed new service launches for customers. SPEKE simplifies DRM integration to a single secure API. Any SPEKE-enabled DRM key server works with any SPEKE-enabled encryptor out of the box without the need for proprietary integration.”

To learn more about how to encrypt live or on-demand media workflows using SPEKE-enabled integrations, please visit the AWS Elemental SPEKE solutions page.

BURLINGTON, MASS.—Today’s media value chain is interconnected—from one end to the other. The myriad of production and post-production tasks now interact in new and complicated ways. So just as overall workflows must be flexible to accommodate different content production and distribution needs and priorities, so too must storage. And since storage represents such a large percentage of the cost to create media, infrastructure economics are always at play. Intelligent, carefully considered storage that includes a range of on premises and cloud tiers is critical to the faster, less resource-intensive and more efficient, collaborative workflows that have now become essential. But how?

TIERS OF A CLOUD

Storage tiers are a natural outgrowth of the economic pressures to produce more content with little to no increase in budgets. It’s just not practical for one storage tier to economically accommodate the varying performance needs seen across all functions and workflows. Typically, two or three storage systems work together within a media organization. Expensive high-performance storage, utilizing flash or raid arrays, are used with real-time applications. The next tier, built for less frequent access and for less cost, stores occasionally accessed media or can serve as a backup for the primary tier. Finally, the tier used for archive is the least expensive, but comes with more complexity and slower access.

These traditional on-premise buckets—including online production storage, flash media, nearline and archive—have been around for decades. Each has its place and is even more relevant as the industry makes its move to the cloud. With solutions like software-defined storage, it’s possible to move these tiers to the cloud. What’s most important, however, whether in the cloud or on-premise, is expanding capabilities and futureproofing workflows for a rapidly advancing cloud environment. Technology like software-defined storage can achieve a combination of performance, scalability and reliability difficult through on-premise storage alone. It can accommodate hybrid models, which are extremely attractive as media organizations migrate to the cloud. There are valid reasons for retaining some storage on-premise. Hybrid solutions offer the flexibility to temporarily park media not actively being used to nearline in the cloud and free up space in on-premise nearline systems.

NEWFOUND FREEDOM

The ability to work collaboratively and remotely is becoming critical to today’s media workflows. Access to cloud-based files accommodates co-located productions. Productions are no longer tied to local talent, preferring the flexibility and cost benefits of talent that can work from anywhere. Consider many of today’s film and TV productions: Production companies have a global talent pool of editors, sound engineers and visual effects experts that are now accessible around the globe. Talent can work remotely and access the same high-resolution files from anywhere. Likewise, studio and production executives can access content and weigh in on dailies from anywhere. This freedom not only yields higher-quality content but also dramatically lowers production costs.

Cloud-based, or partially cloud-based, workflows and storage deliver this capability. Yet, as more and more workflows evolve to the cloud and cloud storage is part of the mix at least for some needs, the economics of how it all works together has not been fully resolved. And, as media in the cloud is everywhere, security becomes a greater concern. Content must be secure both from inside and the outside. With cloud solutions, it’s possible to control who has access internally while protecting assets from external threats.

INTERSECTING GEARS

A car has a lot of potential power. But it takes a good driver to make it run to its full potential. Storage systems should be considered in much the same way. To fully realize efficient workflows, it takes the right engine sitting behind it to fill in the workflow gaps, drive needed functions and accelerate the movement of assets.

Securely and efficiently moving assets where they need to go, as well as providing easy access to a shared library, requires an orchestration layer. It’s not economical to leave media on high-priced storage when you’re not using it so fluid movement by policy from on-prem to the cloud and between tiers is essential. When a storage platform is part of, or closely linked to, an overall content creation platform, it becomes an integral part of a powerful end-to-end content production system.

FLEXIBLE WORKFLOWS

How storage is engaged depends on how workflows are configured and what is being archived. For example, the economics of 4K in the cloud doesn’t work. It’s simply too costly and impractical to move and edit huge 4K files. Saving proxies to the cloud, however, makes sense and facilitates collaboration that doesn’t require a lot of bandwidth. For a production being shot in North Carolina, an editor in Los Angeles can start work almost as soon as footage is captured. Camera originals are immediately archived—most often to the cloud—and media is normalized. A workflow acceleration platform can handle transcoding and other mechanics to get content into production immediately. So as media is prepared for editorial, two storage tiers are in use.

Even 4K production in the cloud is possible through a provider like Microsoft, though it requires the right infrastructure so workflows are fast and efficient enough. Not only is extremely fast production storage in the cloud required, but so is bandwidth fast enough to handle the throughput. All tiers of storage are needed—including online, nearline and archive—but content must also be managed efficiently so it’s economical, secure and accessible through powerful search engines in today’s sophisticated MAM systems.

Again, the system must be fluid. It may not be economical to keep all of your footage in the online tier of storage, so it can be stored to a nearline tier and retrieved when needed. For instance, footage for the second half of a film isn’t needed right away, so it can be accessed when it’s time to edit.

SHARED GOALS

Storage and archive today must help productions and creative teams achieve their pressing, overarching goal: much more efficient workflows that can help get work done faster, easier and with less resources. This requires more powerful collaborative capabilities, simpler integration, faster deployment and easier-to-maintain systems and technical environments. And, especially when considering storage and archive, this is not a one-size-fits-all proposition. Storage tiers are here to stay, at least for the foreseeable future. But moving them to the cloud through virtualized, software-driven technology can go a long way to meeting the challenges facing the media industry today.

Dave Colantuoni is senior director of product management for Avid.

New York City, NY – July 10, 2018 –Frame.io, the leading workflow management platform for video, has made significant steps to strengthen security in media environments, announcing that the company has received SOC2 TYPE 1 compliance, ensuring customers’ data is protected. In addition, the Frame.io video collaboration platform now includes two new security features: Visual Watermarking and Asset Lifecycle Management, expanding security management to front-line workflows.

“At Frame.io content security matters. It doesn’t just matter, it’s everything,” said Emery Wells, co-founder and CEO of Frame.io. “Earlier this year, I wrote an open letter to our customers about our growing security team and initiatives, with a promise to not just meet security best practices, but far exceed them. Becoming SOC2 Type 1 compliant is a big step toward our goal to lead in the content security space. And releasing new security features like Visual Watermarking and Asset Lifecycle Management is another way we can deliver on our promise.”

Ensuring Data Protection Through SOC2 Type 1 Compliance

As part of this compliance, Frame.io underwent a rigorous audit process conducted in accordance with the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants (AICPA). The audit process evaluated Frame.io against service controls derived from three key trust principles of SOC2 - security, availability, and confidentiality. That means all customers can rest assured their valuable media assets are protected from security threats today and well into the future.

“SOC2 Type 1 certification is a milestone in our efforts to keep customers' data protected,” stated Wells. “Ensuring customers’ content is safe and accessible is a responsibility we take very seriously. So instead of just talking about our security processes, we invited an independent third-party auditor from an accredited auditing company and had them examine us against security, availability, and confidentiality controls. This is just the first of many measures Frame.io is taking to build the industry’s best security program. Now, when we say that your content is secure, you don't have to only take our word for it.”

As part of the audit process, auditors examined various internal controls and practices, including human resources, software development lifecycle, risk management & assessment, vendor management, change management, incident response process, security monitoring & operations, infrastructure & cloud security, physical security, and most importantly, the Frame.io management and board's commitment to security & privacy of Frame.io customers.

Customers can review a SOC2 Type 1 report, validating Frame.io security controls. The Frame.io SOC2 Type 1 report is available under NDA to all existing and potential customers.

Frame.io’s effort to obtain SOC2 Type 1 compliance was led by Frame.io Head of Information Security, Abhinav Srivastava. Abhinav joined Frame.io this past September from the AT&T Research Lab where he was leading a number of security research efforts. Abhinav and the Frame.io security team recently co-authored a white paper published on July 9th as a part of Usenix's HotCloud '18 Workshop on cloud computing.

Learn more on the Frame.io blog: https://blog.frame.io/2018/07/10/delivering-on-our-security-promise/.

Download the Frame.io Security white paper, Go Serverless: Securing Cloud via Serverless Design Patterns.

Security is not a checkbox, it is a never-ending part of the product development process. And so Frame.io has released two new features to further strengthen its ties with enterprise customers.

Introducing Visual Watermarking

Now admins and team managers can configure watermarks that are embedded onto any media their users upload to Frame.io. Admins can type out their own custom watermark, set its opacity, and choose where in the frame they want the watermark to appear. Then they can configure their team settings to automatically watermark the content their team uploads to Frame.io, helping deter any unauthorized sharing of their team's content.

Introducing Asset Lifecycle Management

With Asset Lifecycle Management, customers need not worry about cleaning out old videos from the platform; Frame.io does it for you on an automated cadence that you define. Admins and team managers can set a limit on the number of days a given asset will remain in Frame.io. Once an asset hits that limit, Frame.io automatically deletes it. Assets can be restored up to 30 days after deletion and admins can disable Asset Lifecycle Management on a per-project basis.

Asset Lifecycle Management is built for the enterprise admin that finds themselves removing assets from Frame.io constantly, whether that be for security, for better organization, or for increased storage capacity.

About Frame.io

Frame.io powers the future of creative collaboration. Today’s leading media companies use Frame.io to streamline their video review and collaboration process with teammates, clients and a variety of other stakeholders. Frame.io is all about what happens before distribution, before you reach the finish line. They make getting there faster, smoother and more efficient with a single platform that works seamlessly across web and mobile. Frame.io for iOS is the winner of a 2016 Apple Design Award.

Frame.io is backed by industry heavyweights including FirstMark Capital, Accel Partners and Jared Leto. To learn more please visit http://frame.io.

Press Contact

Megan Linebarger

Zazil Media Group

(e) megan@zazilmediagroup.com

(p) +1 (617) 480-367

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Workflow, automation. Workflow automation. Whenever anyone uses these words in a sentence, my eyes start to glaze over, so I don’t blame you if you’re feeling woozy. Hang in there with me for a few hundred words and let’s try to look at these from another perspective.

I like to boil all this down to the essential point and build from there. What is our business? What are our client’s business? After all, one thing we all have in common is the pursuit of profit in the service of our clients. Sometimes it seems we are in the workflow, IT or automation business, but we’re not. Here are some strategies to help achieve our real purpose.

Every time I’ve found myself off in the wrong direction in my career it has always come down to one error. I sometimes work on step four of a 10-step process before I’ve solved steps one, two and three. I suspect I’m not alone here. Businesses are better served if they look at the idea of automation as a holistic strategy and not a point solution. If we look at this holistically, it makes sense to start any automation exercise or workflow analysis at the beginning. At some point, somebody is asking for something. This is the tabula rasa. This exchange should define every other step, be it a simple fulfillment or a 20 system, 200-step, geographically diverse workflow.

I’ve spent a lot of time these last few years listening at conferences where we all are trying to come to grips with the explosion of data and how to solve the issues. I recall a simple lesson I learned years ago working in a record store (for my younger friends, just Google it.). When I moved from a simple cash register to a point of sale system, the data I collected drove almost every decision I made. It was the exercise of “capture relevant data at the time of a purchase,” making the transaction easier for my customer while providing me with a concise, holistic view of the appetite for easy listening jazz in Westfield, N.J. It was higher than I thought.

TWO DISTINCT SPHERES

Let’s take that prehistoric lesson and apply it to today’s media automation needs. If you look at automation from a work order perspective, the opportunities break into two distinct spheres. First, the work order gives us a unique opportunity to completely streamline the onboarding process of work. Using automated workflows and rules engines, the onboarding process should be as simple as a few clicks. For whom are we doing this work? On what are we working? What is the desired outcome? Where does the work ultimately go? 

From this key work order metadata, automated workflows, drawing from a predefined resource pool, can assemble a manufacturing manifest describing what services need to be performed. Also, what system or staff is best suited to perform those services while laying the ground work for remediating any errors, timing issues and delays. Historically, work order systems have only been asked to store data primarily focused on financial and usage results. Today, this repository must store all technical data and the data may also be harvested through interfaces to monitoring systems, harvested from smart networks or manually entered. The idea is we are assembling a database of rich technical data for the workflows to work against. The asset and resource repositories become the variables in the equations generated by workflows and executed through rules engines. This moves the work order system from a cash register to a complete repository of institutional knowledge, allowing us to merge operational data with financial data.

Of course, the work order still performs its traditional function of instantly calculating expenses, applying parameter-based rate cards and preparing either cost recovery journal entries or invoices.

AT A GLANCE

Modern integration methods remove the technical challenge of speaking to others in systems in an audited, queue-based manner, so no integration message ever gets missed. This allows the work order to facilitate the workflows of adjunct systems and aggregate critical metadata—giving users direct feedback about the status of the work order and raising alerts when something goes awry. This also allows the work order system to present holistic dashboards where the aggregated facility data is presented in a usable form. This keeps operations orderly while enabling problems to be flagged early. The real payoff is the ability to leverage a complete picture to make better business decisions. These days, margins are wildly thin and the ability to use data to determine staff footprint, schedules, equipment purchases and cloud strategy can make all the difference.

Of course, work orders are frequently initiated outsidethe work order system. This presents us with an opportunity to address top line revenue. The same automation, workflows and integration technologies are used to imbed the work order initiation process into whatever tool the user requires. This can be accomplished through integration with outside portals, or more effectively by creating smart adapters to the user base system. For commercial enterprises, it offers the opportunity to simplify work orders and streamline the end of month reporting stress.

Workflows, integration, automation and technology are all moving incredibly fast. What was an economically impossible project five years ago can often feel like an absolute imperative today. If the automation strategy isn’t looked at from a work order perspective, it’s like driving in a 500hp sports car with bad handling and old tires. Sure, you can go really fast, but you might not like where you end up.

Greg Dolan is Chief Operating Officer for Xytech Systems.

NEVADA CITY, CALIF.— Telestream announced that Yangaroo, a Canadian digital media delivery service provider for the music, advertising and awards industries, has chosen Telestream technology to improve and speed its media processing, QC and captioning workflows.

Yangaroo’s patented cloud-based platform, Digital Media Distribution System, is said to automate “dozens of manual steps in a streamlined workflow, eliminating errors and increasing efficiencies. Content, such as music, music videos, and advertising can be quickly distributed to television, radio, media, retailers, awards shows, and other authorized recipients safely. Additionally, the platform manages a number of workflows—such as execution of traffic instructions, award show submissions, and approvals of on-air content.”

Yangaroo processes a variety of media, from short-form ads to long-form programs; and broadcast-ready HD content to low-budget music video productions that are not always technically suitable for broadcast. All this content needs to be managed quickly and efficiently, with minimum operator interaction.

To continue to support its rapid business growth, Yangaroo chose several Telestream products to support its methodology.

At the point of ingest, Yangaroo uses Telestream’s Vidchecker QC software to inspect video files and determine if they are technically suitable for broadcast. This is especially important for music video files. Source files are rated by a traffic light system: green is OK to broadcast. Yellow means some corrective action is needed, while red means the files and their associated reports need to be sent back to the producer for corrections.

The API in Vidchecker allows Yangaroo to customize the QC reports and to extract the error data for use in the next stages of their workflows. They also use Vidchecker to check that TV spots meet broadcast technical standards before they are delivered.

The workflow management and transcoding in the Vantage Media Processing Platform enables automated delivery of a variety of formats. An API enables Yangaroo to manage the process from its own DMDS system with customized workflow processes. The Vantage workflow orchestration is also integrated with Yangaroo’s Teletrax and Nielsen systems to add appropriate watermarking, as well as with Aspera to aid in accelerated network delivery of files.

Telestream CaptionMaker is used to add legally required closed captions.

Although the Yangaroo system is predominantly cloud-based, the media processing is hosted on physical servers at their data center in Toronto. Yangaroo has recently added Telestream Lightspeed K80 servers, which Yangaroo chief technology officer, Richard Klosa, said provide an average performance gain of 50 to 100 percent compared to the generic Dell servers that they initially used.

“We owned CaptionMaker and Vidchecker before they were acquired by Telestream,” Klosa said. “Now that they are all under the Telestream roof, we are finding many workflow benefits, with Vantage acting as the orchestrator between all the elements, managing the QC and captioning processes from a central location.”

Most broadcasters and media businesses are now on their second or third generation asset management system. What was once an enforced necessity—a means of keeping track of content on servers and data tapes—is now a positive asset, lying at the heart of the workflow.

Those workflows, in turn, draw together small blocks of functionality (tasks) with, where necessary, intelligent decision-making and branching based on metadata values. They can include manual as well as automated functionality.

The workflows can also be triggered by other systems, and report to them. The business management of an enterprise will be overseen by a system such as SAP: it makes sense for the media workflow layer to provide detailed reports and audit trails into the enterprise management layer. That way the board can take decisions and initiate new services, based on real information on how services are performing and what they cost.

Through this vertical integration the chief engineer knows that, for instance, the transcoder farm is a bottleneck; the CFO knows what impact this bottleneck is having on revenues and what the cost of relieving it will be.

The successful platform, therefore, will require constant enrichment of the metadata. Some of this information will come from the content: in the DPP/AS11 wrapper if it is bought-in content; or as shooting data if you are in production. There are the familiar metadata categories, which are added as you process it: things like reference numbers, program titles, precise durations, compliance edits and so on.

But you can enrich the metadata in many more ways. The idea of tagging—attaching descriptive metadata to a specific timecode—is extending beyond sport to other program genres. Some technical metadata is generated as it is processed through internal workflows: transcoding formats, for example.

Metadata can be enriched through queries of external data sources. If you buy in a movie, you could harvest further information from websites like IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes. If you are covering a golf tournament, you could collect course statistics from the club’s website and player rankings from the PGA.

If your application needs it, scripts can be transcribed, either by an external service or using voice to text conversion. As well as providing additional internal functionality, this continuing enrichment of the metadata can feed on to the delivery system, providing all the information needed for subscribers to discover and explore content, for instance.

It is tempting to think of metadata as a single collection of information, but in our software-defined architecture, as well as moving content between computers, there is no reason why we should not share metadata between systems. The playout software, for instance, needs a set of key information but it does not need access to all the metadata, which is why it is common to develop simple transfer protocols between asset management and playout.

Intellectual property rights management is an immensely complex subject, and its users tend to maintain very sophisticated systems to ensure they comply precisely. But some information from it is valuable to other users, and the actions of other users are vital to the rights management team. As we have already seen, audit trails could be reported to the enterprise management system.

Service-oriented, software-defined workflows are without doubt the way of the future. They provide more efficient ways of working through extensive automation, better management and more responsive customer service. The key to success is metadata.

The workflow orchestration layer is the metadata engine, which is asset management. It must interface with external systems, whether that is by secure link to the enterprise management infrastructure or harvesting information from multiple relevant websites. The asset management platform stores much of our metadata, and knows where to get the rest.

The key to getting the true benefits of the move to IT-centric broadcast and media infrastructures lies in developing new, service-oriented ways of working, allowing the organization to determine what best suits its creative and commercial needs, freed from the limitations of fixed architectures. That cannot happen without the right metadata.

This story first appeared on TVT's sister publication TVB Europe. 

LOS ANGELES —From the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers: SMPTE announced the publication of its study group report on the high-dynamic-range imaging ecosystem. The work of 170 top international experts, the SMPTE SG report summarizes an extensive discussion on the implementation of HDR in professional media workflows and addresses key questions that will arise for industry members as they move forward in using HDR technology. The report also offers recommendations for further HDR standardization efforts by SMPTE and other organizations.

“HDR is a rapidly emerging and much-debated technology with the capacity to make a greater impact on viewer experience than can higher-resolution formats,” said Alan Lambshead, vice president of standards for SMPTE. “Recognizing the remarkable potential of HDR and the media industry.’s growing interest in this technology, SMPTE created an HDR ecosystem study group and—within just 12 months—delivered a valuable consensus report on implementation of HDR and the creation of efficient HDR workflows.”

The SMPTE SG report on the HDR ecosystem provides consensus guidance on HDR terms and definitions and presents detailed and useful information on HDR technologies that, up to this point, has not been readily available to the media industry. The report acknowledges that although HDR technologies, both proprietary and standardized, are available today and already can be implemented for non-real-time workflows, challenges remain in live or real-time applications.

It further recognizes that implementation of HDR will be complex and affect many systems in a professional media workflow. The report catalogs HDR technologies, examines issues in both live and non-live HDR workflows, and describes the role of HDR metadata. Finally, it recommends industry harmonization regarding HDR technologies and parameters, stressing the importance of standardizing new technologies related to HDR and of updating current standards to enable HDR.

“Interest in HDR has begun to explode, and this report on the HDR ecosystem has been eagerly anticipated by engineers and technologists across the media industry,” said Thomas Bause Mason, chair of the SMPTE Technical Committee 10E SG on HDR Ecosystem. “We are confident that this timely SMPTE publication will answer many of the questions that emerge as HDR is discussed and implemented.”

SMPTE is actively working on the recommendations contained in the report and encourages industry participants to join the effort by contacting 10e-hdr@lists.smpte.org. The report is available for download at https://www.smpte.org/standards/reports.

Also see...
October 19, 2015
Global HDR TV Shipments to Exceed 32 Million in 2019

October 15, 2015
Is HDR Worth It?

October 7, 2015
Rogers to Offer 4KTV with HDR in 2016

October 7, 2015
Vizio Launches $130,000 HDR 4KTV Set

September 1, 2015
ATEME and NexGuard Launch Watermark for Pre-Release HDR Content

August 28, 2015
CEA Defines ‘HDR Compatible’ Displays

August 25, 2015
Thomson Video Network to Demo UHD Broadcasting of HDR Content

June 25, 2015
Amazon Instant Video Adds HDR for Prime Members

June 24, 2015
Technicolor HDR Single-Stream System Available for Testing

May 21, 2015
What the Public Gets About 4K, HDR and More Color

April 11, 2015
NAB Labs to Demo Super Hi-Vision, LDM, HDR HFR

April 9, 2015
Technicolor and Sinclair Demo HDR UHD Live Over-the-Air Broadcast

February 12, 2015
Updated: OTT, HDR, 4K and Last Rites for 4:3

January 30, 2015
HDR Video With Stephan Ukas-Bradley

October 22, 2014
SMPTE 2014: Doing HDR With HEVC

July 8, 2014
EBU’s David Wood Pitches HDR

February 20, 2014
DFT to Unveil Scanity HDR Scanner at the 2014 NAB Show

December 26, 2012
University researchers make real-time HDR encoding reality

June 22, 2012
Sony Sinks Nearly $1 Billion Into HDR-Capable Stacked CMOS Sensors

September 13, 2006
Sony rolls out HDR-FX7 1080i HDV camcorder

March 1, 2006
Sony introduces HDR-HC3 Handycam

SAN FRANCISCO—Sometimes it’s not a revolution that begins to transform a technology, but an evolution; even when that evolution turns out to be a jerky, stop-and-start progression.

Over the last five years, the professional video industry has had to rethink the way it integrates multiple delivery platforms into a traditional broadcast infrastructure. Automation within the broadcast plant is one of the last big technologies to navigate this new path. In doing so, these backroom big iron boxes are having to consider ever more little details, from digital media production to automated production workflows for transcoding and ingest.

Integration is a key component to the RUSHWORKS A-List automation system, which can connect to companion systems like the VDESK production system to capture and stream and then schedule through automation.LIVE AND AUTOMATED
That’s where the evolution—rather than revolution—of this complicated technology comes into play. “Our focus is on evolving the production format in a evolutionary way rather than revolutionary way, by making incremental changes to improve production and include ties to products in other areas,” said Bill Hadsell, product manager for Grass Valley, adding that the Montreal-based provider of media production and distribution technology plans to introduce advancements to its Ignite platform in spring 2016 that will better help stations automate and manage their digital platforms.

Where Grass Valley has found its footing is in handling live automated productions, and all the chaos that goes with it. “A newscast never goes according to the script; stuff happens and it doesn’t go according to plan,” Hadsell said. “What you need in a live production system is a system that can automate the parts that are routine and can be driven to automation without any thought, and then allow for the flexibility to go off script on any moment.”

That’s one of the key features Grass Valley attempted to integrate into the Ignite Konnect Live Production Automation System, which serves as a link between the control room and the newsroom to allow users to choose a level of automation that suits a specific workflow.

Taking an automation system and building on top of that—in effect, boosting its capabilities to be more than simply automation— has been one of the biggest trends for the industry. Creating those building blocks was the goal of Imagine Communications for its ADC and D-Series automation solutions. Using the Versio playout platform, users can add so-called business continuity solutions to existing automation systems to expand their channels.

The company used the IBC Show as a jumping off point to demonstrate how a series of solutions—even automation—are deployable on-premises, in a remote data center or virtualized in the cloud. The company showcased a virtualized, cloud-based business continuity solution in which channel operations are automatically mirrored with the D-Series automation system.

“Linear automation plays a critical role for media organizations, but as the scale of content distribution exponentially expands, automation systems need to evolve into a component of a content factory,” said Jason Salyards, director of product development for playout for Dallas-based Imagine Communications. The company’s ADC and D-Series automation systems are being enhanced to become interoperable with content factory operations, he said.

INTEGRATION WITH PLAYOUT
Likewise, keeping tabs on assets as they are passing back and forth between digital platforms was a key priority for Florical, a Gainesville, Fla.-based provider of broadcast automation systems. The company’s FlashForward solution automates the acquisition workflow process in a way that integrates with the company’s big-box automation solutions like AirBoss.

Intertwining automation with playout has proven a smart move for Harmonic as well, which introduced a suite of automation products that enable end-to-end automation and live playout via the iMCR integrated Master Control Room system. At IBC, the San Jose, Calif.-based provider of video processing and distribution technology showed how its Polaris Advance and Polaris Elite automation systems can control the company’s Electra X and XVM encoding systems. This new capability adds to the control of the company’s Spectrum MediaPort, Spectrum Channel-Port and Spectrum X SDI-to-IP playout migration platform.

The result, according to Andy Warman, director of product management, media servers and storage for Harmonic, is an experience that ticks off a long list of necessary options via a single user interface: controlling traditional playout, channel-in-a-box, integrated channel playout, cloud-based playout as well as drive playout and graphic branding.

“We see this as a pivotal enhancement to our automation system as we continue to drive function integration across our video server and encoder product lines,” he said.

SOMETHING FOR EVERYONE
Keeping in mind how much the broadcast industry has changed—and won’t be reverting to the era of single-channel, single-output any time soon—is key when considering automation features.

“Automation has reached a level of maturity, whether it’s for a network broadcaster or a municipality,” said Rush Beesley, founder of RUSHWORKS a provider of television automation and production systems in Flower Mound, Texas. And it’s OK to acknowledge it, whether you’re a small-market broadcaster or university production department, Beesley said: You want what the big boys have, without an unreachable price tag.

“With what we offer in terms of feature sets, there’s a price point that’s equally attractive to public education channels, LPTVs, translators or anyone whose doing linear scheduled broadcasts with a big reliable servers, graphics built into the box, and sophisticated things like EAS management onscreen,” Beesley said of the company’s A-LIST automation system. Today’s automation systems need to provide those kinds of features, regardless of the broadcaster’s DMA, he said.

At the end of the day, a broadcaster has the same basic priorities as a large market station: Use whatever channel platforms are at its disposal to reach an audience effectively. Building upon the features of an automation system was a priority for NVerzion as well. The Salt Lake City-based provider of automation systems recently introduced a new automation, video server and graphics package that includes the NVerzion CLASS automation system and CloudNine video server.

“Today’s broadcasters… cannot afford to be boxed in by the constraints of a channel-in-a-box automation system,” said Reed Haslam, director of sales and marketing at NVerzion. The system is designed to help broadcasters accelerate operations, eliminate scalability issues and make workflow management upgrades, he said.

The educational station OUTV, run by the University of Oklahoma, recently installed a CLASS system to streamline its file-based workflow. The station can control a variety of third-party equipment to assist with ingest, dubbing, scheduled satellite recordings and playout to provide viewers with a mix of live and recording programming.

“Our old automation system was proving to be ineffective at communicating with other equipment,” said George Franklin, instructor and general manager at the University of Oklahoma, which is proving important as the station supports both a Web stream and its four cable TV channels.

What is driving these new options is not new-features-for-features sake, but rather a fundamental shift in the professional video marketplace. “Fundamentally the decisions that are being made have to do with how to help stations monetize content across all these different platforms,” Grass Valley’s Hadsell said. Sure, automation is designed to help streamline that workflow, “but how do we begin to tie our tools together so that someone who wants to output their digital media and tie it into their digital broadcast can do so?” he mused. “No one can afford to be left out of that.”

NEW YORK—Snippies is one of the largest creators of sales and marketing video in the world. Our database of more than 300 clients includes Amazon, Google, AppNexus, Microsoft and Boston Consulting Group. These companies and others like them rely on us to deliver everything from case studies and testimonials to product demos and consumer research.

Video production is a fast-turnaround industry. It’s not unusual for us to get a call from a client on Monday asking us to interview a customer in Iceland on Wednesday and then create a polished testimonial for use at a conference on Friday.

With a network of video journalists in every major city around the world, capturing high-quality content on short notice was never an issue. The real challenge was getting the footage back to our headquarters in New York in time for editing.

Snippies team utilizing Signiant’s Media Shuttle platformTRIAL AND ERROR
Over the years, we’ve experimented with different approaches to this problem. FedEx was a reasonable solution, but shipping a hard drive across the world is expensive and, most importantly, time-consuming. Footage wouldn’t arrive until two or three days after it was originally shot. FTP was fine for small files, but not for hours of full-resolution HD footage; not to mention the fact that many of our videographers had difficulty understanding the highly technical FTP interface. Getting them the proper training was an ordeal, and even when a videographer had done everything correctly, sometimes the FTP link would fail in the middle of the night, forcing us to start over the next morning.

After researching several large file transfer solutions, we chose to go with Signiant’s Media Shuttle, mostly because of the affordable cost and simple user interface. Media Shuttle’s SaaS architecture and pay-per-use pricing model allowed us to try it out without having to risk a ton of upfront investment buying software outright and managing it on our servers, as other solutions required. Also, Media Shuttle automatically scales to our usage and doesn’t have any data caps or file size limits.

Media Shuttle’s simple user interface and checkpoint/restart functionality were also influential factors. We needed something fast, intuitive to use and far less complicated than FTP; something that could pick up transfers where they left off in case of interruption.

SIMPLE INSTALLATION
Installation was relatively simple. Signiant’s customer onboarding specialists helped us install the “file pump” software on our network server and from there we set up our Media Shuttle portal, which is hosted and delivered by Signiant’s cloud software and infrastructure, allowing us to easily make changes to users and track transactions.

We were also able to add images and branding to our portal, so it’s customized with the Snippies look and feel. So far, we’ve worked with only one portal in the “share” mode—there’s also “send” and “submit”—which allows our field teams to upload and download files within designated folders, and for our New York headquarters to transfer finished videos to our clients.

Three months in, we are very happy with Media Shuttle and see the difference reliable electronic large file transfers make to our business and our stress level. As a global video production company that relied solely on FedEx and FTP, it’s clear this is a type of technology our industry will soon be unable to do without.

Tom DiCerbo has been managing partner and co-owner of Snippies since 2010. Prior to joining Snippies, DiCerbo worked for several prominent media outlets such as the New York Times and Newsweek after graduating from California State University in San Marcos. He can be reached attdicerbo@snippies.comor 212-594-9500.

For more information, visitwww.signiant.comor call 781-221-4051.

PHOENIX—For anyone who doubts the ability of cloud-based systems to handle large-scale broadcast and media production capabilities, recent high-profile localized system failures at the New York Stock Exchange and United Airlines should have them taking notice. Ian Fletcher, chief technology officer for Grass Valley, points to the July 8 failures, when the NYSE shut down for three hours and a computer failure at United Airlines caused havoc with airline schedules, as examples of why broadcasters should be leveraging the security and robustness of cloud-based solutions and not relying solely on internal systems.

Dave Rosen Dave Rosen, vice president, Solutions and Business Development at Sony, thinks the critical question that broadcasters and related media enterprises need to ask is, “What business should I be in?” He explains that public cloud providers have already given businesses across the board an ability to get back to their core competencies. “If I am in the business of making movies, I shouldn’t be building data centers and trying to keep bad guys out,” he said.

INCREASING ACCEPTANCE
Fletcher sees confusion about how cloud and virtualized systems differ as the reason why more companies aren’t turning to the cloud. “A lot of vendors are talking about cloud services in a broad sense,” he said.

A virtualized service is one that is taken offsite to a single location where a software-as-a-service solution takes the service and spreads the processing across multiple locations. He noted a change in the level of acceptance as broadcasters become better educated about the types of systems and their benefits.

“Last year customers were not sure about the technology, but today it is the other way around, with clients and partners asking what we have in the SaaS space,” Fletcher said. He feels the market now demands business agility that only cloud based systems can provide.

WSI, a Boston-based provider of weather systems, is using SaaS to manage its huge amounts of data and deliver only what the client needs. “You have access to more data from a cloud based service than the traditional method of downloading everything locally, whether it was used or not,” said Jim Brihan, director of product management for WSI. He sees an on-demand model replacing the original push model for many data and content-based companies, referring to a new NOAA satellite coming online that could deliver Terabytes of data for his subscribers as an example. The only way to efficiently and cost effectively provide that data is through an on-demand pull model.

So the question arises: How can media companies find the means to focus on their core content creation model, leverage the computing and storage capacity of the cloud, and still provide an acceptable level of security? Jim Martinolich, vice president of integration technologies for ChyronHego, which has been using a cloud-based distribution model for more than five years, thinks cloud-based systems are the future.

SECURITY VS. ISOLATION
Today, software continues to take over many of the functions in media production. To manage the business’ hardware and software, SaaS solutions have to create an ecosystem comprising connectivity, computing power, and storage. A private or self-hosted data center is a singular location using a specific number of machines, often with very finite resources and able to only scale to the resources at hand. A public data center like those of Microsoft, Amazon, and IBM are fully scalable and geographically diverse.

Steve Smith Steve Smith, chief technology officer for Cloud Technologies at Imagine Communications in Dallas, explains that true cloud-based services are not hosted by a specific machine but rather by a “something.” This may sound as nebulous as the term “cloud,” but it refers to how a software-based process can run across multiple machines in multiple locations, and is never tied to a specific or singular device or group of devices.

“Cloud providers have the skills and resources to make their platforms robust and secure,” Smith said. “That is what they do and only what they do.” Due to their sheer global size and resources, such providers have the money and staff to create safer data facilities than any singular company could.

Grass Valley’s Fletcher concurs. “Broadcasters used to say ‘if we don’t own or control it, we don’t want it.’ But many now realize that they cannot build a data center as well as Amazon or Microsoft.”

In fact data centers are less a hacking target than media enterprises, as hackers are often looking for the easiest system to get into.

One of the greatest benefits that Sony’s Rosen sees in SaaS is the great equalizer that cloud computing presents. “The smallest company to the largest media conglomerate have the same access and cost for access,” he said. This means that a small company that can’t afford its own IT expert as well as a large corporation that can employ dozens, can share the same level of service and security, evening the playing field in many ways.

BEGINNING WITH A HYBRID
Nevertheless, certain things don’t make sense to do in the cloud, according to Fletcher, who sees high-bandwidth transfers remaining on premise, while taking control and processing services off premise. Systems like WSI’s cloud-based weather system provides users an interface to choose what material and data they need, which is then downloaded locally and played off local hardware. “This allows us to have more data available as we don’t have to push everything to the station,” Brihan said.

This “hybrid model” provides the benefits of leveraging cloud computing for data aggregation, selection and distribution, but keeping the playback locally. Even if the Internet connection is lost the data previously downloaded would all still be available locally and ready to play out.

“The hybrid model will help affect the transition over the next several years,” said Fletcher, adding that his clients’ existing expensive hardware has to phase out over time and allow a phasing in of a newer distribution model.

San Jose, Calif.-based Quantum Corp. is one of the hardware providers for the local data management portion of a Hybrid model. Products like its StorNext line help improve the robustness and security of the localized portion of ingest and playout.

“The cloud can provide huge benefits to broadcasters looking to remain competitive in an increasingly more complext content management and delivery market, said Alex Grossman, vice president, media and entertainment for Quantum. “The virtually unlimited scalability and OPEX-based cost model of public clouds enables broadcasters to adapt to changing needs in their operations, ranging from securely archiving owned content to expanding IP delivery capabilities. By adding cloud services, broadcasters can also swiftly respond to fluctuating demands without making complex technology investments. However, it’s important that the cloud be integrated into existing workflows so content can be managed across local facilities and the cloud.”

THE NEW PARADIGM
“I believe broadcast is dead and we are moving towards a unicast personalized experience,” said Smith. Millennials consume most of their media and entertainment from an on-demand pull model, while older viewers, for the most part, still partake in the tradition push model of broadcast, but that group will eventually phase out. “I think with the spectrum repack we will see some of the smaller broadcasters moving to a pure OTT play,” Smith said.

Aspera, an IBM company, is already supplying SaaS services to broadcasters, especially with sporting events. The functions for big events (broadcast, transcode, distribution) are perfect for the cloud as no capital expenditure is required and the setup and deployment is much faster. “We see a lot of requests for our services for these time-bound events,” said Richard Heitmann, vice president of marketing for Aspera.

In the future, broadcasters who add an OTT model could quickly spin up channels for local or national events with strong social media ties-ins. They could then offer tiered on-demand or live offerings from free content with commercials to commercial free UHD content at a premium. The cloud could enable this by providing a cost-effective and secure way of creating virtual distribution channels when they are needed and provide revenue streams not currently available.

Imagine’s Smith said that businesses like the cloud model with its OPEX versus CAPEX structure. “If a business does not work out they can just shut it down without dealing with ownership of legacy hardware.” This model makes for a more nimble entry and exit into new businesses.

Over time WSI plans to migrate all current products to the cloud and all new ones will be cloud-based. “The handwriting is on the wall, and we are realizing the benefits of SaaS, as are our customers,” concluded Brihan.

AMSTERDAM, THE NETHERLANDS—At IBC2015, ChyronHego will showcase its entire BlueNet end-to-end graphics workflow, including solutions for enhancing offline graphics production and creating graphics anywhere and at any time using file-based video import and export. ChyronHego will highlight these solutions in an end-to-end BlueNet workflow for creating not only 4K broadcast graphics but ultra high-resolution video wall displays, augmented reality, and virtual graphics, all powered by the next-generation CAMIO 4.2 graphics asset workflow solution.

ChyronHego Channel Box Prime The company will also introduce Channel Box Prime, a significant new release of the company’s Channel Box branding system, re-engineered for the 64-bit environment. Channel Box Prime features an all-new dedicated rendering engine and scene designer for optimizing channel branding and playout. Channel Box Prime includes Warp Effects, a never-before-seen special effect that integrates with industry-leading third-party modeling and rendering tools such as Adobe After Effects and 3ds Max from Autodesk.

ChyronHego will also feature CAMIO 4.2, a significant update of its graphic asset management solution. CAMIO 4.2 includes a complete redesign of LUCI, the modular interface for producer fulfillment of graphics in newsroom computer systems (NRCS), with tight integration across the entire ChyronHego product line.

Making its IBC debut is Lyric64, a significant release of ChyronHego's Lyric graphics solution. As a true 64-bit application, Lyric64 includes a new and updated user interface including point-and-click access to data using ChyronHego's Advanced Data Object technology, with seamless usability and easy access to Lyric's feature set. In addition, Lyric64 is resolution-agnostic with full support for authoring and playout in nonstandard aspect ratios and resolutions of 4K and beyond.

ChyronHego will showcase Lyric64 in a 4K environment and in an advanced video wall application.

The company will also showcase Studio MediaMaker, ChyronHego's new solution for streamlining broadcast production in smaller or nontraditional organizations. Studio MediaMaker provides complete automation for the end-to-end processes of broadcasting — from planning to production to file-based publishing of news content, and then through seamless links to ChyronHego graphics workflow solutions and other production resources.

Also new is Paint 6.1, a new release of the ChyronHego's telestration solution that features comprehensive support for 4K productions and integration with EVS systems and workflows. The Paint family includes advanced production analysis and telestration tools designed specifically for the needs of sports broadcasters. With Paint 6.1, broadcasters can introduce and telestrate a 4K stream in an HD broadcast without any loss of resolution. The company will also showcase Paint Live, a solution targeting live OB productions with the ability to telestrate fill and key output, as well as Paint Offline, enabling users to leverage file-based import and export of video for creating graphics on their laptops at any time and from any location. In addition to Windows support, Paint 6.1 is now available on Mac.

ChyronHego will be in Stand 7.D11. For more information on the IBC Show, visit www.ibc.org.

Production facilities have many reasons to consider moving: more space, a better layout, cost savings. Coupled with record low interest rates and changes in the media industry landscape, it is no surprise that we see new facilities and consolidations announced almost every month.

I’ve reviewed my notes from overseeing dozens of moves to prepare a brief guide to help with your planning. Some of this might seem obvious, but each is drawn from an eyewitness account, and represents experience learned the hard way.

PLAN FIRST, THEN TALK
Companies don’t build new facilities all the time so they instinctively reach for the phone. External help from architects, systems integrators, and mechanical teams is often brought in early.

That impulse undervalues important information best gathered from within, free of outside bias. Start by defining the goals of the move: cost savings, new technology, expanding or new business? A move is the perfect opportunity to reinvent tired work practices, but it is hard. Ask first: How much change are we willing to accommodate? Are we willing to change people’s roles? What pushback are we likely to get? How will we measure the benefits of this change?

Those answers should guide every conversation and decision, including which consultants to consider. (Consultants should not help make the decision that will lead to their hire!) Clear project objectives protect the evaluation process and ensure that you hire the right firms.

WORKFLOW COMES BEFORE SPACE
People tend to think of workflow as something reserved for techies who handle editing systems, but it’s not. Workflow is all about how your organization works together.

You know that light switch in your house whose function you’ve never figured out? You can avoid that by designing high-level workflows first. That allows architectural plans to be optimized to suit the facility, rather than forcing critical workflows to fit. High-level workflow definitions will help develop adjacency plans that guide the architects. Ask yourself:

• What workgroups benefit from face-to-face communication?
• Where are sightlines important?
• Which rooms need to be live 24x7 versus only during the business week?

Answers to questions like these should drive your plans.

DEVELOP A THREE-DIMENSIONAL FINE-TOOTHED COMB
Architects and engineers will give you thousands of drawings to review. You need to visualize these in three dimensions. Go over every line, circle and symbol and, yes, ask questions:

• Is there sufficient support in the wall to support that bank of monitors?
• Are the power systems diverse enough to cover a breaker failure?
• Is that outlet for the monitor at 18 inches above the floor or 54?
• Is the air-conditioning sufficient and redundant to support a 24x7 room?
• Will the mechanical systems reduce the available headroom and destroy the sightlines we hoped for?
• And the hardest question of all… “Okay, what’s missing?”

Small errors in drawings lead to surprisingly expensive construction change orders and delays. They can be hard to catch, but it is worth the effort. Facility problems are easy to see, but difficult to repair. Errors on paper are hard to see, but easy to fix.

PURGE, PURGE, PURGE
If your business has been around for awhile then your workflows have likely accumulated extra steps, kludged work-arounds and inefficient communication. You might even have a redundant department or two.

Render workflows down to the bone. What steps really have value? Eliminate everything else. Don’t pass up the chance to start fresh. These opportunities are rare.

A WORD ABOUT RECYCLING
Don’t hinder new workflows or miss opportunities for the sake of an old video server. You’ll waste many times that device’s value paying labor costs while staffers wait for transcodes that could have been eliminated. If you have not gotten rid of tape, now is the time. (If you must, keep a machine in the dub room for archival stuff). Do remember to save your old software licenses, which are often transferable and upgradable.

FORWARDING THE MAIL
Transitions are never easy. Ask a lot of questions during the design phase to avoid dead-ends and catch limitations before they are too late to correct. Consider:

• Will you cut over all at once or stage the transition?
• Do facilities need to work in parallel for a period of time?
• How will your news-room operate during the transition?
• Will teams move by show or by function?
• How much double staffing is needed?
• How will that staff be hired and paid for?
• If you are moving equipment, how will it be staged?
• Can systems be cut in half to function in both places at the same time?

A GROWING FAMILY NEEDS SPACE
Your new facility is just the beginning of a 10-20 year commitment. That requires both a very long glance into your crystal ball, as well as preparation for changes that might come just 2-3 years after the doors open. Again, it comes down to questions. Here are some that I insist clients consider:

Business questions:
• What are likely business drivers over that time?
• How will those changes drive personnel and technological choices?

Space questions:
• Can we build with enough flexibility so that equipment can be easily changed?

Technical questions:
• What do we know about how technology is going to change the operation in the future?
• Can we plan to be HD today and UHDTV (or more) later? Do we need to implement UHDTV now?
• How much excess capacity do you need in the data centers and cable raceways to support a change to the next generation equipment 8-10 years from now?

Moving is a challenge that is only made more complicated by your need to get on with day-to-day work while the new facility is under development. It is very tempting to pick up the phone and start bringing in help. Make sure that first call is to someone who can help you ask, and answer, the right questions.

General Dynamics Mediaware’s InStream Splice enables seamless insertion of file-based and live video feeds directly into the live compressed digital video stream.
OTTAWA—Based on global ad revenues, Google is the world’s largest media owner; according to ZenithOptimedia’s Top Thirty Global Media Owners 2015 report. Moreover, Google is 136 percent bigger than Disney, the world’s second-largest media owner. Google is also bigger, in terms of ad revenues, than Disney—and the third-largest media company, Comcast—combined.

One major reason why Google has gained such traction in the advertising market is its ability to narrow-focus its ad deliveries based on each user’s personal demographics and preferences; ensuring that a 20-something male isn’t seeing commercials for Depends. In contrast, broadcasters are stuck with linear advertising where one ad is seen by all.

“Even when a TV show is targeted at a specific demographic, linear advertising cannot provide the same precise targeting offered by Google, Facebook, and other major websites,” said Aravindh Vanchesan, digital media industry manager for research firm Frost & Sullivan, and an expert in cutting-edge advertising technologies. “The difference is similar to the long-distance precision of a sniper’s rifle, and the scattered birdshot blast of a shotgun.”

CUSTOM DEMOGRAPHICS

Telestream’s VOD Producer DAI provides DAI functionality for content owners and cable TV operators.
Fortunately for broadcasters, there is a weapon that can help them stand their ground with Google and other major websites: dynamic ad insertion. DAI allows broadcasters to electronically mark their linear program feeds with the “in” and “out” points where commercials and PSAs have been inserted. Like the in/out points of a video edit, these points alert a connected DAI server/service to places in the feeds where new ads can be inserted. And like Google, these ads can be selected based on the specific demographics and preferences of viewers.

“The only downside is that this insertion can only be done in non-broadcast mode, such as cable TV VOD playback or OTT streaming,” said Vanchesan. “Still, this represents an opportunity for broadcasters to make their program feeds more valuable to advertisers, thus increasing the amount that they can charge for their slots.”

Case in point: “‘With the advent of dynamic ad insertion, broadcasters can decide when to go with dynamic targeted ads online immediately or add to ratings within the C3 window and then move to dynamic targeted ads,” said Corey Halverson, product director of media business solutions for Akamai. “This can deliver more ad revenues to streaming broadcasters.”

THINKING AHEAD

At present, dynamic ad insertion is not a major priority for broadcasters; at least based on their level of takeup. “Some of the major networks are doing some work in this area,” Vanchesan said. “However, right now many don’t see the financial benefit in terms of CPMs [cost per impression] and increased ad revenues, so they are going slow.”

Broadcasters’ attitudes to DAI may change once the ATSC 3.0 standard is deployed. Under ATSC 3.0, it will be possible to replace linear ads during live broadcasts with substitute ads stored in the viewers’ smart TVs or set-top boxes. Delivered by non-real-time transmissions, these substitute ads can be delivered embedded in the ATSC 3.0 OTA signal stream, or via a connected broadband channel.

“With ATSC 3.0, broadcasters will be able to insert targeted ads based on regional zones or audience segments,” said Anne Schelle; managing director for Pearl, the broadcaster-driven next-generation research partnership.

Triveni Digital, a Princeton, N.J. based provider of professional monitoring and metadata management solutions for broadcast, sees a real future for DAI under ATSC 3.0, according to Ralph Bachofen, vice president of sales and marketing. At the NAB Show, the company demonstrated targeted advertising technology for the nextgen standard. “ATSC 3.0 can give broadcasters the kind of DAI flexibility currently reserved today for cable TV, and the Web,” Bachofen said.

Other vendors are already releasing products that leverage the power of DAI for broadcasters. For instance, Elemental Technologies’ Delta video platform, which manages the packaging and distribution of video across multiple viewing platforms, includes the ability to set and read “ad insertion” points, on a “justin-time” basis.” Rather than having to store multiple prerecorded versions of the program feed, Delta can do DAI on the fly with each playout. “You can use this same feature to serve national TV ads on a network feed with localized ads in real-time,” said Lionel Bringuier, director of product management for Elemental in Portland, Ore. “Delta adds a level of content control that frees up broadcasters to serve various parts of their audiences more effectively.”

General Dynamics Mediaware’s InStream is an integrated, scalable liner TV ad insertion and playout system that runs on off-the-shelf IT-grade hardware. Capable of serving multiple channel feeds, InStream can frame-accurately splice content into compressed transport stream broadcast, according to Shane Angelo, sales director for the Australian-based company. “At its core, InStream enables operators to regionalize linear broadcasts through the insertion of either live or prerecorded content,” he said. “File-based content, such as advertisements, promos and news clips in short and long form, can be loaded directly into InStream Splice’s embedded video server for direct playout.”

Disney/ABC recently chose Imagine Communications’ VersioCloud IP-based infrastructure to migrate its global playout/distribution system to the cloud, a move that will help advance the networks’ DAI capabilities. Glen LeBrun, vice president of product marketing for Imagine in Dallas describes Disney’s adoption of VersioCloud as a “‘virtual master control’ approach that supports highly flexible ad insertion based on regional and demographic criteria. We feel that DAI is the right way to go in this setting, which is why it is a big part of Versio-Cloud.”

At the 2015 NAB Show, Telestream introduced its VOD Producer DAI, which provides DAI functionality for content owners and cable TV operators. “The big problem for such providers is that their VOD content has been assembled in complete linear form; if you want to replace the ads, you have to redo the entire video feed,” said Paul Turner, vice president of enterprise product management for the Nevada City, Calif.-based company. “VOD Producer DAI allows you to create the content such that new ads can be inserted during playout as needed.” The result: cable VOD is freed from its linear advertising constraints.

With increasing interest in customizing ad distribution, DAI could be a boon for broadcasters wanting to level the advertising playing field with Google and other online digital media. “There is strong momentum building towards implementing DAI solutions from every aspect of the value chain, including content owners, broadcasters, MSOs, and advertisers,” said Vanchesan. “But there still are technological and business model hurdles that need to be addressed before DAI goes mainstream.”