In Broadcast - March 2014 - 68

I N T E R N A T I O N A L

WWW.INBROADCAST.COM | ISSUE 29 - MARCH 2014

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InMEDIA
The Productive Power Of IP Cont.

68

IP camera technology, it's worth
looking at devices used in the CCTV,
medical, education and corporate
sphere. Here there is a plethora of
integrated HD heads that rely on
Ethernet data delivery. Currently,
most models are restricted in the
frame rate they shoot and the
data rate they deliver (often under
15Mb/s), making them unsuitable
for HD television.
Is there the ambition to follow
the direction of travel of the rest
of the broadcast industry and to
bring IP into the live studio? BBC
Research and Development has
a working IP studio in place as a
test bed project to show the power
and ﬂexibility of Ethernet-based
production. It includes dedicated
IP cameras as well as SDI-type
broadcast equipment adapted to
ﬁt into an Ethernet environment.
Demonstrations of the studio
in practise show that potential
advantages go beyond a mere costcutting exercise: with all devices
intelligently connected, the single
CAT cable does not just replace SDI.
It also adds signiﬁcant functionality,
enabling full remote control,
metadata entry and the integration
of computer-based data; plus it
allows equipment not designed
for broadcast use - such as IP
recorders - into television studios.
The BBC has been at the
leading edge of the technology
since the launch of its Stagebox
device in 2012. Stagebox allows
an HD camera, with associated
sound channels, and talkback,
tally lights and timecode and
genlock data to be brought
together and sent, fully duplex,
down a standard cat5 Ethernet
cable. Within the encoded format
all the data is manageable over
standard IP protocols. The video
is encoded at AVC100 by default,
a widespread industry standard for
HD television production.
Hot on the heels of the BBC
system, Sony concentrated minds
only a year later on its intriguing
NXL-IP55 - a live production unit
which enables multiple video data
streams to be transmitted over an
IP. It enables multi-camera shoots

Sony's NXL-IP55 live production unit

with up to four video streams (three
downstream and one upstream, or
two downstream/two upstream).
Like the BBC system, IP55 handles
up to ten audio channels, including
intercom, control signals, tally,
general purpose I/O and genlock.
Norbert Paquet, Product
Marketing Manager Europe,
System Cameras, IP Live, 4K &
3D for Sony explained the genesis
of the project: "Our customers
are always pushing to find the
best means for transmitting their
content. We continuously work with
our customers to understand the
challenges they face, and this was
absolutely the case with the NXLIP55. As a result, we developed a
solution that reduces operational
complexity while preserving
the broadcast quality of our
customers' content."
The solution supports both multicamera production and remote
operation from a distance of up to
400km, making it suited to a range
of live production scenarios. NXLIP55 is aimed at regional TV stations
and the live production market,
such as conferences, concerts,
and sports matches - all of which
have a quick turnaround for set-up.
With organisations such as
SMPTE and the EBU busy at work
defining a strategy for packetbased network infrastructure, it's
clear that the direction of travel is
towards IP technology. Sony concur
that IP devices are being taken
very seriously by their customers.
Paquet remarked: "There's no
doubt that the convergence of
IP and broadcast technology is
becoming more mainstream, and
will continue to do so. When the
NXL-IP55 launched in 2012, rental
company Al Jazeera integrated
the IP55 into remote studios,
simultaneously enhancing both
operational efﬁciency and overall
production quality output. Seamless
integration and immediate beneﬁts
like these are the reasons why IPbased products are becoming more
mainstream in broadcast. Sony's
experience and leadership in the
ﬁeld of broadcast live production
solutions is key, as IP-based

Snell has demonstrated the potential
of IP workﬂows

solutions have to adhere to strict
operational requirements while
maintaining a high level of security,
all at the same time as catering to
the standardisation needs of the
broadcast industry."
Snell is equally keen to show its
leadership in live IP workﬂows. It
recently demonstrated real-time
content transfer via IP between its
Kahuna 360 production switcher, IQ
Modular range and Sirius 800 router.
Again, the driving force behind
the development is in order
to better integrate broadcast
equipment, to reduce investment
in expensive broadcast-speciﬁc
cabling and to enable production
teams to access lower cost IT
hardware. Snell's example shows
how broadcasters will inevitably
co-habit a mixed baseband and
packet world for some time to come.
In the demonstration, the signal
originated as a 1080 59p feed
from the Kahuna 360 multi-format
production switcher; the content

was then encoded into a 200
Mbps video stream using the
AVC-Intra 100 video codec.
The signal passed via an
Ethernet switch to Snell
IQ modules to provide
IP-to-SDI decoding, with
downconversion to 1080
59i to feed a video monitor,
an IQ module for logo
insertion, and encoding
back to SDI for transfer to
the Sirius 800 router.
"At Snell, we understand
that many of our customers
will take a phased approach
to implementing all-IP
workﬂows, and that they will
need to manage both SDI
and IP interfaces for a period
of time," remarked Paola
Hobson, Senior Product
Manager at Snell.
That the adoption of live
IP production extends beyond the
biggest manufacturers is also highly
encouraging.
Specialist provider of integrated
live video productions systems
Broadcast Pix has joined the
movement with version 2.0 of its
Flint production system.
The solution was developed
to take content from ingest to
distribution.
One of its most striking features
is its ability to take in any video
source across Ethernet, in addition
to its existing video inputs.
Less ambitious in its all-round
scope, Vitec's Monisys MR multichannel IP stream recorder is
another product that is proof of
the crossover from the traditional
to the IT. Its ability to capture up
to four HD streams makes it an
interesting prospect.
While Vitec currently attracts the
training, medical and legal markets,
don't be surprised to see this kind
of network-attached technology
being embraced by broadcasters
in the very near future.

Vitec's Monisys MR multi-channel IP stream recorder

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