In Broadcast - July 2016 - 60


60

www.inbroadcast.com | Vol: 6 - Issue 7 | July 2016

InMedia

TNDV Chooses Cobalt Digital
Signal Conversion Gear

N

ashville-based mobile production
specialist TNDV: Television has
installed seven frames of Cobalt signal
conversion and distribution gear in
Exclamation, TNDV's first fully native
1080p and 4K-ready Class A broadcast
and production truck.
The Cobalt equipment maximizes
space inside the new truck while
ensuring flexible, efficient signal
handling for the largest live
productions.
"We needed to pack as much
capability
and
versatility
as
possible into the space so we could
accommodate the large shows
for which this truck is intended.
Every show has surprise technical
requirements - not just a couple of
'oh, by the way' requests, but 20 or
30 surprise critical needs that pop up
almost hourly on a show site," said Nic
Dugger, owner and President, TNDV.
"It's clear that Cobalt engineers put
careful consideration into fitting a
great deal of capability into a small

space. By having this selection of tools,
we can be much more flexible and
respond to requests that clients might
not have anticipated."
TNDV's Cobalt system includes four
Cobalt openGear 9903-UDX-ADDA 3G/
HD/SD-SDI universal format converter
cards with CVBS/YPbPr video I/O,
up/down/crossconversion,
frame
sync, and AES and analogue audio
embedding/de-embedding. The cards
offer multi-input support, flexibility,
and ease of use, with integration of SDI
and analogue video and discrete audio.
TNDV also installed two Cobalt
9933-EMDE-ADDA
3G/HD/SD-SDI
AES and analogue audio embedder/
de-embedder cards. Each card
provides full 16-channel embedding/
de-embedding between AES, eight
channels of analogue audio, and all
four groups of embedded audio.
Exclamation, the eighth truck in
the TNDV fleet, is a 53-foot doubleexpando production truck that
covers multicamera live events -

TNDV's Exclamation production vehicle

productions that often require more
than 100 inputs. Even though any
given show is designated at a specific
resolution - 1080p, 1080i, or 720p,
for example - inevitably incoming and
outgoing signals must be converted
to accommodate multiple flavours of
feeds for multiple destinations. The
Cobalt system provides maximum
versatility so that TNDV can be ready
for any possible scenario.
"We treat these hardware tools as
a Swiss Army Knife. We never know
exactly what we're going to need
them for, but invariably, we always

IPV & StorExcel Boost
Collaborative Workflows

U

K-based MAM and technology
specialist, IPV, has announced a
strategic collaboration with StorExcel,
a developer and provider of nextgeneration content management and
workflow automation solutions for
scale-out storage environments.
As a result, StorExcel's AXZiS
platform now integrates the IPV
Curator MAM system with the Quantum
Xcellis
high-performance
shared
workflow storage system. Equipped
with Curator, AXZiS delivers advanced
asset
management
capabilities
that are ideal for demanding sports
production and corporate video
applications.
"As part of our fully integrated
AXZiS platform, IPV Curator provides
a robust and proven end-to-end asset
management layer that seamlessly
coordinates media production, editing,
and content management," said Lance
Hukill, President at StorExcel. "The

synergistic integration of
Curator into AXZiS makes
it easy for companies both
large and small to quickly
realise sophisticated MAM
capabilities within their
collaborative
production
workflows and, in turn,
maximise the value of their
media assets."
"Integrating components in this
way significantly increases production
efficiency, reduces operating costs,
and creates a new means for driving
content production in both live and
non-live environments," added Nigel
Booth, IPV's Executive Vice President
for Business Development. "The
StorExcel AXZiS platform built on our
Curator MAM system and Quantum's
Xcellis storage system will assist any
organisation wanting to speed up
the production process or efficiently
manage its archive."

find a way to use them. Frequently,
we use them all," Dugger said. "That's
what happened on Exclamation's very
first show. We used every piece of
conversion hardware we had on the
truck and actually had to bring in some
extras. With Cobalt, we know we'll
have the flexibility to handle unusual
client requests on the fly."
The Cobalt gear also makes audio
processing much more convenient.
Instead of having to run separate
cables for video and audio feeds, TNDV
can handle both on the same cable
without any loss of quality.

application, IPV's Curator offers
an intelligent archive management
environment in which media assets
are migrated through storage tiers
according to their age, temporal
relevance, and priority. The system's
in-built
knowledge
management
ensures that assets reside on the most
appropriate storage media
from on premise systems to
the cloud.
In the sports production
environment, IPV Curator gives
users contextual search and
automated proxy workflow
tools that allow them to
show every goal, strike,
A synergistic integration of IPV Curator into AXZiS assist, run, and slam dunk
Delivered
and
supported
by
as it happens, supported by
StorExcel, a Quantum and IPV partner, commentary and trending opinion. For
the AXZiS platform allows content highlights programmes, IPV Curator
creators and producers to reduce the allows concurrent users to perform
time and cost associated with their translation, subtitling, and editing,
shift to higher-performing shared all on low-resolution, metadata-rich,
workflow storage with exceptional timecode-accurate files before all
scalability.
elements are brought together in the
Rather than work with a variety high-resolution programme.
of vendors for integration and
In corporate video applications, the
support, users can make a single integration of IPV Curator into the
call to StorExcel. Running on the AXZiS platform supports fast creation
Quantum Xcellis high-performance and delivery of content when and
shared storage platform as a native where it is needed.
http://www.inbroadcast.com http://www.tndv.com/hardware/production-trucks/exclamation/ http://www.ipv.com/simply-curator/
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of In Broadcast - July 2016
