Technology for Hybrid/Converged Playout and Streaming

Technology for hybrid/converged Playout and Streaming

Converging playout and encoding

Delivering ready-to-air channels

Hybrid playout architectures

Case study: channel OTT encoding

Case study #2 : channel manipulation

Questions & Answers

• The number of channels drastically increases – Secondary channels (barker, music, occasional…) – Regional channels – OTT variants of Premium channels • Channel regionalization is growing • The need of scalable and future-proof technologies becomes critical – IT security needs • Need for a cost effective solution, which collapses channel playout, compression and delivery, on a future-proof, secure and scalable infrastructure

TRAFFIC SYSTEM

SCHEDULE AS-RUN

AUTOMATION SYSTEM

IRDs

SDI ROUTER MPEG ENCODING MASTER CONTROL SYSTEM SERVERs BROADCAST PRG OUT DELIVERY PROGRAMING MULTIPLEXER HD/SD ENCODER SOURCES (SDI)

SWITCHING / BRANDING / EFFECTS OTT STUDIOs ORIGIN SERVER DELIVERY MULTI-SCREEN ENCODER

PLAYOUT COMPRESSION

TRAFFIC SYSTEM

SCHEDULE AS-RUN

AUTOMATION SYSTEM

IRDs

SDI ROUTER MPEG ENCODING MASTER CONTROL SYSTEM SERVERs BROADCAST PRG OUT DELIVERY PROGRAMING MULTIPLEXER HD/SD ENCODER SOURCES (SDI)

SWITCHING / BRANDING / EFFECTS OTT STUDIOs ORIGIN SERVER DELIVERY MULTI-SCREEN ENCODER

PLAYOUT COMPRESSION

TRAFFIC SYSTEM

SCHEDULE AS-RUN

AUTOMATION SYSTEM

IRDs

SDI ROUTER MPEG ENCODING MASTER CONTROL SYSTEM SERVERs BROADCAST PRG OUT DELIVERY PROGRAMING MULTIPLEXER HD/SD ENCODER SOURCES (SDI)

SWITCHING / BRANDING / EFFECTS OTT STUDIOs ORIGIN SERVER DELIVERY MULTI-SCREEN ENCODER

PLAYOUT COMPRESSION

• GOP or Frame-accurate splicing between TS live and/or file sources – Frame-accurate splicing requires to dynamically re-encode the frames at the transition • The pro’s – Preserve the audio/video quality of the sources – Optimize the resources  better channel density – Optimize the in-to-out latency • The con’s – The sources to play-back shall have the same format (A/V codec, resolution,…) – Audio and video processing is not possible

External Graphical Traffic External Storage interface & Billing Automation

Asset Automation Manager

TS Media Library Multiplexing Compressed Streaming Splicer TS Monitoring Live feeds

• Dynamically decode the compressed source, perform the A/V processing and switching in the non-compressed domain, do the channel branding and re-encode • The pro’s – Use heterogeneous input formats: compressed / non-compressed, MPEG-2 / H.264 / HEVC, SD/HD – Perform A/V video processing, such as • Video up / down scaling • Audio loudness control – Perform advanced channel branding – Generate a statistical multiplexing pool at the output – Perform ABR encoding for OTT delivery • The con’s – Re-encoding is not transparent in terms of video quality : need for a Premium VQ encoder

External Graphical Traffic External Storage interface & Billing Automation

Asset Automation Manager

TS Media Library MPEG- 2/4 A/V MPEG-2/4 Multiplexing SD/HD HEVC Statmux TS Processing Graphics Decoding Switcher SD/HD Packaging Live feeds (Resizing/ and DVE De-interlacing/ OTT ABR Streaming Loudness/…) encoding Monitoring SDI Live feeds

• Hybrid audio / video – The video component is re-encoded, the audio components remain compressed. • Application: channel branding, up/down scaling – The audio components are re-encoded, the video remains compressed • Application: audio loudness control (ad-insertion) • Primary and secondary sources – One primary compressed source is passing through • The audio/video quality of this live feed is preserved – Whenever the system switches to a secondary source, the re-encoding mode applies • The re-encoding sources may different formats • Non-compressed secondary source (SDI) is possible

External Graphical Traffic External Storage interface & Billing Automation

Asset Automation Manager

TS Primary live feed

TS Media Library MPEG- Multiplexing 2/4 A/V MPEG-2 Splicer Streaming MPEG-4 Monitoring SD/HD Processing Graphics TS Switcher HEVC Decoding (Resizing/ and DVE live feeds De-interlacing/ SD/HD Loudness/…) encoding SDI live feeds

• An encoding system may need playout capabilities • SCTE-35 insertion controlled from schedules • Basic channel branding or black-out

• A playout system may need encoding capabilities – Delivering channels ready-to-air – Tier 2/3 channels, disaster recovery, channel regionalization

• Discrete appliances are replaced by software defined customizable workflows • A workflow is a logical view of the processing modules involved in playout and encoding

• A workflow can be instantiated once or multiple times, with a different set of parameters • The library of processing modules can be enriched : new A/V codecs, new streaming protocols, new video effects…

• A unique video framework: Maltese – Maltese offers a unique library of elementary software processing modules dedicated to audio & video (decoding, processing, encoding…) – Maltese allows assembling these elementary modules in workflows and instantiating the workflows into multiple jobs. – Maltese provides a native Web Services API

• A video operating system – Clustering: Maltese can manage multiple servers as a single system – Load balancing: Maltese automatically estimates the CPU cost of a job and is in charge of allocating the appropriate HW resources to make it run. – Resiliency: Maltese continuously monitors the jobs health and is able to restart or re-deploy a faulty job automatically and instantly.

• Software based playout/encoding workflows can run on COTS high-end servers. – CPUs are enough powerful to run encoding and playout applications – IP networks can be used to convey non-compressed or compressed audio/video streams. • Multiple deployment models are applicable – A standard IT based server (appliance) • One graphical user interface, a local storage system – A cluster of multiple IT servers • One single graphical user interface, an external shared storage • Native load-balancing and redundancy mechanisms CiaB CiaB CiaB VM VM VM – A Virtual Machine Hypervisor Hypervisor Hypervisor Hypervisor • A virtual edition, which makes the application hardware agnostic Hardware Hardware Hardware Hardware – A cluster of Virtual Machines • To take benefit of elastic hardware resources

• The standalone hardware appliance – Internal media storage (RAID5) – 1+1 redundancy

• The cluster of Spectrum XE nodes – A unique interface to command & control all nodes – A unique external storage (MediaGrid) shared by all the nodes – An internal load-balancing mechanism (+ simulator) – A native N+P resiliency

• The Virtualized edition – Makes Spectrum XE agnostic of hardware – VMWARE virtualization technology

• A Channel-in-a-Box (CiaB) solution runs its own built-in automation – It is connected to an external traffic & billing system, which provides the schedules • Different types of channel playlists exist: – 24/7 time-based playlists  channel origination – Trigger-based playlists : (SCTE-104 over SDI, SCTE-35)  regionalization, ad-insertion – Manual control playlist : live events control, EAS • These channel types may not be exclusive – One channel could be driven by multiple playlists. As an example:

TRAFFIC SYSTEM TRAFFIC SYSTEM EMS

24/7 schedule Commercial breaks Call

• Spectrum XE allows defining multiple video layers for one channel – Each video layer is driven from an independent playlist (playlist levels) – The video layers (playlist levels) are ordered by priority. • Let’s take an example

Playlist level 1 Video Layer #1 Channel A Channel B Channel A (national automation)

Playlist level 2 Video Layer #2 Ad1 Ad2 3 (local traffic, triggers)

Playlist level 3 Video Layer #3 EMS (manual or trigger control)

ChannelAd1 A EMS Ad2 Channel3 B Channel A Final programming

• A full-blown Channel-In-A-Box solution – Playout and graphics overlay – Automation and asset management – User selectable video processing: compressed and/or baseband domain

• A premium quality software encoder – Broadcast (MPEG-2, MPEG-4, HEVC) and OTT formats

• Designed for HD / SD / Multi-screen channels manipulation and origination – Production of emission-ready formats

• A fully software and standard IT based solution – Designed to run on standalone servers or on virtualized environments – Based on VOSTM FLEX

• Who is the customer: - The customer is an American commercial broadcast television network, who operates many entertainment channels in international markets

• What is the application: - Use the cloud to distribute the customer affiliates (190 stations across 43 station groups) to MVPD OTT platforms (multichannel video programming distributors). - Send MPVDs the linear content together with streaming restrictions that control how viewers can access the content - Aggregate all local schedules in a cloud database and provide a web portal to add OTT restrictions

• What is the challenge: - Dealing with un-managed affiliates and adapt to various types of environment (automation, traffic, IT, breaking news,…)

Affiliate Stations and Station SCTE 224 Policies Groups Customer NOC

Affiliate #1 Customer Private Cloud (AWS) Affiliate #2 Schedule Network Management Feeds Affiliate #3 (incl. web portal) MVPDs OTT Restrictions OTT Platform and Delivery (w/ Cloud Links) Affiliate #190 (TS and HLS)

Initial deployment: • 7 x MVPD w/ OTT platforms (AT&T) • 4 x MVPDs OTT-native (Hulu)

A hybrid on-prem / cloud solution with Spectrum XE + VOS Cloud

Schedule Management Stream Processing

• Aggregate 190 local schedules into a central • Transcode at the affiliate HD from MPEG-2 cloud database and provide a web portal for to H.264 and uplink to VOS station personnel to augment schedules with • Insert SCTE 35 markers to signal every OTT restrictions (embargo, target devices, piece of content that makes the channel start-over) (including unique IDs and web restrictions) • Export 2 weeks of augmented schedules to • Distribute 190 decorated channels to 10 the customer NOC system in charge of MVPDs over the Internet creating/distributing out-of-band SCTE 224 policies (ESNI) to MVPDs

BROADCAST Schedule Files TV Network Affiliate CLOUD

OPERATOR Network Schedules ESNI SYSTEM

Augmentation Schedules Local WEB PORTAL Schedules CLOUD DB SCTE-224 Schedule Mgt (Aggregate System Schedule Schedules) Files MVPDs

GPI Play TS TS AUTOMATION Commands TS OTT Processing CL Play Platform Commands HLS TS w/ HD MP4 + SCTE-35 HZIXI/UDPSP w/ HD w/ M HDP4 MP4 TS OTT TS/ASI w/ HD MP2 CL Platform

TS/IP w/ Network TS/IP mirrored Time SCTE-35 output CDN TS OTT CL Platform

Cloud+Appliance synergy!

Good understanding of the customer & affiliates architecture and workflows

Strong Harmonic cloud infrastructure and deployment expertise

Compelling demonstration of Spectrum XE doing all processing on-prem

Spectrum XE will enable the customer migration to next-generation splicing at affiliates

Account team relationship with customer

• Who is the Customer? – The Customer is an american satellite television network. – The service broadcasts general news, weather, stock market updates, entertainment and travel content to airports across North America. • What is the application? – Allow contracted airports to play live national broadcast stream (News) for display on screens in the gate hold rooms and other public areas. – On schedule, play out and insert local advertising, public service announcements, squeeze back messages, emergency announcements and banner ads. • What is the challenge? – Replace seamlessly the existing system. – Offer more flexibility and simplicity in the scheduling and monitoring operations. – Ensure protection mechanisms against errors. – Provide a premium video quality (clean transitions and DVEs).

NATIONAL CENTER

• Clip transcoding On-demand generation Control & Monitoring of emergency messages Electra VS

Airport schedules • Playlist editing & export Emergency • Clip editing and QC announcement • Clip repository SPECTRUM XE CENTRAL PLAYOUT CONTROL PC EMS SERVER SAM APPLICATION

AIRPORT#1 AIRPORT#N Automatic clips provisioning (ads, promos) • Ad-insertion (SCTE-35) • EM insertion (immediate) AIRPORT#2 Airport #N schedule & emergency messages

AIRPORT#3 News SPECTRUM XE channel QAM MODULATOR IRD LOCAL PLAYOUT

• Local advertising – Each schedule is prepared in Atlanta in the form of a 1hr periodic programming • The network program has up to 6 commercial breaks per hour • A break is ~4min30s long • The last minute of the break is available for airport local insertion • The breaks are signaled with SCTE-35 triggers – Each airport schedule is exported from the central Spectrum XE into an XML file. – All the schedule files are distributed by the SAM to the local Airport Spectrum XE’s. – Key benefits : • Schedule manipulation is easy and simple (in comparison with flat schedule files) • SAM centralizes the schedules distribution and monitoring • Emergency Messages – On demand messages are converted into BXF files – SAM distributes and monitors the BXF Emergency messages • Last minute changes are always possible locally

• A typical use case of cascaded playlists – A first playlist level schedules the local commercial breaks (level #1) – A second playlist layer schedules the Emergency Announcements (level #2) • An alert is inserted over the local program, whatever the on-air content (national feed or local advertising) • The advertising 1Hr schedule does not need to be modified when a new emergency announcement is submitted

Level #0 News national channel Live event

Level #1 Ads Ads Ads Commercial breaks

Level #2 EMS EMS Emergency messages

Switch output News EMS Ads News AdsEMS News Ads News Airport channel

• Premium Quality – Clean transitions between the network program and the local ads – Clean squeeze-back effects – Premium HD video encoding • Scheduling flexibility – Ability to create 1Hr periodic schedules • Easier to handle than flat linear schedules (which need to be continuously updated) – Simple interface with EMS system – Automated clip and bitmaps provisioning – Centralized control and monitoring Key takeaways • Robustness – High level of reliability Number of units 48 – ASI by-pass mechanism On-air date Jan’16