RTS Thames Valley held a technical colloquium for engineers and technologists on the theoretical and practical aspects of moving video and audio over IP in mid-October.
Television is experiencing a technical revolution in broadcast facilities. This new technology – video and audio over IP – uses computer networks to replace traditional broadcast infrastructures to deliver more flexibility and scalability for programme-makers.
Sports producers have already started to benefit from IP. Multiple cameras and microphones at events can be directly streamed into a centralised broadcast facility to increase the number of events covered. Scalable IP studios provide pay-as-you-go resources to improve efficiency and reduce costs.
Hosted at Techex in Bracknell, the RTS event offered five speakers who discussed their experiences of building and designing IP infrastructures in broadcast facilities throughout Europe.
Martin Paskin from Techex gave an overview of the current Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers standards governing IP, while Peter Brightwell from BBC Research & Development discussed the Networked Media Open Specification interoperability standards.
Geoff Love from Axon Digital Design described system control, Gerard Phillips of Arista Networks spoke about signal switching and APC Time’s Rob Skinner discussed the operation of system-critical timing.
More than sixty delegates attended the afternoon and evening sessions, with Techex providing working demonstrations of the technology.
