Broadcasters and other producers of high-quality content have long been demanding higher video quality in order to fully utilise the potential of broadband streaming. The new Aqua™ Internet encoder from the Grass Valley Group offers this quality. This new product is part of the company’s web media publishing solution. This range of solutions also includes the Profile® XP media platform, the ContentShare™ platform for managing programme material and the WebAble™ technology for streamlining and optimising the preparation of content for the web.
Thanks to Grass Valley Group’s One Pass Encoding™ technology, the Aqua encoder achieves higher streaming throughput per unit than any other product in its class. With this technology, the encoder can pre-process, capture, clean and encode input data and display it at multiple bit rates in multiple streaming formats – all in real time. Unlike other encoders, which are designed for a time-consuming, serial process, the Aqua encoder uses multiple HD processing units to perform various steps in parallel.
In addition, the Aqua encoder can be accessed via any standard web browser.
The Aqua encoder – a combination of hardware and software offered as a turnkey system – covers the streaming bandwidth spectrum from 28.8 Kbps (standard audio) to over 2 Mbps. The system supports all major streaming formats, including the latest digital media technology from Microsoft, Windows Media Audio and Video 8, as well as RealVideo from RealNetworks and Quick Time from Apple.
“Grass Valley Group’s Aqua Internet encoder promises the high level of quality that broadcasters and other high-quality content producers need to make broadband content delivery a success and capitalise on the associated sales opportunities,” said Dave Fester, general manager of Microsoft Corporation’s Digital Media Division.
“At a time when cutting-edge technologies such as Media Audio and Video 8 from Microsoft Windows™ are setting new standards in the delivery of the highest quality audio and video at minimal bandwidth, users of the Aqua encoder will benefit twice over: they will get better quality at a lower bandwidth cost,” comments Tim Thorsteinson, President of the Grass Valley Group.
To meet the strong demand for the efficiency of plug-and-play solutions, the Aqua encoder interfaces with rights management systems, is capable of increasing throughput when using standard load balancing software to evenly distribute the workload, and supports Microsoft.NET, which allows users to access the encoder directly, regardless of where the encoder is located or where their material is stored. The Aqua encoder will also be equipped with interfaces to various e-commerce applications and applications for the digital publication and distribution of programme contributions.
The Aqua encoder is based on extensive development work by the Grass Valley Group in the field of video compression and production technologies – work that was supported by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) of the US Department of Commerce. These technologies help professional producers achieve the highest possible signal quality and product reliability, whether they are developing new streaming media or preparing content for the web.
“Today’s digicasters don’t need toys, they need tools for video streaming – the Aqua encoder is exactly the cutting-edge product they demand,” Thorsteinson continues. “With our product, the media only needs to come into contact with the process once. Thanks to our One Pass Encoding technology, capture, preparation, encoding and streaming are all done in one step.”
This product announcement is part of the Grass Valley Group’s Overarching Internet offering, which includes hardware and software for video storage and production, programme material management, video editing and encoding, and web publishing. These products, which the company will showcase at NAB 2001 in Las Vegas (booth L10409/P), are part of its Media Without Bounds™ initiative for products that enable digicasters to access any programme anytime, anywhere.
POWERFUL ENCODERS ESSENTIAL FOR EFFICIENT STREAMING
Industry analysts predict that time spent streaming media will account for 23 per cent of total Internet usage time by 2004 and that the industry will spend $7 billion on online streaming advertising in the same period (Deutsche Bank Alex Brown, Lightningcast). This means that at no time have technologies that expand the bandwidth spectrum been more important.
The Aqua encoder enables highly efficient workflows as it works with the most sophisticated CODEC (Compressor/Decompressor) algorithms from Microsoft, RealNetworks and Apple. It also features Grass Valley’s unique signal processing and distribution technology and an innovative, simplified user interface.
With these features, it achieves a level of efficiency that broadcasters and other professional producers (including: Encoding labs, new media producers and publishers, broadband ISPs, webcasters and companies ranked among Fortune’s 500 most successful companies) to realise new video applications.
ONE-PASS ENCODING TECHNOLOGY SETS AQUA-ENCODER APART FROM THE COMPETITION
To ensure that producers who distribute their material online receive the same top video quality as producers who broadcast their contributions, the Grass Valley Group developed the One Pass Encoding technology. This technology includes various tools for signal cleaning before and after digitisation, such as tools for noise suppression, removal of irregularities and interlacing as well as colour correction. This enables the Aqua encoder to handle multiple high-bitrate encoding processes simultaneously and in real time – efficiently producing a wide range of output data, from simple audio to streaming video in DVD-like quality. The Aqua encoder, which specialises in real-time production, also supports some basic pre-encoding editing functions.
To complement the One Pass Encoding technology, the Aqua encoder has a user interface that is equally suited to users with different levels of encoding experience. Each user can customise the interface to suit their personal level of expertise and still use all the important encoding commands.
THREE OPERATING MODES ENSURE THE GREATEST POSSIBLE FLEXIBILITY
The Aqua encoder offers the greatest possible flexibility and guarantees compliance with application-dependent deadlines, such as those common in web publishing and live environments. The Aqua encoder can operate in three different modes: lights on when a user is at an interface and operating controls; lights out when the encoder is operating unattended (i.e. running jobs from the batch queue or searching for source material to encode); and crash encode when the system is in a ‘look-ahead’ mode for applications such as breaking news or high priority web-based jobs that require a temporary interruption to normal operation.
Because the Aqua encoder is equipped with the proven technology of the Profile family of video server systems, it has an automatic recognition and encoding function that allows it to be connected to the Profile XP media platform. This connection allows the encoder to access the media storage directory of a Profile XP media platform. If new files are available, it can automatically convert the contents of a file into the appropriate streaming media formats without any user intervention.
The Aqua encoder is based on hotswappable CompactPCI processors connected via a very fast 64-bit PCI motherboard. The Aqua encoder requires only 12 height units in a 19-inch rack and is fully transportable thanks to this compact and robust design.
DIGICASTERS DEMAND A COMPLETE SOLUTION FOR WEB PUBLISHING
Today’s digicasters are keen to rationalise and simplify the preparation of their content for the web and e-commerce. They require a web publishing solution that is capable of assigning the relevant metadata to the transmitted contribution – descriptive information, price entries, legal rights and duration of use of the programme material. You want to use the same solution to convert content for distribution over the web and encode and encrypt this material in a way that ensures the highest possible video quality and maximum security. They want a streaming solution that prepares incoming video and audio material, allows easy editing of the material to be encoded, and has a standardised user interface for all functions, simplified input/output and batch processing.
The Grass Valley Group’s web media publishing solution attempts to fulfil all of these requirements.
The company’s WebAble technology streamlines the preparation of content for the web from the Profile server and from the Profile XP media platform.
The Aqua Internet encoder has complementary capabilities to process and encode multiple sources, including live video, and can generate real-time streams at multiple bit rates. In addition, it can be configured as a “turbo charger” for WebAble technology to maximise video quality.
The Profile XP media platform and the Profile family of video server systems from Grass Valley Group store and play back more broadcast material than any other server. Now that Profile systems also feature the Grass Valley™ Media Area Network™ (MAN) option for real-time shared storage, broadcasters and other producers of demanding content can use these systems to optimise and streamline their production workflows – from ingest, editing and viewing to publishing and webcasting.
Thanks to ContentShare, Grass Valley Group’s XML-enabled software platform for managing programme material, digicasters can save the time and cost of programming their own interfaces between applications for processing programme contributions, even if these applications change. The ContentShare platform is becoming an established solution in the broadcast industry, seamlessly connecting all systems from newsroom computers to billing applications.
PRICING AND AVAILABILITY
Base configurations of the Aqua Internet encoder are expected to be available in the summer of 2001 at a starting price of $20,000.
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