NEXT GENERATION of DIGITAL MEDIA WORKFLOW

The

Evolution to a File-only Infrastructure

Session Topics
What happens when they are only files?
aka when baseband is no more

Quality Control in a File-based domain

Automated Test & Measurement

How the Network is Impacted

Provisioning and efficiency for content migration Content delivery networks - internal & long distance exchange

Planning, Processes and Procedures

Expectations, shortfalls, handling upgrades

The Demise Of Baseband

Inevitable reduction of baseband implementations
Retained for live production NLE is moving away from exclusive real time ingest Baseband costs increase to maintain the status quo

Non-real time media exchange expands

Faster or slower depending upon immediacy of content Scalable with the network bandwidth/speed Ideal for compressed video and file based platforms

Baseband unnecessary for delivery going forward

Pre-packaged formats (already in cable & satellite) Platform Interchange (direct to air and for transport)

The Value of Working with Files

Platforms offer unconstrained flexibility Content is readily repurposed The transport of content is unbound
network based vs. point-to-point physical

Replaces aging analog and digital lineal tape

files are more durable and extensible promotes independence from fixed media formats

Costs for file only implementations will decrease

Uses & Expectations

File-based platforms will

support the NextGen Digital Media domain address ATSCs evolving standards (i.e., A/101 interactive, A/72 AVC, NRT protocols, ATSC 2.0) new mobile applications (A/153 ATSC-M/H) future delivery diversification (VoD, Web)

Preservation of legacy content and fixed media

archive content once clean up analog formats correctly, once and for all preserves digital content completely

File-based Frameworks
Promote integration through a layered architecture Acquisition, storage, manipulation, and delivery processes Achieves flexibility by loosely coupling the infrastructure to the applications Force structure for media asset management focused work centers, content sharing, collaboration capabilities that aid in developing or repurposing content

File-based Frameworks
Provide consistency in workflow broadcast operations will still use several workflow flavors applications are extended to work area needs from acquisition through content preparation then to playout and on to archive

Legacy Hybrid Workflow

ARCHIVE

Limited Formats Rigid work structure labor intensive Generation losses Excessive Q/A Secondary Information/Metadata manual

The New Digital Media Workflow (DMW)

ACQUISITION & INGEST
VIDEO

PLAY TO AIR
VIDEO

GIGABIT NETWORK

POST PRODUCTION

FILE BASED PROCESSING NEW MEDIA DISTRIBUTION

QA
ARCHIVE MEDIA MANAGEMENT

Enabling a Comprehensive File-based Environment

Decisions and Policies must be established: Compression types and formats Coding types and bit rates for levels of quality Acquisition media (SSM, optical disc, HDD) Intra-facility interchange formats Archive methods (near-, short- and long-term) Disaster recovery mechanism and platform Edit decision making (proxy vs. low-bandwidth) Monitoring and quality assurance

When There Are Only Files

Many Work Tasks can be Automated
ingest, quality control, security, backup

Personnel diversification is improved Baseband house formats can be relaxed Platform interchanges gain flexibility
however, not necessarily simpler or more achievable

Quality control becomes essential !

Part II Quality Control in a File Domain

Touch Points for QC/Test & Monitoring

Media Types
Analog Video Sources

Video Formats
ANALOG (NTSC, PAL) SD, HD (720p, 1080i, 1080p) CIF, QCIF (Internet, Mobile)

VIDEO CODECS MPEG2, H.264, AVCINTRA, JPEG, JPEG2K, MPEG2 Pt-2, VC-1, VC-3

T AS DC Y R OA BR LIVE DE
ALT ER N ME ATIV DIA E
AUDIO CODECS AUDIO CODECS FILE FORMATS FILE FORMATS

Digital Video Sources

Other (resolutions, frame rates, aspect ratio, formats)

MPEG-2 MPEG-2 (TS, PS, PES) (TS, PS, PES) ASF, QT ASF, QT GXF, MXF GXF, MXF 3GPP, DV 3GPP, DV

AAC AAC E-AC-3, AC-3 E-AC-3, AC-3 DOLBY-E DOLBY-E WMP3 WMP3 WMA WMA Layer II Layer Layer II Layer II

POINTS OF QC ANALYSIS

Automating File-based QC

What Operators Wont See or Hear

Content can be irreparably damaged very early on
dangers of image impairment are camouflaged with no way to recover from many errors and while it may look good, it is still no good

Errors created in the encoding process

may be passed through or masked by a good decoder may still crash a home STB decoder hard to spot missing I-frames, corrupted syntax, levels of macroblocking, improper motion vectors, etc

Audio that sounds good, but has:

out-of-phase, channel swapped or lost due channels missing, wrong dial_norm or DRC compressed audio but metadata parameters are corrupted

Audio/Visual Impairments
Encoding quality errors
blockiness, improper motion-vector, misordering missing or other improper audio metadata

Timing and segmenting

mistiming, truncation, extension of heads/tails commercial insertion triggering errors, splicing errors

Format errors or missing information

PAL instead of NTSC, progressive instead of interlace line standard or framing incorrect

Non-Audio/Visual Impairments
Multiplexing Errors Missing data (closed captions, ratings) Metadata errors
DRM, MXF, BXF (automation/traffic)

Industry interchange specifications

Improper CableLabs compliance Incorrect MPEG syntax (in ES or PS) PIDs, PATs, PMTs, PCRs

Traditional Content Work Flow for QC

INGEST PROCESSES
Multiple Content Providers or Sources

Manual QC Checks

CONTENT REJECTED

Transcoding Wrapping Trimming (Tops & Tails) Segmenting Versioning

Transfer to Server ----------Playout Ready

QC Script

Improved Content Quality Assurance

Content Providers or Sources

Linear Programs LINEAR VIDEO

Transcoding Wrapping Cataloging Segmenting Add Graphics Transfer to Server ----------Playout Ready

IRD

FILES
Automated QC Plugged Into Existing Workflow

CONTENT REJECTED

Automated QC Checks

Content Meets Rules

Automated QC

Corrective Actions
Option-1
decode to baseband, correct with baseband processing equipment, re-encode
(most aesthetic correction or visual/aural discrepancies must be fixed by humans)

Option-2
fix the syntax, (meta)data insertion, or timing adjust audio metadata or normalization

Option-3
reject, then re-feed/re-order the content abandon and substitute with evergreen material

New Tools for File Analysis

Automated File Analysis
Tektronix Cerify Interra Systems Baton Videotek QuiC

MXF tools
Snell & Wilcox, MOG Solutions, Metaglue

Transport stream, MUX and Picture Quality checking

JDSU, Rohde & Schwartz, Tektronix, Triveni

Audio analysis, encoding and metadata correction

Dolby DP600

Delay and Lip Sync correction

disruptive vs. non-disruptive instruments

Tools Allow You to See & Solve

Test summary for each file in Job Details for each file within the Job Errors in frame

Alerts for each error within the file Video thumbnails and audio waveform shown in frames surrounding the alert
Courtesy Tektronix
(AZCAR is a Cerify Developers Community member)

File-based Augmentation
Adding ancillary data (cc, ratings, or v-chip) Adding logos or branding Tagging of AdID, ISAN/V-ISAN or ISCI data Inserting playout descriptors
Active Format Description (AFD SMPTE 2016) Certain traffic/automation tagging (BXF SMPTE 2021)

MXF versioning
Multi-language, video description, PG vs MA versions Advanced Media Workflow Association (AMWA)
Focus on high-level workflow for commercial, syndicated and long form programming from creation through distribution and then broadcast.

Part III Impacts on the Contribution Network

Managing Files Over Networks

Requires appropriate network provisioning
Scaling for growth Internal or local storage management Moving of very large file sizes (upwards of 50 GB) Security Handling of varying traffic volatility

High Speed Interchange

Internally between work centers Site-to-site and site-to-multisite Geographic exchanges with products such as Omneon ProCast CDN, Isilon, Aspera, Signiant

File Preparation & Processing

Preparation to prescribed formats
delivered to the facility read to go

Transcode farms
option to use COTS products vs. grow your own license & per seat costs, interoperability, customization

Engines may be dedicated or integrated

server storage with application processing integrated transcode clients deeply tied with automation (extended with QC)

Transcoding vs. unwrapping/rewrapping

processing times vary blind transcoding may be ambiguous

Network Security and Resiliency

Secure file delivery
cryptography SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) TLS (Transport Layer Security) selectable payload encryption (AES 256/128/64) certified delivery using Public Key Infrastructure

Network resiliency using

file check-pointing (saving a program state) firewall traversal

Operability
Employs industry-standard applications
watch folder based management and interchange encoding, proxies, and metadata carriage watermarking, transcoding, content playout or distribution

Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP), Service Oriented Architecture (SOA), Web Services

Network Centric Digital Media Distribution

Policy based, Web-enabled network management
the network traffic control cop uses business-based prioritization

Tracking, scheduling, reporting and auditing

employs a dashboard view of system status

Controls data confidentiality and integrity

Certifies delivery to resources and recipients Denies unauthorized access

Template based execution of scheduled jobs

using data movement agents with conformance to business policies provides redundancy utilizing data differencing

Intelligent Content Distribution Networks (CDN)

Intelligent Traffic Management (ITM) offers: efficient network traffic & bandwidth utilization diversification of transcoding and rate shaping operations rights management and security platform extensions, adding diversity to operations automated re-transfer as a background task ability to use content before FTP transfer is complete controlled exchange of content between workgroups and other sites

Media Dispatch Protocol

SMPTE EG 2032-4-2007
For the delivery of files over IP networks Three parts to MDP
protocol specification (SMPTE 2032-1) mapping specification (SMPTE 2032-2 for MDP/XML/HTTP) profile specification (SMPTE 2032-3 is the basic target pull profile)

Developed for MAN and WAN

suitable for LAN

MDP is not
a transfer protocol a file wrapper or container format (i.e., MXF, QuickTime, etc) a metadata protocol

Media Dispatch Protocol

SMPTE EG 2032-4-2007

Courtesy of SMPTE

Content Management Architecture

Site-to-Site Distribution
File interchange for
collaborative production content delivery (WIP, approvals or release) disaster recovery site content population

Content is automatically distributed to destinations using watch folders Nodes (agents) at each site ensure content is moved in the most efficient manner Transfer scheduling employed to
manage the bandwidth of each individual transfer prioritize jobs via rules-based transfers increases network proficiency

Site-to-Multisite Distribution
Moves content efficiently between several geographically distributed global sites
provisioned on existing IP-networks as an overlay uses a content-aware file delivery layer

Uses highly scalable enterprise-class platforms Nodes easily added/removed at new locations Unidirectional distribution
selects most appropriate route available multi-cast enabled for satellite delivery

Managed from any location on the network

ensures universal management, monitoring and access

Part IV Planning Considerations for a File-based Infrastructure

Realization Potential
...should realize a 4x-increase in real time processing per component when moving to a file based workflow. ingest - the starting point
(get it right the first time)

analysis and quality assurance

(validation, reporting, repeatability)

ancillary services
(tagging, data insertion, versioning)

post-production, disaster recovery, and library needs

(archive, alternative coding, proxy and browse generation)

Media Asset Management

The Key to Success is in a centralized MAM plan
essential element in automated file management

Requires adopting new workflow principles

should adhere to open work flow standards development of your own service oriented architecture (SOA)

Selecting the right MAM product

most products are still proprietary users often insist upon customizing workflows
costly, less friendly, often undesired by vendor

Process and Procedure Setting

Establish written policies, practices and procedures
Set acceptability thresholds

Utilize a reporting check list automate whenever possible

logging of errors, statistics, all corrective actions taken

Develop a backup plan with sufficient evergreen content Prepare the system failover and failback Adopt versioning management (use MXF) Know how to find the files
Catalog with MAM, use check-in and check-out, etc

Rigidity with flexibility

Just in Time content delivery may not be practical

Impacts from System Upgrades

Upgrades will become a regular part of life Make certain you perform regression testing Forward thinking needed for server growth
play to Air platform, disk expansion, VoD, archive

Understand that both file and system issues are affected by

inter-departmental interchanges or workflow platform obsolescence in work zones the I need a better mousetrap proliferation

Shortfalls in Implementation
Spotty or incomplete implementation
Deployed only a portion of the necessary tools

Insufficient training and exposure prior to launch System was customized for todays thinking
sort out and remove unobtainable results set aside misrepresentations and vaporware

Limited acceptance by the staff

the old ways never die, felt threatened, apprehensive didnt want to become the guinea pig

Only a few understand or evangelized the long term, extensible value to the overall organization
initial ROI didnt meet the accounting expectation

The Successful Implementation

Mitigates manual processes Reduces time getting products to air Minimizes errors improves flexibility Creates the perfect paths for
archiving repurposing/versioning of content disaster recovery/asset protection prevention of obsolescence

Complex at the start worth it in the end

Thank You
Karl Paulsen Chief Technology Officer AZCAR Technologies, Inc.
karl.paulsen@azcar.com 724-873-0800 ext 203