QC Station extends TAG’s Realtime Media Platform with advanced, scope-like video quality tools directly inside the multiviewer. Operators and engineers can see real-time metrics alongside the live video itself, including ETR, video, audio, SCTE, subtitles, and more. In addition, QC Station offers deep color analysis with vectorscopes, waveforms, luminance and chrominance monitoring, HDR validation, and audio channel checks.
Unlike threshold-based alarms, QC Station provides continuous visibility of metrics, enabling faster troubleshooting and deeper analysis of high-value streams. By consolidating QC into the same environment as monitoring & multiviewing, it removes the need for additional tools, reducing both operational cost and technical complexity.
QC Station helps media companies protect revenue by ensuring content integrity and compliance with industry standards. Engineers gain precision tools for detecting artifacts and misalignments, while operators benefit from immediate visibility in their daily workflows. The result: faster issue resolution, consistent quality at scale, and streamlined operations.
Technical Overview
QC Station extends TAG’s probing architecture by embedding engineering-grade measurement tools directly within the live multiviewer. It operates on decoded video, audio, and metadata streams, providing per-frame and per-field analysis that adheres to industry measurement standards.
At the video level, QC Station supports luminance and chrominance scopes including waveform, RGB parade, and vectorscope, along with live histogram and gamut visualization. Measurements are sampled at native frame rate and bit depth (8–10 bit), allowing operators to validate brightness levels, color balance, and saturation in real time. The system flags deviations such as over-range values (IRE > 100), color space violations, and gamut clipping across Rec.709, Rec.2020, and DCI-P3 color spaces.
Audio analysis includes true-peak, short-term, and integrated loudness readings compliant with ITU-R BS.1770-4 and EBU R128. Each channel is individually monitored for silence, phase errors, and level imbalance. Waveform overlays allow correlation between audio and video timing, providing immediate insight into sync accuracy and A/V drift.
For metadata, QC Station can display SCTE-35/104, HDR metadata, and subtitles/caption timing, ensuring all ancillary data remains synchronized with picture and sound. It can also detect mismatched HDR flags or incorrect transfer functions (e.g., PQ/HLG), crucial for HDR/SDR consistency.
QC Station outputs detailed metrics via API 5.0, Redis, and SNMP, enabling integration with Grafana, Kibana, and DataMiner dashboards for historical trend visualization. Thresholds for every parameter – video luminance, color saturation, audio loudness, or subtitle timing – can be configured dynamically through MCS.
By consolidating scopes, analyzers, and compliance monitors into a single software environment, QC Station eliminates the need for external hardware QC devices. This integration provides precise engineering insight directly in the operator view, reducing tool fragmentation and ensuring technical compliance across the broadcast flow.
