Multiviewing Archives - TAG Video Systems

TAG Revolutionizes Closed Captions & Subtitles Quality Assurance with New Language Detection Feature

ilana@tagvs.com — Tue, 30 Apr 2024 08:10:08 +0000

TAG Video Systems, a leading force in video monitoring solutions, has developed a new Language Detection feature set to transform how operators ensure quality and compliance across large scale operations with multiple closed captions and language subtitles. Unveiled at the recent NAB 2024, this innovative technology offers much-needed automation and precision to the traditionally labor-intensive world of caption quality assurance.

The Challenge of Multi-Language and Large Scale Captions Monitoring

While accurate and compliant captions are essential for a positive viewer experience, operators have long grappled with the complexities of ensuring captions meet the mark. This is particularly true in today’s content landscape, where video is consumed globally across multiple languages. TAG’s Language Detection feature aims to alleviate this burden.

The sheer scale of video content produced and distributed makes accurate caption monitoring an immense task. The resources required to manually track and analyze captions across multiple languages can be overwhelming. Additionally, relying on human operators introduces the potential for errors. Fatigue, distraction, and varying levels of expertise can all contribute to inconsistencies in caption quality, posing a challenge to compliance with accessibility regulations.

How It Works

The core of this technology lies in its ability to automatically pinpoint the language of subtitles within video content. Powered by advanced algorithms, TAG performs a meticulous quality analysis informed by language-specific dictionaries, which in turn provides the data within the multiviewer output in the form of two parameters: identified language, and quality percentage against the identified language’s dictionary. The data can also be aggregated and visualized with data visualization tools to identify trends or centralize large scale operations. This significantly streamlines the caption monitoring process, offering these key benefits:

Frees Up Operator Time: By eliminating manual monitoring of closed captions and subtitles, operators gain valuable time to focus on more strategic and nuanced tasks.

Proactive Problem Solving: Real-time monitoring paired with helpful, informative alerts enables operators to quickly address any potential caption quality problems.
Pinpoint Accuracy: Reliable language identification and quality measurement against a dictionary helps avoid human error and assure accuracy and compliance.
Quality That Meets the Mark: Language-specific analysis ensures captions uphold quality standards and regulations, ultimately enhancing the viewing experience.
Informed Decision-Making: Data visualization tools provide insightful overviews of caption/subtitles quality trends, empowering media operations to make strategic improvements.

“TAG’s Language Detection is a glimpse of the future of quality assurance” says Michael Demb, VP Product Strategy at TAG Video Systems. “Operators no longer need to watch and listen to every channel to deliver quality captions and subtitles. By automating crucial processes, we’re enabling them to focus on higher-level analysis and decision-making, ultimately ensuring a better experience for all viewers.”

Recognized for Innovation

The impact of TAG Language Detection hasn’t gone unnoticed. The feature has already garnered significant recognition within the industry, taking home the following awards:

– NAB Product of the Year 2024
– Future’s Broadcast & Cable Best of Show 2024

The Future of Caption Quality Assurance

TAG Video Systems’ Language Detection feature marks a new era in quality assurance. By injecting automation and precision, it promises to reshape how operators approach this crucial aspect of media production and delivery. As the demand for accurate and accessible multi-language content continues to rise, this technology is poised to become an indispensable tool for ensuring a seamless and inclusive viewing experience for audiences worldwide.

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TAG’s Realtime Media Platform Receives AWS Foundational Technical Review Badge

ilana@tagvs.com — Wed, 24 Apr 2024 07:51:04 +0000

TAG, the leading provider of advanced monitoring & visualization software for live production, playout, delivery, and OTT, announced that its realtime media platform has been awarded the AWS Foundational Technical Review (FTR) badge. The FTR is a rigorous assessment conducted by Amazon Web Services (AWS) that evaluates solutions against AWS security, reliability, and operational best practices, outlined within the AWS Well-Architected Framework.

The TAG platform underwent a detailed assessment across several pillars, including:

Security: Demonstrating strong encryption, comprehensive identity, access management, and robust logging.
Reliability: Highlighting scalability, redundancy, fault tolerance, and disaster recovery processes.
Operational Excellence: Showcasing effective monitoring, alerting, incident management, and continuous improvement practices.

“We’re incredibly proud to receive the AWS FTR badge, as it reinforces TAG’s commitment to providing secure, reliable, and technically superior solutions built on AWS,” said Golan Simani, Director of Cloud and Tech Operations at TAG. “This recognition showcases the strength of our platform and the exceptional capabilities it brings to cloud-based media workflows.”

The FTR badge provides customers with confidence that TAG’s platform adheres to AWS best practices and is well-positioned to support even the most demanding cloud media use cases. This includes: Low latency streamlined live production multiviewing and monitoring (Including remote operations) and reliable playout and delivery probing and monitoring, for both traditional delivery methods and OTT. TAG’s solution was evaluated per individual workflow and proved to be secure, reliable and efficient running on AWS in all workflow environments.

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Monitoring is just the beginning

ilana@tagvs.com — Sun, 10 Nov 2024 15:38:41 +0000

TAG’s Realtime Media Platform goes beyond monitoring

If you google ‘multiviewing’, a mere 847,000 search results pop up. TAG Video Systems is right up there, on the first page. Which is great. However, although TAG is known for its exceptional ultra-low latency multiviewer adaptable to every media workflow, multiviewing is only one small component of the TAG Realtime Media platform – a comprehensive toolset that manages and elevates media performance across operations at any scale, setting TAG in a class of its own. TAG’s unique differentiators enable broadcasters and media companies to unlock significant operational efficiency and flexibility, so we’ve picked a few, outlined below.

Content Matching

Content Matching is TAG’s unique and award-winning process that ensures content is delivered in real time to its intended destination without errors or discrepancies. Content Matching identifies potential issues and confirms signal integrity, leading to increased broadcaster confidence and a high-quality viewer experience.

Content Matching creates a unique fingerprint for video streams to match them across the entire media distribution path. It accurately identifies and correlates audio and video uniqueness regardless of the resolution, bitrate, or framerate, thus enabling a match between two or more points in the workflow. This technology notifies users when the first content inconsistency occurs allowing them to get to the root cause of problems faster and troubleshoot more efficiently. Workflow complexity is dramatically reduced, allowing operators to work more efficiently by reducing “eyes-on-glass” while ensuring consistent delivery of quality content.

Content Matching can be applied to the most requested applications including frame-accurate latency measurement, SCTE ad insertion, AV alignment and audio channel drift validation.

Integration of Structural Similarity Index Measure (SSIM)

TAG’s platform is designed to deliver an unparalleled viewer experience by combining advanced Quality of Experience (QoE) and Quality of Service (QoS) tools. Based on Content Matching Technology, TAG now supports straightforward, reference-based QoE measures like Structural Similarity Index Measure (SSIM), an industry-leading algorithm that mimics human visual perception to assess video quality in real time. SSIM is seamlessly integrated with TAG’s Content Matching technology allowing for precise comparisons between reference (e.g., source at acquisition) and other points along the workflow (e.g, before/after encoders/packagers). This standardized evaluation simplifies quality assurance across workflows, ensuring a consistent and high-quality viewer experience.

However, TAG’s commitment to quality goes beyond SSIM. The platform also includes comprehensive QoS features that monitor video and audio parameters, signal loss, jitter, latency, and compression artifacts. Together, these tools provide operators with a comprehensive view of stream quality, ensuring both visual and technical fidelity throughout the entire media workflow.

TAG Bridge

TAG Bridge solves two major problems. It helps reduce the bandwidth needed to deliver uncompressed video from the receiving device to a remote location for multiview generations, and it eliminates the need to process the same source multiple times.
This technology is designed to handle various transport methods, such as 2110 uncompressed video or compressed MPEG TS streams, and many others.

TAG’s Bridge removes the complexity of routing the same stream across multiple locations ensuring efficient resource use with minimal bandwidth and compute requirements. This proprietary technology enables an operator to receive a source once – including video, audio and metadata, analyze it for quality, compliance and errors, pre-scale it to the destination tile size and display it directly on any TAG system, anywhere, regardless of input source, size or format. Compute resources are drastically reduced, and a minimum amount of network bandwidth is consumed, freeing up capacity for the customer.

Managing HDR in Live Broadcasting

High Dynamic Range (HDR) technology is redefining the visual standards of television, offering unprecedented brightness, contrast, and color that dramatically enhance the viewing experience. Across Production, Playout or Distribution, multiple HDR formats are here to stay and co-exist for a while. All have different color volume characteristics, many formats include metadata, and SDR will be present in many places. All these need to be managed correctly end-to-end to ensure that the viewer’s TV makes the right choices in displaying them, and that they arrive with appropriate quality and accuracy. They may traverse many codecs and transports; they may incorporate multiple HDR formats in their composition and provide HDR and SDR versions for some time to come. Monitoring this complexity requires adaptive, flexible, and data-driven tools that provide a comprehensive view of all elements in real time, which can accommodate any combination of source characteristics and provide probing/monitoring / alarming, visualization and rich content data from network to essence in one solution.

TAG Video Systems empowers broadcasters with the tools they need to navigate the HDR transition without dependency on expensive, dedicated hardware. By enabling the integration of multiple HDR formats into a single HDR multiviewer mosaic, these solutions offer an accurate visualization of all sources regardless of type, full monitoring of all metadata and behavior. This allows broadcasters to ensure the highest quality standards while also exploring new opportunities for content monetization through enhanced viewer experiences.

Zero Friction® Licensing

TAG ‘s Zer0 Friction® is an agile licensing model that fits both CAPEX and OPEX budgets, unlocking a world of possibilities with every TAG functionality at your fingertips, in every application and workflow. Zer0 Friction allows dynamic sharing across functions, workflows, and locations maximizing efficiency and adaptability in real time. This level of flexibility ensures that customers can adapt quickly to changing requirements, using the same TAG license to visualize a production in one location today and monitor an OTT data point in a different location tomorrow.

Conclusion

TAG is known for its multiviewers, but that’s just a part of the TAG story. The TAG Realtime Media Platform empowers customers to adapt to the rapid changes in content delivery workflows while ensuring consistent quality and operational efficiency. TAG provides the tools to scale operations efficiently and adapt to new challenges. This article gives a summary of some of those tools, unique to TAG.

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BRIDGING the Gap: Transforming IP Workflows in Broadcast and Media

ilana@tagvs.com — Mon, 01 Jul 2024 13:23:50 +0000

Innovation is the key to staying ahead in today’s fast-paced broadcast and media landscape. One such innovation is the new approach to managing and delivering signals across multiple platforms. This approach emphasizes reducing costs, optimizing resources, and providing unparalleled flexibility, making it indispensable for broadcasters and media companies striving for efficiency and excellence.

Simplifying Signal Management

Managing multiple signals for various monitoring locations traditionally requires significant resources and bandwidth. The complexity arises from the need to route the same stream to multiple destinations, often involving redundant processes and high costs. Each signal must be carefully managed to ensure quality and synchronization across different platforms. In contrast to older SDI technologies, which rely on straightforward, point-to-point connections, modern IP workflows must handle diverse transport streams, codecs, and bit rates (ABR).

This complexity is further compounded by the need to avoid redundant signal transmissions to multiple monitoring endpoints. A crucial aspect of this advancement is dynamic scaling, simplifying signal management by automatically creating signal proxies from any source type and optimizing them for display. This ensures that pictures are scaled and compressed to fit monitoring and visualization requirements, minimizing bandwidth usage and ensuring low-latency delivery. It’s like having a custom-fit solution for every screen, everywhere.

Enhancing Resource Optimization

Efficiency in signal management doesn’t stop at simplifying the process; it extends to optimizing the resources used. The latest technology allows for significant reductions in compute resources once a stream is ingested. This is achieved through advanced scaling, compression and delivery protocols such as SRT and RTP.

These optimizations are particularly beneficial in cloud and hybrid environments. For instance, in SMPTE 2110 uncompressed environments, while monitoring signals from cloud to ground, using optimization techniques where ‘bridge’ proxies of video, audio, and metadata are utilized for multiviewing your saving data egress costs and bandwidth. Conversely, from ground to cloud with the same proxies, you’re saving bandwidth and simplifying operations. By respecting data gravity—keeping data where it’s generated—the system minimizes unnecessary redundant data movement, further reducing costs and improving efficiency.

Real-World Applications

The practical applications of these innovations are numerous and impactful. Consider a large media organization with multiple studios across different continents. Previously, each studio would need to ingest the same signals separately, leading to redundancy and high costs. With advanced signal management and optimization, a single signal can be ingested once and shared across all locations. This streamlined process not only conserves bandwidth but also significantly reduces the operational burden.

During a global sports event, studios in different regions might need simultaneous monitoring access to the same feeds. With the new technology, these feeds can be efficiently distributed without duplicating the signal ingestion process. This ensures a smoother operation and a more cohesive broadcast experience. The technology’s ability to dynamically scale and adapt to different multiviewer and mosaic display requirements means that each studio receives the optimal signal quality for its specific needs.

Figure 1 – TAG Bridge Technology

News organizations particularly benefit from this innovation. Newsrooms must often monitor multiple regional channels to stay updated with breaking news and vast array of other sources. The new approach allows them to ingest these channels once and distribute them efficiently to anywhere they are needed. This conserves bandwidth, reduces costs, and ensures that the newsrooms can quickly and efficiently access the information they need.

Another critical application is in cloud environments. Media companies increasingly rely on cloud solutions for their operations. The technology’s ability to minimize cloud costs through adaptive monitoring and efficient data management is invaluable. By keeping data within the cloud and reducing egress costs, companies can leverage the cloud’s full potential without incurring prohibitive costs. This flexibility supports various workflows, from traditional on-premises setups to hybrid models and fully cloud-based operations.

Maximizing Flexibility and Interoperability

The flexibility and interoperability of modern signal management technologies are transforming how broadcasters and media companies operate. At the heart of this transformation is TAG Bridge Technology within TAG’s Realtime Media Platform. This innovative platform supports a variety of workflows, ensuring that media companies can seamlessly integrate new technologies into their existing infrastructure without disrupting their operations.

One of the most significant advantages is supporting infinite multiviewer and mosaic configurations. This capability allows organizations to mix and match sources, tiles, and formats to create customized displays that meet their needs. For instance, a control room can display a multitude of multi-format sources in a single mosaic, providing operators with a comprehensive view of all relevant signals.

This flexibility extends to the system’s architecture. By allowing different units to specialize in receiving inputs or creating mosaics, the system can be tailored to the specific needs of any operation. This separation of roles enhances the system’s efficiency and capacity, benefiting studios, control rooms, remote production, and mobile units alike.

Moreover, this technology is designed to be future proof. As media companies continue to evolve and adopt new technologies, the flexibility of these systems ensures that they can easily integrate new capabilities without significant overhauls. The interoperability of these systems ensures compatibility with various formats, protocols, and platforms, creating a cohesive and integrated workflow.

Conclusion

As the broadcast and media industry continues to evolve, staying ahead requires embracing innovative technologies that enhance efficiency and reduce costs. Signal management and delivery advancements are prime examples of how innovation can revolutionize operations. By simplifying signal management, optimizing resources, and providing unmatched flexibility and interoperability, these technologies empower media companies to meet the demands of today’s fast-paced environment.

Ultimately, embracing these advancements is not just about improving efficiency or reducing costs; it’s about enabling the next generation of media experiences. As technology continues to evolve, the possibilities for innovation in broadcasting are limitless. With tools like TAG’s Realtime Media Platform leading the way, the future of broadcast and media is bright, dynamic, and full of potential.

The post BRIDGING the Gap: Transforming IP Workflows in Broadcast and Media appeared first on TAG Video Systems.

Full Demo Overview

danna@tagvs.com — Sun, 12 May 2024 09:35:07 +0000

Dive deeper into TAG’s advanced monitoring capabilities as we walk you through each solution/ workflow demonstration in detail. Gain a deeper understanding of TAG’s unique solutions for simplifying your workflows, mainatining agility and maximizing resources. Whether you’re interested in multi-format quality managagemnt, hybrid workflows, or SCTE monitoring, this review has you covered.

Get the full overview

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Optimize Live Production Workflows with TAG’s Comprehensive Monitoring & Multiviewer

noa@tagvs.com — Sun, 12 May 2024 11:52:50 +0000

Explore TAG's advanced capabilities for streamlining live production environments. This demo showcases real-time multiviewing, control, and monitoring tools designed to enhance efficiency and decision-making for live production teams.

TSL Tally Integration

Full and rich Tally display, providing operators with clear visual cues and control over live feeds. The demo highlights how this information improves accuracy and responsiveness in real-time production scenarios.

Format Support and Visualization

TAG supports a wide array of compressed and uncompressed formats, allowing for versatile monitoring on a single display. The demo showcases how various formats can be visualized simultaneously, enabling efficient multi-format workflows (Used in this demo: 2110, NDI, JPEG-XS)

Time Zones, Clocks, and Timers

Precise timing is crucial in live production. TAG’s multiple time zones, clocks, and timers, including integrations with external timers like Plura, provide operators with the necessary tools for seamless coordination. The demo also demonstrates how TAG’s UMDs (User-Defined Metadata) can be used to display valuable production information for customized insights.

API-Based Heatmap for Camera Status

Monitor the status of multiple feeds at any point in the workflow with TAG’s API-based heatmap. This visual tool displays channel health and performance, using color-coded indicators for quick status checks. The demo highlights how this feature enhances overall monitoring efficiency.

Tile & Layout Customization:

The demo layout itself is created using TAG’s rich layout and tile builder, showcasing the platform’s extensive customization options. This allows production teams to tailor their displays to their specific needs, maximizing operational efficiency.

The post Optimize Live Production Workflows with TAG’s Comprehensive Monitoring & Multiviewer appeared first on TAG Video Systems.

Simplify HDR quality management for HDR & Hybrid workflows

noa@tagvs.com — Sun, 12 May 2024 11:14:42 +0000

This demo showcases TAG's advanced capabilities in handling High Dynamic Range (HDR) and Standard Dynamic Range (SDR) sources within a unified workflow.

Watch as TAG accurately detects and monitors HDR metadata across formats like PQ, HDR10, and HLG in real-time.

Discover how TAG bridges the gap between HDR and SDR worlds with intelligent upscaling and downscaling of color spaces. Get unprecedented visibility and control as you mix HDR and SDR content, even monitoring HDR feeds on SDR displays for maximum flexibility.

The post Simplify HDR quality management for HDR & Hybrid workflows appeared first on TAG Video Systems.

Power Cloud & Hybrid Workflows with TAG’s Cloud-Native Monitoring

ilana@tagvs.com — Sun, 12 May 2024 11:51:06 +0000

TAG's cloud-native design enables robust monitoring and visualization across cloud and hybrid environments. This demo showcases the seamless operation of on-premise systems, multiple cloud regions, and a cloud-based central control point. TAG's robust support for cloud deployments, empowers you to manage resources dynamically, spin instances up/down as needed, and seize new opportunities with cloud agility.

See TAG in action across a geographically dispersed hybrid workflow. The demo highlights real-time monitoring and visualization of feeds shared between on-premise and cloud locations using JPEG-XS and SRT. Additionally, TAG supports all cloud (NDI, AWS CDI, WebRTC, Zixi, HLS, and more) for seamless cloud integration.

TAG’s multi-cloud compatibility (AWS, Google Cloud, Azure, Alibaba Cloud, and Oracle Cloud) gives you exceptional flexibility in designing your workflows. Choose the cloud providers that best suit your specific needs and operational goals.

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Optimize Media Workflows with TAG’s Ultra-Low Latency Multi-Format Capabilities

ilana@tagvs.com — Sun, 12 May 2024 11:34:20 +0000

In today's complex broadcast landscape, handling a multitude of media formats efficiently is critical for success. This demo showcases TAG's exceptional ability to decode and encode a wide range of essential formats, ensuring ultra-low latency for real-time media workflows.

Watch as a live camera feed undergoes seamless conversion into major industry-standard formats, and the frame count for the latency added by processing:

2110- SMPTE suite of standards for sending Digital Media (Video, Audio, Metadata, and Synchronization) over an IP Network. Used for Live production and uncompressed sources in an all IP infrastructure.

JPEG-XS- Standard for light, lossless, real-time compression of uncompressed sources

NDI- (Network Device Interface) is a realtime low latency IP video network technology

WebRTC- Web Real-Time Communication is an open-source real-time communication (RTC) via application programming interfaces (APIs).

SRT- Secure Reliable Transport is an open-source transport protocol that allows for robust transmission of high-quality high-bandwidth video signals over public internet

TS- MPEG Transport Stream sent via RTP (Real-time Transport Protocol) on managed & predictable IP Networks

HLS- HTTP Live Streaming technique, used for high-quality streaming of media content over the public Internet

Additionally, the demo highlights TAG Bridge – a powerful feature designed to streamline workflows and save resources. See how TAG Bridge intelligently automates format, sizing, and delivery protocol adjustments for multiple destinations. This translates to significant reductions in resource consumption, network bandwidth usage, and ultimately, operational costs.

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FOX Sports Case Study: Mastering Multi-Format Workflows with TAG

noa@tagvs.com — Sun, 12 May 2024 10:17:57 +0000

This demo examines how FOX Sports integrates TAG's powerful monitoring and visualization platform into their Emmy-winning remote production system. The video highlights TAG's role in supporting a wide range of formats crucial to FOX Sports' diverse broadcasting operations.

Key workflow elements covered in the demo include:

FOX Sports’ use of ST2110 for remote production connecting between stadiums in Doha and their Dubai International Broadcast Center
Use of JPEG-XS for transmissions to U.S. facilities in California and Arizona, and later on to the FOX Sports cable network and broadcast affiliates.
Employing ABR (Adaptive Bit Rate) technologies for seamless distribution to the FOX digital platform for live streaming.

The demo showcases how TAG’s unified monitoring solution ensures end-to-end quality control for all of these formats. Additionally, it emphasizes TAG’s essential role in facilitating FOX Sports’ IP-based remote production infrastructure. This allows for high-capacity, low-latency transport, and ultimate reliability – essential factors for broadcasting high-profile sporting events.

TAG’s native IP based technology enables FOX Sports to create not only an extremely comprehensive and reliable infrastructure, but also an efficient, portable one to enable high quality production world wide.

Speaking at the Sports Video Group’s Remote Production Forum, Kevin Callahan, VP, Field Operations and Engineering at FOX Sports, said “The key is the monitoring, being able to see everything coming in and going out and being able to QC it – that’s really the goal of the IBC as the central hub. It connects to the studio location; it connects to all the venues; it connects to our Los Angeles broadcast facility as well as our Tempe broadcast facility.”

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