Peterson noted that master control automation has come a long way from the original Louth ADC-100 system, when the trick was to be able control multiple devices across a facility from a single user interface in order to playout a single channel. Bitcentral is also supporting streaming distribution for a number of broadcasters through its FUEL and products. The company’s “Central Control” software manages playout through COTS hardware, running on HP Enterprise servers with Matrox input/output cards. In that vein, Aviator is designed to work in conjunction with another new cloud-focused product from Imagine, Surefire, which Reynolds described as “a video ad server for FAST channels” that brings “broadcast-grade” advertising delivery to OTT including business rules like category separation, clash rules and time-of-day restrictions.īitcentral first made its mark in broadcast news production but has been gaining traction in master control since its 2015 acquisition of Fission Software. On the digital side, it means connecting with dynamic ad insertion systems to perform tasks like manifest manipulation. “Monetize”, the third part of Aviator, means interfacing with the traffic system to be able to do linear playout and ad insertion, including addressable ad insertion. Simultaneously doing linear and digital.” “So, graphics overlays, branding, all the DVE and squeezebacks, master control in the cloud, and being able to do that from a single unified console for all of the distribution you need to do.

“And whether it’s for linear or digital, when we’re talking about ‘making’ it’s obviously all the audio and video stuff, but it’s also everything used to enhance it,” Reynolds said. The “make” piece for linear means channel origination, creating a transport stream suitable for traditional distribution platforms like broadcast, cable or satellite, while on the digital side it means creating MPEG-DASH or HLS (HTTP live streaming) content for streaming distribution.

The “planning” piece of Aviator includes media plans, rights management and setting up ad inventory across multiple platforms, Reynolds said. Aviator ties together several capabilities that were already in the Imagine portfolio, such as rights management and digital ad insertion, and is designed to support both traditional linear and OTT channel origination from a single unified system.

Cable tv automation playout software