Cablecast added support for NDI and here's what you can do with it

As we learned in the first part of this series, NDI® is a protocol that was developed by NewTek® to support IP-based video production and distribution. In just a few years, it has been embraced by a number of software and hardware companies, because it offers a number of workflow advantages.

NDI® requires no special hardware and is designed to work with existing network infrastructures. Plus, NewTek has provided free access to the protocol, allows royalty-free use, and offers a free SDK (software development kit) to help companies integrate NDI® support into their own products. That’s a lot of free, which has resulted in NDI® becoming a de facto standard for professional video-over-IP production.

Last September, the new Cablecast 7.2 software added support for NDI®, allowing our system to ingest streams from the popular NewTek TriCaster® and other NDI®-enabled production switchers as IP-based input sources. As PEG stations move from SDI and other baseband signal infrastructures to IP-based workflows, NDI® support seamlessly integrates Cablecast into these new video architectures. It can even help streamline the SDI-to-IP transition for some stations.

How can NDI® improve your PEG programming? Feeding your Cablecast an NDI® source via your switcher is a great way to start implementing NDI® into your workflow:

• A PTZ camera with NDI® support can be a live video input from anywhere on your network, connected via a single Ethernet cable, with integrated tally support and pan-tilt-zoom operation through your TriCaster (or third-party controller). If your channel is housed in city hall or a similar government building, you can mount that PTZ camera on a tripod and take it beyond council chambers for live coverage of meetings in other parts of the facility.

• Press conferences just got easier and more professional, too. Connect your PTZ camera with NDI® support to the network, feed it to your switcher, add live pass-through graphics on top of the NDI® video, and output that signal to Cablecast Live to stream the press conference to your website.

• Always wanted that beauty cam to provide an external shot from your building? NDI® makes it easy – no SDI cable needed! Schedule switches to add a dedicated crawl message, or update it in real time if you cut to your beauty cam if an event ends early (or even if you have technical difficulties). Plus, you can control the PTZ camera remotely using the same connection through your switcher, so it doesn’t have to be the same shot day after day.

Cablecast 7.2 with NDI® support is FREE for Cablecast VIO customers with an active support agreement. Find out more about the Cablecast platform here.