Innovations to help video providers gain efficiency, agility, scalability, and intelligence for media workflows at scale

Portland, Ore. – Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS), an Amazon.com company, today announced plans to demonstrate advanced approaches for media ingest, video processing and delivery, storage, content monetization, and machine-learning enhanced video at the IBC 2018 Show, Sept. 14 through 18, stand 5.C80, RAI Amsterdam Convention Centre, Amsterdam. The solutions from AWS offer media and entertainment companies, enterprises, start-ups, and government agencies the ability to create and deliver video faster and more efficiently, build intelligent video applications enhanced by machine learning, and extend the reach of their content globally.

“Agile, efficient, and reliable video infrastructures offer content creators and providers a trusted foundation for innovating and delivering new viewing experiences,” said Keith Wymbs, Chief Marketing Officer, AWS Elemental, an Amazon Web Services company. “AWS media solutions are architected to help content providers build faster, work smarter, increase efficiency, and scale globally. We look forward to sharing video technologies and strategies that enhance compelling content and enable competitive advantage at IBC 2018.”

Advancing Content Creation

AWS will showcase a host of solutions designed to help media enterprises of all types create rich, dynamic live and on-demand video experiences. Demonstrations will include:

• Low-latency live video workflows – AWS Elemental MediaStore provides origin services for a low-latency, live streaming video distribution through Amazon CloudFront content delivery network (CDN). Using standards-based protocols, the live workflow maintains end-to-end latency of less than six seconds;

• High-quality video-on-demand with QVBR – AWS Elemental MediaConvert with Quality-Defined Variable Bitrate (QVBR) control encodes and packages video-on-demand (VOD) in the Common Media Application Format (CMAF). Developed by AWS, QVBR is a video compression technique that automatically adjusts to the complexity of source content, maintaining high-quality video while reducing storage and distribution costs;

• Cloud DVR services – AWS Elemental MediaPackage provides the basis to create an end-to-end cloud DVR workflow that lets content providers easily deliver DVR-like experiences, such as catch-up and start-over functionality for viewing on mobile devices;

• Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (Amazon EC2) Spot and AWS Thinkbox Deadline 10 – Users can easily launch a powerful render farm on-premises, in the cloud, or in a hybrid architecture with AWS Thinkbox Deadline render management software. Flexible infrastructure, usage-based licensing, and EC2 Spot instances enable extreme scalability as well as cost-optimization for render workloads;

• Virtual VFX Workstations – Leverage the best global talent, regardless of geography, with powerful virtual workstations for visual effects. Quickly increase post-production capacity without adding expensive, specialized equipment.

Innovations in Content Distribution

The AWS stand at IBC Show offers several examples of real-world solutions that advance security and efficiency for content distribution, along with machine-learning applications that enhance the value of video content and simplify complex workflows:

• Intelligent video workflows – Cloud services automate the extraction and analysis of metadata from video streams, supporting fast, easy creation of searchable media libraries. AWS Elemental Media Services, Amazon Rekognition and other machine learning services are used to identify and obscure persons or objects for automated compliance, moderation, and redaction for on-demand video;

• Live video clips and captions – AWS Elemental MediaLive and MediaPackage work with Amazon Transcribe and Amazon Translate to generate captions of live video content and automate multi-language subtitling and dubbing for on-demand assets. The demonstration also includes automated creation of VOD clips based on caption text;

• Reliable live video with the latest standards – A live video workflow demonstrates ground-to-cloud-to-CDN redundancy with components including AWS Elemental Live, AWS Elemental MediaLive, AWS Elemental MediaPackage, and Amazon CloudFront. QVBR compression maintains high-quality live video while decreasing storage and distribution requirements. Additional demonstrations process live video in fMP4, CMAF, and HEVC formats to spotlight video quality improvements, increased compression efficiency, and benefits of ecosystem convergence;

• Secure content distribution – Live video workflows incorporate optimized video distribution with CloudFront, a highly secure CDN that provides both network- and application-level protection. CloudFront is also seamlessly integrated with AWS Web Application Firewall and AWS Shield Advanced to help protect applications from more sophisticated threats and DDoS attacks.

Optimizing the Media Supply Chain

AWS brings together at IBC a comprehensive set of integrated video solutions to demonstrate advancements in asset management, metadata analysis, video processing and delivery, and content monetization:

• Cloud-based broadcast and multiscreen video services – AWS Elemental Media Services form the foundation for cloud video infrastructure, integrating storage and origin services, real-time encoding, file-based transcoding, content packaging and protection, and targeted ad insertion as part of end-to-end workflows;

• Tape-to-cloud media migration – Media asset management tools integrate with AWS Elemental MediaConvert, Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3), and Amazon CloudFront to accelerate migration of large-scale video archives into the cloud. Built-in metadata tools improve search and management for massive media archives;

• Enhanced live sports content – Amazon machine learning services and AWS Elemental Media Services process sports content, detecting players and action in real time for streamlined metadata tagging and enhanced live sports coverage. Automated highlight clipping and on-screen graphics creation are spotlighted in these demonstrations;

• Personalized advertising insertion – AWS Elemental MediaTailor performs real-time insertion of personalized ads into video streams for increased reach, relevance, and quality for monetization campaigns. Integrated machine learning tailors advertising to broadcast content using image, object, and scene detection. Support for VAST, VMAP, and VPAID standards, along with multi-period DASH functionality, offer rich, standards-based dynamic ad insertion.

Envisioning New Video Workflows

AWS will participate in four speaking sessions during the conference.

• Max Amoredeluso, EU Lead Alexa Evangelist, will deliver Trailblazer Keynote: Give your vision a voice, Thursday, 13 Sept., 18:00 to 18:45 in the Forum at the RAI.

• Fabrice Rousseau, General Manager, Alexa Skills EU, Amazon, joins an expert panel for Future Interfaces: How voice transforms content, Friday, 14 Sept., 12:05 to 12:45 in room E102 at the RAI.

• Usman Shakeel, WW Technology Leader for M&E at AWS, joins speakers from Netflix, The Walt Disney Company, Sony Pictures, and 20th Century Fox to share first-hand accounts as part of Deploying component-based workflows: Experiences from the front-line on Saturday, 16 Sept., 12:30 to 14:00 in the Emerald room at the RAI.

• Keith Wymbs, Chief Marketing Officer for AWS Elemental, will lead a fireside chat featuring Hugh Westbrook, Product Owner for Sky News, and Josh Wiggins, Chief Commercial Officer for GrayMeta. Taking viewing experiences over the top will take place Sunday, 16 Sept., 12:30 to 13:00 in room E102 at the RAI.

4K 4Charity Fun Run

An IBC Show tradition in its fourth year, the 4K 4Charity Fun Run brings the industry together to celebrate its achievements and raise awareness and funding for non-profit organizations focused on increasing equity. This year’s event will take place Saturday, 15 Sept. at Amstelpark, Amsterdam at 07:00, and will benefit Stichting NewTechKids, which provides computer science education for girls, minorities and economically challenged youth in the Netherlands, and Iridescent, a global education non-profit that empowers underrepresented young people to become innovators and leaders through engineering and technology. To register, visit: https://4k4charity.com/ibc.