Radiodiffusion-Television ivoirienne (RTI), state broadcaster for the Ivory Coast,
has taken delivery of a new CG titling and television playout solution from
PlayBox Technology, manufacturer of television channel-in-a-box systems. This
was installed by Brussels-based systems integrator Periactes Broadcast
Solutions at RTI’s production and transmission centre in Abidjan.
“We have been using PlayBox Technology equipment very successfully for many
years,” says Venance Kouakou, Head of Operations – Digital Workflow and
Maintenance, at RTI. “We transmit round the clock so reliability is obviously a
major requirement. PlayBox Technology products integrate into a fully unified
system which is highly stable and easy to control. This is naturally appreciated
both by our production and our engineering staff. Switching between live and
file-based feeds is seamless. Other very useful advantages include the system’s
ability to manage incomplete clips and to automate the management of logos.
This latest installation comprises three AirBox servers, each equipped with
TitleBox Interactive on-air graphics, SafeBox automated content management
software and Multi Backup Manager. We have also invested in a fourth AirBox
and TitleBox which are being used for content preview and system testing.”
“PlayBox Technology equipment is ideally suited to the fully tapeless
environment in which RTI and most other modern broadcast networks operate,”
adds Baptiste de Bemels, General Manager of Periactes Broadcast Solutions.
“The new AirBox and TitleBox servers are housed in the central apparatus room
and will provide fully redundant protection across RTI’s two main channels, using
PlayBox Multi Backup Manager and an auxiliary server with RAID5 storage. Triple
hot-swappable power supplies are incorporated. These can be replaced while
the channels are on air without any service interruption. We have also installed
a smart video hub which can be used to switch between the two programme
sources and the backup. The system is operated from the master control room.”
AirBox is a universal SD/HD content playout and streaming server designed for
continuous unattended operation. Every clip in the playlist, except the one which
is currently playing, can be trimmed, edited or repositioned. Playlist order can be
changed on-the-fly using commands such as skip-to-next or jump. Changes are
performed seamlessly without stopping current playout session. Live
productions are facilitated by a Live Show clipboard which allows insertion
and/or execution of various events or live streams. AirBox accepts
MPEG1/2/H.264, HDV and DV streams from practically every known production
platform providing AVI, MPEG, WMV, Quick Time or MXF content. Files from third-
party servers such as Leitch or Seachange are natively supported.
TitleBox delivers on-air graphics which can be controlled interactively. Multi-
layered simultaneous crawls, rolls, animated logos, clocks and text templates
can be activated by a mouse click. TitleBox provides total control during on-air
session, including text selection, running speed and transitions.
SafeBox replicates remote content to local playout server folders for safe
playback. It can gather content from a number of sources automatically, when
new content is available at the remote locations. SafeBox can work in playlist-
dependent or stand-alone mode. In playlist-dependent mode, all file operations
are slaved to schedule contents. New daily schedules are transferred along with
their associated content and file paths in the playlists are automatically updated
according to the new local storage. Expired daily schedule content is
automatically deleted or moved to a predefined purge folder for manual deletion
or archiving. Deletion can be done automatically or with user approval of
deletion lists.
