SYSTEM INTEGRATION                 OBVAN                DSNG                STUDIOS                MCR                AUDIO ROOM                AND MORE....
         

Lawo V__matrix IP Core Routing & Processing Platform Used at Asian Games

Held concurrently in Jakarta and Palembang for the first time in their history, the 18th Asian Games ended in September with a closing ceremony in the Indonesia state capital of Jakarta where their opening ceremony had been staged 15 days earlier.

The 18th Asian Games Jakarta-Palembang 2018 – widely called the "Olympic Games of Asia" – includes disciplines practiced only in Asia. In addition to the well-known Olympic sports, dragon boating and the Chinese martial art of Wushu were among those contested.

The tournament was broadcast throughout Asia and beyond, watched by 112 million spectators, with the Indonesia Asian Games Organizing Committee (INASGOC) appointed International Games Broadcast Services (IGBS) as host broadcaster. A joint venture between IMG (London) and HBS (Switzerland), IGBS was responsible for the Games’ live broadcast production and distribution. The event’s International Broadcast Center (IBC) in Jakarta hosted a number of international broadcasters, including NHK and TBS (Japan), KBS, MBC and SBS (Korea), CCTV (China), TV5 (Philippines) Astro (Malaysia), SCTV (Indonesia) and BEIN and AlKass (Qatar).

During the live production, Lawo equipment was used for signal processing and distribution, as well as for central control. Central routing in the Lawo setup was handled by a V__matrix unit, Lawo's software-defined IP core routing and processing platform. Two V__remote4 units provided the PTP synchronization, and a VSM (Virtual Studio Manager) system provided the overarching control. For the live broadcasts, the 27 major stadiums involved in the event were continually connected to the IBC, while the feeds for sports coverage at "smaller" venues were recorded by ENG cameras and the material fed to the IBC.

The broadcast setup included production kits in the stadiums with commentator units, as well as permanently installed equipment in the IBC for multilateral reporting. The signals produced at the venues were transmitted to the IBC, where they were distributed to broadcasters after technical and content checks.

The event calendar also determined the signal volume: In addition to live feeds from the 27 stadiums and the ENG material, signals from six beauty-shot cameras distributed throughout Indonesia for scenic and cultural impressions were recorded and distributed. With the daily feed of the press conference and the highlights of the day’s events to be produced and distributed, a router able to accommodate the large number of feeds was required. For this, HBS chose a V__matrix, Lawo's software-defined IP core routing and processing platform – also with a view to future IP-based broadcast production.

Configured with 400 inputs and 400 outputs, the matrix – 64 C-100 boards in eight frames – offered 21 multiviewer ports, controlled by Lawo's Virtual Studio Manager running on two VSM servers. The VSM system was operated via 16 VSM soft panels on six 23-inch displays available in the CDT (Contribution, Distribution and Transmission Room), as well as on tablet screens used in other rooms.

Head of Engineering, Harry Petry: "We chose the V__matrix for this task in order to be able to set up a decentralized IP infrastructure for our future projects. With its product portfolio, Lawo offers state-of-the-art IP-based technology and, with the V__matrix, is the market leader," he explains.

"Due to the Asian Games’ proximity to the World Cup in Russia, there was no time for us to configure and test the entire system as usual, but our cooperation with Lawo over many major sporting events in recent years gave such confidence that we nevertheless decided in favor of this solution. So we put the system into operation at the beginning of August, and despite the time pressure, everything went according to plan.”

The V__matrix provides a fully virtualized real-time production infrastructure supporting many cores connected to a powerful standard switch with redundant 10GE and 40GE connectivity. This allows a distributed IP routing and processing matrix to be built with frame-accurate clean switching as with traditional baseband routers.

Where dark fiber venue connections were available, Lawo Commentary Systems were used to receive the commentary signals from the indoor swimming pool, the main stadium and the three venues in the IBC building.

The LCU (Lawo Commentary Unit) was developed in close cooperation with Host Broadcast Services (HBS); the system uses IP broadcast infrastructures and allows direct connection to Lawo mc² audio consoles and Nova routers for stand-alone operation. The extensive development work invested by Lawo's R&D team has resulted in a fully digital commentary system based on RAVENNA real-time transmission of audio data via IP (Audio-over-IP). This makes it possible to network both premises and equipment over standard IP networks, reducing cabling and increasing system flexibility.

 

World Premiere for Lawo’s 4K Format Converter – New Virtual Module for V__matrix providing format conversion between SD, HD and 4K

Lawo’s latest innovation premiered at the IBC 2018 is the vm_udx Virtual Module (VM) for the V__matrix eco-system, providing format conversion between SD, HD and 4K formats plus audio embedding/de-embedding, frame-sync, proc amp and RGB color correction functionality.

At its core the vm_udx provides four independent paths of format conversion between SD, HD and 4K for IP and/or SDI signals. Conversion between SD and HD formats uses one path while conversion to/from 4K uses four paths. Each path provides full video framesync and audio sample rate conversion as well as audio and video delay functionality. Every path also has audio embedding/de-embedding capabilities with audio gain, surround to stereo downmix (5.1 & 7.1) and x/y-fade functionality for all outputs. A 5,312x5,312 mono audio router provides ample room for audio embedding/de-embedding to video as well as pure audio channel reshuffling if desired. Broadcast quality RGB and YUV color correction is provided for every processing path. An additional four independent paths for a total of eight are available with the +4UDX option that can be added at any time.

Fundamentally designed with IP networking in mind vm_udx natively supports both ST2022-6 and ST2110-20 IP video as well as ST2110-30/-31/AES67 and RAVENNA IP audio streams. Conversion between IP video and IP audio standards is also possible, e.g. ST2022 to/from ST2110. To ensure high availability ST2022-7 hitless protection switching is natively supported. With the available io_bnc rear-plates vm_udx allows for legacy connection to SD-, HD- and 4K-SDI. For 4K both single-link 12G-SDI as well as quad-link (2SI and SQD) is supported. In addition the vm_udx is also capable of single-link to quad-link and 2SI to SQD cross-conversion.

 

KEY FEATURES

  • 4 instances of Up/Down/Cross conversion between SD/HD/4K (1 instance when converting to/from 4K)
  • Additional 4 instances available with the +4UDX option
  • 5,312 x 5,312 audio mono matrix with full audio embedding/de-embedding and shuffling between SDI/IP, IP/IP and SDI/SDI with SMPTE2110-30/RAVENNA/AES67
  • Includes framesync, RGB/YUV color correction and timecode insertion
  • 4K 12G-SDI single-link inputs/outputs when combined with the io_bnc rear-plates
  • Built-in programming, configuration and streaming telemetry capabilities
  • Simple management and control through Lawo vsmStudio makes operation imperceptible from a traditional baseband environment while maintaining all of the benefits of an IP system

Astro Radio Makes “High Stakes” Commitment to Lawo Virtual Mixing

Installing a third generation of consoles in its radio studios, Kuala Lumpur’s Astro Radio has standardized on virtual studio technology from German broadcast innovator, Lawo.

Continue Reading

Lawo Radio Consoles First To Adopt SMPTE 2022-7 Standard

Lawo implements the SMPTE 2022-7 standard for Seamless Protection Switching into its family of radio mixing consoles, as it has already done for its mc² production consoles.

Continue Reading

mc²96 GRAND PRODUCTION CONSOLE

PURE, PRECISE, PEERLESS. With the mc²96, the mc² platform is pushed beyond limitations, culminating in a pure, unparalleled audio production tool dedicated to those who can tell the difference. Whether its intended to be used in broadcast, theater or recording – in each of these applications it stands out with a unique set of features. The mc²96 provides optimized performance within IP video production environments with native SMPTE 2110 support.

Continue Reading

Featured News

Latest projects

November 03, 2022
2022 2874

National Theatre in Prague - Audio Console

National Theatre in Czech Republic's capital Prague has not only an extraordinary beautiful historical building located on the right bank of the Vltava river, it's got also first-class audio equipment in it.The heart of the National Theatre's audio is a…
June 02, 2022
2022 3855

Radio Free Europe - 4 IP-native audio consoles

ELEKTRONIKA in partnership with IVC and Lawo has just delivered and configured the largest ecosystem of Lawo audio consoles in SK & CZ region.Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty (RFERL) based in Prague has put trust into the fastly evolving next-generation of…
May 31, 2022
2022 4004

TV Markiza - Broadcast cameras for OB van

In Q1 2022 we delivered to TV Markiza 3 new Grass Valley camera chains (2x single-speed LDX 92, 1x triple-speed LDX 96) including camera heads, fiber adapters, CCUs, viewfinders, OCPs and a large lens adapter. By this purchase Markiza strengthened its OB…
February 11, 2022
2021 5115

Czech Radio - IP Upgrade

Czech Radio uses Lawo Nova73 and DALLIS technology for 6 years and the time has shown that this robust, thinked-through, in all aspects redundant set of devices was a lucky choice for the mission-critical role of central routing of over 20 radio stations, all…