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INDUSTRY REPORTSAmagi FAST Report #13: The Growth of Live Sports Viewership on FAST & StreamingOctober 23, 2024Read More
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Case Study
Blue Ant Media expands its FAST portfolio with 4K UHD channels
Blue Ant Media is a leading media and broadcasting company in Canada that’s into content production, distribution and TV channel operation. It delivers broadcast TV channels across multiple regions across the world - with Love Nature, Total Crime and Smithsonian being some of its flagship channels. The company creates and produces factual entertainment, lifestyle series, animation, award-winning documentaries and has the largest 4K natural history offering in the Canadian market.
The Problem
Delivering broadcast-grade 4K UHD playout and driving content monetization
Blue Ant Media wanted to deliver broadcast-grade channels globally and maximize content monetization. They were looking to achieve the following:
HD and UHD channel playout: Leverage a single solution to power HD and UHD broadcast for different channels. They also needed to ensure that HD and UHD files were appended in a way that allowed for easy differentiation.
Infrastructure monitoring solution: To ensure an uninterrupted viewing experience, Blue Ant Media wanted an error-free playout without black/frozen screens or sound issues.
Playlist integration customizations: Since their main channel, Love Nature’s video files, were in Broadview (BXF) format, they sought a solution to ingest/accept it in the same format.
The Solution
Amagi’s one-stop cloud solutions empower channel creation, monetization, and monitoring
Amagi deployed Amagi CLOUDPORT – our broadcast-grade channel playout platform, and Amagi THUNDERSTORM – our dynamic ad insertion platform for monetization. Here’s how the change was implemented:
Channel creation and ingest scheduling: Media assets, including closed captions, were uploaded to Amagi's S3 cloud storage, and their metadata was uploaded to Amagi CLOUDPORT UI using the CSV metadata template — updating the Amagi megastore. This helped prepare EPGs for channels from customer-published playlists.
After assets and captions were ingested, SCTE markers were scheduled, and HD feed schedules for the current + 29 days were cloned for UHD feeds, with a 'U' appended to UHD filenames. This distinction between HD and UHD files streamlined the scheduling process, eliminating the need for separate playlists for HD and UHD channels. Playlists were synced every six hours, with schedulers ensuring timely updates for both channel types.
Content monetization: Blue Ant Media used Amagi THUNDERSTORM to monetize its channels, delivering them as multi-bitrate (MBR) HLS streams after configuring platform-provided ad tags. The UDP stream from the cloud player was converted to an HLS stream and fed into Amagi THUNDERSTORM. Upon detecting SCTE markers, the platform identified ad placement spots, fetched relevant ads from an ad server, and stitched them into the stream for delivery.
However, Amagi did not manage monetization for channels on platforms such as Orange TV, Pluto TV, and Samsung USA, as these platforms handled their own ad integrations. For instance, for Love Nature UHD, Amagi only delivered a redundant SRT feed with SCTE markers to Samsung USA. In these cases, the MBR HLS feed went directly to the platform, with the output file in the required format (HLS, SRT, or Zixi). Amagi also provided an Electronic Program Guide (EPG) according to platform specifications.
Infrastructure monitoring: All assets uploaded to Amagi CLOUDPORT underwent an initial quality check to prevent screen freezes, black frames, and silence. If issues persisted for over 10 seconds, the asset failed the QC and was fixed before ingestion. Final streams were also monitored, and customers were immediately notified of errors. Additionally, if Amagi's cloud components faced downtime, the team was alerted and quickly restored the service.
“When it comes to distributing 4K UHD channels, the ability to preserve the original quality and deliver a great viewing experience over large screens is critical. Using Amagi CLOUDPORT, we were able to deliver our 4K UHD channel without transcoding, thereby ensuring that the quality remained intact. Amagi CLOUDPORT could seamlessly integrate with our existing workflow and scheduling engine and deliver high quality output to the distribution platforms.”
Julio Sobral | SVP, Latam & U.S. Channel Distribution
Taking the next giant leap in FAST with Amagi
With Amagi's end-to-end cloud-based solutions, Blue Ant Media launched Love Nature, its premium wildlife and nature brand, across free streaming platforms such as Samsung TV Plus in 4K, The Roku Channel, PLEX, VIZIO WatchFree+, LocalNow and KlowdTV in the U.S. Amagi also delivered and powered two additional Blue Ant Media FAST HD channels in Canada, including HauntTV, a paranormal-themed channel, and CrimeTime, the ultimate destination for true crime programming, on Samsung TV and The Roku Channel. Additionally, Amagi helped deliver HauntTV to the Roku Channel in the U.S.Below are the significant milestones:
- Spun up and delivered channels on the go, including one 4K UHD feed for Love Nature UHD
- Provided basic secondary graphics (channel logo)
- Built and scheduled playlists
- Embedded closed captioning in the playout stream so downstream platforms can read it
- Enabled content monetization for these feeds by providing SCTE 35 markers for ads Infrastructure monitoring
- Reduced time & effort through unique customizations in the programming logic, especially to handle BXF playlists
- Cost-effectiveness by using a single solution for HD and UHD channels
- Greater efficiency in scheduling content
- Enhanced monetization via targeted ads
- Rich viewing experiences through 4K UHD cloud playout – to bolster Blue Ant Media’s established brand
- Expanded reach across the globe and established a strong presence in the growing FAST ecosystem
