With the professional audiovisual (AV) world constantly evolving, Institutes of Higher Learning (IHL) like Singapore Polytechnic (SP) are embracing the latest AV technology to stay in step and empower the future generation of AV professionals with the most up-to-date skills. It recently collaborated with broadcast and AV system integrator IDEAL Systems to build a state-of-the-art NDI-based video production studio that will enable students to ease into the technology.

Pivotal to their new studio architecture is AJA BRIDGE LIVE, which helps ensure students get hands-on experience withexisting baseband and new Internet Protocol (IP)-based workflows. Its AV staff, instructors, and students use the technology to seamlessly convert SDI and SRT to/from NDI. Jack Jiang, AV Sales Manager at Ideal Systems Singapore, recently provided us with a detailed account of what the project entailed and a behind-the-scenes look at his work at IDEAL Systems. 

Describe an average day on the job and what you enjoy most about your role. 
I handle account management for our ProAV customers, and my primary responsibility is driving AV solution sales and ensuring client satisfaction. I manage everything from bidding to talking to clients, following up on new inquiries, understanding client needs, and delivering solutions. My favorite part of the job is helping people solve their AV problems and working with our solution architects on tailored solutions that match each customer’s unique requirements. Doing so means we must stay on top of the latest AV technologies. 

Tell us more about IDEAL Systems. 
We’re one of the leading broadcast and AV system integrators in the Asia Pacific region and have worked with AJA for many years. We currently have 14 offices across APAC, employ over 250 personnel, and serve a wide range of customers in the government, hospitality, education, business, and house of worship sectors. We've worked on several successful projects for customers like the Singapore Central Bank, the Singapore Football Association, RWS Singapore, Sengkang General Hospital, Facebook (Meta), and Sony Pictures TV. 

Our team and industry experience give our clients an advantage when implementing new AV systems, offering real-time and technology expertise to support them. This is crucial, as there are many ways to design systems with interchangeable components in ProAV, and our technical teams and architects help me design solutions that align with each customer’s needs and budget. 

How'd the Singapore Polytechnic project come along and what did it involve? 
SP is Singapore's first and oldest polytechnic institution and is renowned for its engineering programs. It was looking for an NDI studio to leverage for its live event productions and to teach students the underlying technology; the school also needed to enable remote production in different buildings and locations. From the beginning, SP wanted to incorporate the studio into its Diploma in Integrated Events and Project Management (DEPM) program syllabus; the program is offered as part of a module that focuses on live and hybrid events. Its main goal is to train students in real-life projects, with opportunities to create, plan, and execute live events. 

As a leader in NDI technology deployments, we knew that we could build on the success of our previous NDI installations to establish an architecture that would meet their requirements. Working with their team, we developed a new native IP video production studio offering students hands-on experience with the latest technology advancements in a collaborative environment; they can stream events from up to six locations and combine them into one master live stream for the viewers. The system will also be used to support SP events, including product launches and symposiums.

Why did you opt for NDI? 
We’ve seen so many positive NDI deployments with clients that NDI was a natural choice. It’s user-friendly and significantly more cost-effective to deploy and maintain than other IP alternatives, with all the traditional IP advantages like low latency, system flexibility, and simple cabling requirements. You also get discoverability, and it streamlines cloud workflows, plus the rapidly growing ecosystem of NDI equipment makes it a clear winner. For example, we use core IP switches with native NDI support that come with built-in NDI optimization settings so that our clients can easily set up and change the IP network settings for different events or network topographies. We also see NDI as a growing technology locally and globally, both in Broadcast and ProAV, and thus, a very useful skillset for Singapore Polytechnic students to have in the future.

What technology is built into the studio?  
The brain of the system is an IP-based live video production system that supports live video switching, broadcast graphics, virtual sets, special effects, audio mixing, recording, social media publishing, and web streaming. Other key infrastructure elements include professional HD/UltraHD camcorders, NDI PTZ cameras for NDI low latency streaming and remote control, mixers with Dante audio networking, wireless microphone systems to capture audio in dynamic environments without interference, NDI-enabled network switches for fast, reliable data transfer to multiple video sources, SRT (secure reliable transport) 4G/5G wireless routers for secure data transmission, and AJA BRIDGE LIVE for bridging between SRT and NDI.    

Describe the setup in more detail. 
The installation includes six mobile rack units which travel to remote locations; each is equipped with mobile SIM cards for internet access and supports SRT audio and video signal transmission to a master control room on the educational institution’s campus. SRT protocols are configured in "caller" mode to initiate connections through the internet, sending live signals to the control room, where an AJA BRIDGE LIVE connected to an internet router serves as the receiver in “listener" mode. It converts the SRT streams into NDI signals for input to SP’s video production system, which processes the feeds for live production and streaming.

We designed all six racks for optimal flexibility, with portability and extendibility as also top design considerations. The units feature customized foldable tables and an audio mixer, control panel, monitor, a laptop, PTZ cameras, camcorders, and tripods etc. They’re built to operate in remote locations with minimal infrastructure requirements while the SRT protocol provides secure, low latency video and audio transport over the internet. The fact that our client can use BRIDGE LIVE to convert SRT to NDI signals from multiple mobile racks simultaneously and transmit them to the control room is a huge advantage. 

The workflow showcases the versatility of BRIDGE LIVE, with its capability to also provide pure IP transcodes. BRIDGE LIVE’s inherent bi-directional capabilities enable both encoding and decoding in a single product, simplifying the infrastructure while reducing costs to the end user.

What advice would you offer to aspiring young professionals in your line of work?  
Get to know underlying technology standards and products. Learn the differences between the various protocols available today and try to understand the supporting control products and technology. Also, pursue industry courses, including AVIXA CTS, which I found useful.

About BRIDGE LIVE
Developed in cooperation with streaming software experts Comprimato, BRIDGE LIVE is a turnkey solution built for critical streaming and contribution applications with high performance 12G-SDI video encoding/decoding, stream-based transcoding, with flexible 12G-SDI I/O, comprehensive metadata and closed caption support, all within a compact 1RU form factor with redundant power supplies. ww.aja.com/bridge-live.

About AJA Video Systems 
Since 1993, AJA Video Systems has been a leading manufacturer of cutting-edge technology for the broadcast, cinema, proAV, and post production markets. The company develops a range of powerful, flexible video interface and conversion technologies, digital video recording solutions, and color management, streaming, and remote production tools. All AJA products are designed and manufactured at our facilities in Grass Valley, California, and sold through an extensive sales channel of resellers and systems integrators around the world. For further information, please see our website at www.aja.com. 

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Media Contact:
Katie Weinberg
Raz Public Relations, LLC 
310-450-1482, aja@razpr.com