Post Magazine

March 2015

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www.postmagazine.com 37 POST MARCH 2015 edia retiming has long been a necessary but inefficient element of post production work. Fitting client content to a specific broadcast window based on the amount of commercial con- tent or the time allotted for broadcast has been a resource-intensive and time-con- suming process. With growing adoption of solutions that address this very issue, such as the Tachyon Wormhole auto- mated file-based retiming and standards conversion solution from Wohler Technol- ogies, post facilities are transforming the media retiming function from a business cost into a source of revenue generation. Tachyon Wormhole enables a plus or mi- nus runtime adjustment while preserving not only video and audio quality, but also closed caption integrity. "Time is money, and every second counts," says Ross Millward, director of technical operations at Roundabout Entertainment, a Burbank, CA-based post facility that has invested in the Tachyon Wormhole solution to increase the capacity of its retiming services. "Our goal is to help our customers monetize content by fitting their projects into tight time constraints while retaining both the quality and the creative intent. As a file-based solution with top-notch image-processing algorithms, Tachyon Wormhole has allowed us to increase the amount of content we can process and significantly reduce the time our team spends on manual QC." The retiming technology allows users to adjust projects to hit specific time budgets without materially altering the viewer's experience. This particular solution eliminates the need for time-consuming, hands-on edit- ing, automatically shortening or length- ening the run-time of program content so that it meets the time requirements of a network or leaves room for the broadcaster to insert additional ad spots. Because processing remains in the file domain from start to finish, rather than going to baseband, users avoid the time required to go to baseband and back, as well as the expense of using tape stock as a transfer mechanism. Roundabout Entertainment has imple- mented its Tachyon Wormhole retiming solution so that it is available on ma- chines throughout the facility. In this "hot desk" environment, it is no longer necessary to dedicate specific rooms, equipment, or personnel to retiming projects. The Tachyon Worm- hole GUI turns retiming into a much less technical process, and this means that through- put at the studio is no longer dependent on the availabil- ity of specific operational areas or team members. The staff member tasked with retiming selects the target runtime by choosing a specific length or by entering a percentage adjustment. At Roundabout, which was among the first companies to migrate to Version 2 of Tachyon Wormhole, users also have the ability to use timecodes to designate cer- tain regions or segments of a media file to be retimed, or to prevent certain segments, such as an opening credit sequence, from being adjusted. By providing predictable results with very few artifacts, Tachyon Wormhole reduces the time and cost spent on manual review, as well as the need to commit equipment and technical staff to addressing artifacts in the edit suite — or with another processing pass. Conse- quently, post facilities such as Round- about can quickly and cost-effectively adapt content and enable their custom- ers to realize new revenue opportunities. "The unusual availability, accessibility, and flexibility of Tachyon Wormhole, as well as its speed and performance, have helped us not only to boost our pro- ductivity, but also to move forward into 4K work," adds Millward. "Rather than make compromises and work around the limitations of a less-advanced retiming solution, we have been able to capitalize on this forward-thinking technology to expand our service offering and take on new opportunities." With a 4K-capable video pipeline, Wohler's RadiantGrid platform serves as the file-based processing framework that integrates retiming of closed-captioning data, audio retiming, and pitch correction into the Tachyon Wormhole video pro- cessing workflow. The turnkey Tachyon Wormhole system can process up to two video assets simultaneously while syn- chronously handling up to 64 channels of audio and CEA-608 and -708 and SMPTE 436M and 360M caption data. Along with automated retiming, Tachyon Wormhole also supports standards conversion, dein- terlacing, resolution conversion, inverse telecine, and broken cadence removal/ correction, with options such as Dolby E processing and color legalization. This feature set enables users to consolidate critical media processing functions within the retiming workflow. A competitive price allows users to save money on their front-end invest- ment, and the density of the system effectively doubles those cost savings. While users will realize iterative returns as a result of better efficiency, they stand to realize much greater gains with their ability to take on demanding new projects, including retiming in the 4K/ ultra-high-definition (UHD) realm. "Ultimately, our investment in Tachyon Wormhole allows us to make the most of our resources — staff, space, equipment, and expertise — in delivering content that is critical to our customers," adds Millward. IT'S ABOUT TIME FILE-BASED RETIMING DELIVERS NEW EFFICIENCIES AND OPPORTUNITIES M WORKFLOW BY CRAIG NEWBURY VP OF SALES WOHLER HAYWARD, CA WWW.WOHLER.COM Tachyon Wormhole from Wohler addresses the industry's concerns about inefficient media retiming.

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