The pace of migration from videotape systems to file ingest devices is rapidly accelerating with the traditional use of videotape to store a finished archive spot. Videotape is being used less frequently in modern broadcast production, due to the higher cost of storing media on it compared with hard drives and data tape. What are […]
The pace of migration from videotape systems to file ingest devices is rapidly accelerating with the traditional use of videotape to store a finished archive spot. Videotape is being used less frequently in modern broadcast production, due to the higher cost of storing media on it compared with hard drives and data tape.
What are the right choices for storing media, given the higher cost of traditional archive approaches? Facilities must manage an increased quantity of file-based media that is brought into the facility on a daily basis, whether via real-time capture or from modern file-based cameras using SxS, P2, SDHC, SSD and spinning disk. Engineers must decide what kind of data is appropriate to store in a modern archive, whether camera-original data or finished media. Where to store archive data becomes a challenge, when there are local and remote (aka Cloud) options as well as disk and data tape.
The challenge of modern archive planning creates pressure on modern broadcast and studio operations that record new types of data using an increasing variety of broadcast and post production formats such as MPEG2, Apple ProRes, Avid DNxHD, Sony XDCam and HDSR, Panasonic AVC-I and camera-native formats such as H264, RAW, R3D, DPX and even JPEG-2000. Deciding on a Master Bitrate Format (MBR) makes sense for most broadcasters, since it means that there are standardised procedures that can be applied to file-based media workflow. Any of these formats can be appropriate to use as an MBR format, in order to standardise production data flow and maintain best quality relative to the amount of capacity needed to store it. An analysis of these formats often reveals an opportunity to choose one as the MBR in order to avoid transcoding media as much as possible while preserving the most quality.
The process of migrating to file-based workflows often begins by reviewing how data enters the facility, and how it is finished. Preserving the best quality in the final product is paramount to maintaining its value in future markets, since new consumer viewing devices with resolutions of 2K can now be held in your hands. This also creates a challenge in deciding what data to keep, and what to discard since larger files create capacity challenges for archives. How much archive capacity a broadcaster or post house needs has a lot to do with the ability to reformat or transform file-based content for another market. If there is a desire to provide archive content to other distributors, then preserving the most data in a project is vital to the ability to extract additional value from it.
If the broadcaster is a distributor, then the archive strategy focuses on preserving only whats needed to maintain operation.
There are pros and cons to using a lower-cost remote storage option for broadcast archive, either private or public. The key consideration is weighing the cost of an outside service, relative to the ability of that service to maintain your file-based archive in a safe, secure and redundant manner. A broadcaster needs to ensure it is not exposed to outages due to network connectivity, remote datacenter access issues, insecure access or questionable integrity of the remote cloud-based storage platform. For this reason, many broadcasters opt to develop an internal cloud storage service where costs can be spread out among many different department functions. This is an advantage of file-based workflows, since archive data can be treated like any other IT service in the facility. In some cases, lower-value data is tiered to a third-party cloud provider because there is great value to be found in low-cost cloud providers that extend the capacity of broadcast archive for lower-value media. Storage platforms should integrate well with cloud services in order to deliver a seamless integration for MAM solutions where the data may be local and remote at the same time.
Archive strategies should finally leverage the advantages of scalable disk storage in combination with LTO technology. While tape offers certain cost advantages compared to disk, and it is getting faster with every generation of LTO brought to market, using disk for parts of the archive makes business sense in order to restore data more quickly than tape. Workflows that service live sports coverage or multi-user production methods are able to manage their data more quickly when working with disk archives. Finished productions can be mirror-archived using tape and cloud service for disaster-recovery scenarios, where the need to restore data is far less frequent than in mainline production. A balance of tape and disk makes sense in broadcast archive, in order to meet Service Level Agreement requirements where any loss of time restoring data can result in loss of revenues.
