Challenge 3: Get in the Mix

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Introduction

In this challenge, we’ll be bringing our feeds into a vision mixer and creating a program output that will be used in our pipeline.

You will work with a professional vision mixer, VizRT Vectar.

First you will wire up the mixing board inputs with feeds from the previous step.

Then using some creative art direction, you’ll be producing a program out. “PGM” or program out is a single video feed from a vision mixer that represents the final, switched, live output intended for broadcast, streaming, or recording.

We will be using VizRT Vectar as a virtual appliance. It runs on VM to which we’ll connect with our GPU accelerated remote desktop client: HP Anywhere PCoIP.

Tools Used

  • VizRT Vectar
  • HP Anywhere PCoIP for GPU accelerated remote desktop access (formerly known as Teradici)

Description

We have provided a virtual workstation with the VizRT Vectar vision mixer. Your coach will provide log in details. See the Tips section below for instructions on installing the client and connecting to the workstation. Only one team member needs to install this.

Configuring Inputs

  • Within the Vectar interface, press the Setup button at the top of the screen
  • Locate input 1 in the setup screen and click the Configure wheel at the end of the row.
  • In the dialog that opens, find the source drop down menu and choose: Local -> Add IP Source…
  • In the IP Source Manager dialog that opens, click Add New IP Source
  • Select SRT Source in the drop down
  • In the Configure SRT Input Connection dialog box that opens, enter Camera1 in the Connection Name field
  • To find the server URL, check the internal IP address of the VM named: norsk-gw-nnn (where nnn is a random string). You can find this name in the Google Cloud console VM list.
    • In this example, it is 10.164.0.5, yours will be different.
  • In the Server URL field, enter srt://10.164.X.X
  • In the port Number enter 5101 which was the port number allocated to SRT Listener Egest camera1 in Norsk.
  • Press OK but do not reset your session. We need to add the other cameras first.
  • Repeat the above process for Camera 2, Camera 3 and Camera 4, using their respective port numbers.
  • To receive the streams, we need to reset Vectar. Go to File -> Exit (you will need to position your mouse at the top of the screen to get the File Menu to appear, it’s a little tricky).
  • Now you are in Kiosk mode. Click Start Live Production in the bottom right corner of the screen.
  • Vectar takes a while to load again, when it’s back you still need to configure the inputs.
  • For Input1 Thumbnail, click the Configure wheel in the bottom right of the thumbnail
  • In the Input1 dialog box, select Source -> Local -> Camera1
  • Repeat this for the other 3 feeds.

Verify Transitions

  • After configuring the inputs, the four camera sources should appear in Vectar’s source preview monitors.

     Note
    It can take up to 2 or 3 minutes for the video to appear in the input’s preview windows, please be patient and continue working.

  • Try out all the switcher controls.
    • Click on sources to put them in Preview and use the T-Bar or Cut/Auto buttons to transition them to Program. This confirms that the streams are correctly ingested and that Vectar is operational.

Configure SRT Output

  • Similar to Norsk, you need to configure an output stream. This is typically done in the Output or Streaming settings.
  • To configure the output, locate the STREAM button in the top menu, press the Configure wheel next to it.
  • Locate the output labelled SRT Stream that has a tick mark next to it. Click the Configure wheel to the right of it.
  • In the Configure SRT Connection dialog box, choose Connection Type -> Host Local SRT Stream
  • Leave the Server Port at 10000
  • Now press the STREAM button at the top of the screen.
  • You must set the output type to SRT. Vectar will provide a new SRT URL for its program output.

     Note
    Write down this new SRT output URL for the next challenge.

Success Criteria

  • Your have connected 4 inputs on the Vectar mixing board to the 4 outputs from Norsk Studio used in the last challenge
  • You have shown you know how to switch between outputs in Vectar using the T-Bar control or Cut/Auto buttons.
  • You started a stream and have an SRT output URI to use in the next challenge for the next part of our pipeline.

Tips

To access the remote desktop of the VizRT Vectar VM you will need a GPU accelerated remote desktop client. Regular Windows Remote Desktop will not be able to run VizRT Vectar.

Download the HP Anywhere PCoIP Client for your OS from this link

  • On the downloads page, look in the Anywhere Clients section

     Note
    If the page gets stuck on the splash page, click the browser reload button.

Install the client and then use the credentials provided by your coach to log into the VizRT Vectar workstation VM.

Learning Resources

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