Pebble Beach integrates Digital Rapids ingest solution

Pebble Beach Systems, a broadcast automation specialist has
introduced a new automation module enabling advanced control of Digital Rapids’
StreamZ ingest and encoding systems through
Pebble Beach’s
automation solutions.

The new integration with StreamZ is supported in Pebble Beach’s
Neptune automation software and Anchor Media
Manager for file-based workflows.
Pebble
Beach customers can now
build cost-effective large-scale ingest systems that directly encode content,
with the resulting encoded material moved intelligently through a facility
based upon rules specifically tailored to the customer’s workflow.
Pebble Beach developed the automation interface
to StreamZ using Digital Rapids’ Web Services development toolkit. The Web
Services interface enables developers to directly integrate Digital Rapids
solutions with their own custom applications and management systems through an
easy-to-use XML-based toolset. This advanced level of integration allows
Pebble Beach
to go far beyond the capabilities of automation control protocols such as VDCP
by enabling them to directly manage the encoders’ complete feature set,
including simultaneous encoding to multiple output formats; hardware-based
video pre-processing; frame-accurate capture from decks; and post-encode
processes such as automated FTP delivery of the resulting files.

The combined
Pebble
Beach and Digital Rapids
solution is available immediately, and has recently been employed on a customer
project controlling six dual-channel StreamZ encoders to ingest a large archive
of tapes.
“Products such as the Digital Rapids StreamZ encoder,
together with
Pebble
Beach’s automation
solutions, are likely to change the way broadcasters think about digitizing and
managing their assets,” said Peter Hajittofi, Managing Director of Pebble
Beach. “Rather than having to use conventional broadcast devices,
broadcasters can choose more IT focused solutions which will bring about
greater flexibility and reduce costs. We are pleased to be working with
Digital Rapids to make this possible for our customers.”

“Our StreamZ ingest and encoding systems have set the
standard for visual quality, robust functionality and format flexibility, and
the pairing of our systems with leading media management and automation
solutions allows customers to seamlessly integrate StreamZ into their automated
environments,” said Brian Stevenson, Director of Product Management at
Digital Rapids. “The integration by Pebble
Beach is a great example of the tight
level of integration that developers can achieve through our Web Services APIs,
and we’re pleased to be working with
Pebble
Beach to bring the
benefits of StreamZ to their customers.”