Panasonic and LANG Drive SMPTE ST 2110 IP Transmission Standard for Broadcast Tech

LANG AG announces its commitment and continued investment in SMPTE ST 2110-compatible products from Panasonic Connect Europe, increasing the deployment of the open and flexible IP-based video transmission standard.

The Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE) created SMPTE ST 2110 – a family of open standards for the transmission of video and audio signals over IP – in an upgrade for broadcast and media technology as well as the events industry. The standards define how digital media can be transmitted over an IP network, including video, audio and metadata.

Panasonic recognized the potential for the broadcast market and has already developed numerous SMPTE ST 2110-compatible products as part of its portfolio. Customers of LANG can rent or buy this technology for their events and productions, and benefit from new application possibilities based on standardised IP protocols and infrastructures.

“Thanks to the open and manufacturer-independent protocol family around SMPTE ST 2110 and the IPMX based on it, there are completely new possibilities for IT-based video distribution. Panasonic’s broad product portfolio helps us and our customers to experience the benefits of this new technology in a wide range of applications,” says Pascal Ertl, Product Manager Image Processing & Event IT at LANG.

New applications based on IP protocols and infrastructures.

SMPTE ST 2110, and with it the migration from SDI to IP, creates an interoperable, scalable system where all signals required for production and transmission facilities can for the first time be distributed bi-directionally over a local network. The standard defines the entire transmission system, the maximum supported resolutions, and synchronization between streams via precision timing protocol. The flows of audio, video, and metadata such as subtitles, teletext and timecodes are synchronized with each other, and can be sent separately and brought back together again at the end point.

While SMPTE ST 2110 is gradually replacing the SDI interface in the broadcast sector, the standard is at the same time the basis for the transmission format IPMX (Internet Protocol Media Experience), which was created by the industry consortium AIMS. IPMX can work with a light compression, where JPEG-XS is used as codec. This allows images to be transmitted visually without loss and with microsecond delay. IPMX also supports HDCP-protected content, which is often used in HDMI connections.

“We believe the SMPTE ST 2110 standard will continue to play an increasing role as a core technology in the industry and will be a key element in the development of new cameras and vision mixers,” says Justus Künanz, Sales Engineer at Panasonic Connect. “Panasonic supports SMPTE ST 2110 and its full breadth of applications, from broadcast applications to compressed JPEG-XS. Panasonic not only scales the devices in the network, but also by supporting a wide range of AVoIP formats across the different application areas.”

Panasonic announced a partnership with JPEG-XS technology provider IntoPIX at NAB 2023.

The following Panasonic products already support SMPTE ST 2110 and are part of the LANG portfolio:

• The AW-UE160 4K PTZ camera has been on the market since spring 2023. This was the first compact PTZ camera in the industry to support SMPTE ST 2110, and in the future will support IPMX among numerous other streaming formats.
• The AK-PLV100 4K studio camera featuring a Super35 sensor will be compatible with SMPTE ST 2110 and IPMX in the near future. Bi-directional SMPTE ST 2110 transmission is possible without a CCU, therefore enabling efficient IP-based live productions using the camera head alone. SMPTE ST 2110 compatibility also allows more efficient connection to the KAIROS IT/IP platform.
• As a hybrid system, the KAIROS IT/IP platform supports established baseband signals as well as SMPTE ST 2110, providing a migration path to IP-based formats. The live switching system supports far more than 100 SMPTE ST 2110 channels for efficient live productions.
• The AK-UCU600 Camera Base Station is also compatible with SMPTE ST 2110 with the AK-NP600 Option Board.
• The AK-HC3900 studio camera, which features heavily in the corporate sector, is also now compatible with SMPTE ST 2110 with the purchase of a firmware update.