Crystal Vision new product news

Crystal Vision's latest picture processing software apps for its MARBLE-V1 media processor hardware all work with IP, with SDI or with both IP and SDI at the same time. The functionality offered by these apps – which support ST 2022, ST 2110 video and 31 different SDI standards including 1080p – includes web browser keying, linear keying, picture-in-picture, clean switching, video delay, colour correction and up and down conversion. Their support for multiple signal formats gives the easiest possible SDI to IP upgrade, while also making the apps perfect for mixed SDI and IP installations as well as fully IP or fully SDI environments.

One of the new products highlights is the M-WEBKEY IP/SDI web browser keyer app, which provides a cost-effective alternative to a full graphics system. The M-WEBKEY is unique because it can key a web page on to a video input. The M-WEBKEY allows Flow 1 or a matte to be set as the background source, with the overlaid foreground source and key signal (which defines the graphic's location and transparency) coming from the URL that is entered. With traditional keying, the external key and fill have to be created and output as video which requires expensive dedicated character generator hardware, whereas keying a web page means that the key and fill source never become video. The M-WEBKEY plus a web designer and web server could provide all the graphics for a channel – saving broadcasters money compared to a traditional graphics system. The M-WEBKEY can be used with IP, with SDI or with both IP and SDI at the same time for hybrid systems. Features include the ability to fade the key up and down, masks and cropping, a framestore synchroniser plus ten frames of video delay to help with system integration and extensive signal monitoring. The M-WEBKEY software app runs on the MARBLE-V1 media processor (a card housed in the Vision 3 frame) which features a powerful CPU/GPU processor, six bi-directional SDI connections and four 10GbE SFP+ network interface ports and allows different apps to be installed when needs change.