< Previous | Contents | Next >

SECTION 20.2 ISOCORDER™

TriCaster’s unique IsoCorder™ technology brings even more powerful capability to TriCaster’s Record feature. With IsoCorder, it’s possible to record all primary video sources simultaneously, or a perhaps mix of sources and output channels, including Outputs 1 and 2. Since the latter outputs are configurable, you can also capture Program, Program (Clean), individual Switcher sources, or even an Alpha Matte.

Recording is easily enabled by clicking the large Record button in the Dashboard (Figure 317). The nearby counter tracks the number of clips recorded with the current base filename, and shows the duration of the current recording.

Note: It is not necessary to interrupt recording to add a clip that is being captured to a DDR playlist or the Publish Queue.

Add the last 5 seconds of the Primary recording to a DDR simply by holding Shift and clicking Record. Alternatively, you can use the Media Browser to do so. Clip icons show a red ‘recording’ indicator on clips currently being captured (see Section 11.2.2 for more details).

FIGURE 318

20.2.1 RECORD CONFIGURATION

FIGURE 320

GLOBAL RECORDING OPTIONS

BASENAME

The first thing you may want to do is replace the default Base Name for captured files with a custom file name. TriCaster uses the base name and other information (such as the source) to apply a unique name to each captured file (the names are numerically incremented automatically as well).

SYNC FRAMES FOR NLE

Synchronizing isolated recordings of all cameras is a huge challenge in traditional production work-flows. Pressing “Record” on every camera simultaneously, even when possible, doesn’t ensure sync, because each camera records frames to the timing of its own clock. Thus clips painstakingly aligned to a ‘sync event’ (typically a ‘flash’ or ’clapper’) in editing software still inexorably drift apart. Solving this problem can require extra effort, and expense, including genlocking all sources and syncing them to a common time-code reference (many modern cameras don’t even support these options).

TriCaster’s Sync frames for NLE feature leverages internal switcher timing to ensure all recorded signals share the exact same timing – whether you use gen-locked cameras or not. This makes multi-camera post production simpler, and faster. Just drop the clips into your favorite NLE and start cutting immediately, shaving turnaround time and producing better, more consistent results every time.

Note: In rare cases of framerate or fielding mismatches between session and record formats, enabling this option may result in adjustments to the capture format.

PRIMARY RECORDING

The main features of the Primary and Secondary Recording control groups, when present (IsoCorder models), are identical – but they are grouped separately to highlight two unique aspects of the Primary Recording, those being the Add to Playlist and Add to Share Queue controls.

FIGURE 321

Let’s looks at these latter two items, unique to the Primary Recording group, before considering Source, Shared to and other shared controls.

ADD TO

FIGURE 322

Select one or more DDR MEM slots using the menu that opens when you click the nearby gear to automatically append newly completed Primary clips to designated playlist(s) of the corresponding Media Player(s).

Hint: You’ll generally enable this feature and set at least one of the DDR targets to “Current” when using the optional NewTek TimeWarp™ control surface with your TriCaster for ‘instant replay’ purposes.

PUBLISH QUEUE

Check-marking Publish Queue in the Send to menu causes the primary recording to be added to TriCaster’s Publish Queue, with destinations as configured in the Publish Destinations menu (see Section 19.3.2).

Hint: Enabling Publish Queue does not automatically initiate file upload when recording is stopped, except when Auto Upload is also enabled – see Auto Upload in Section 19.3.2.

FIGURE 323

SHARED OPTIONS

Apart from the Add to (playlist) feature, Primary and Secondary (IsoCorder models) recording controls are similar.

SOURCE

A drop-down menu labeled Source lets you choose which video channel (along with the audio assigned to it) will be captured. TriCaster provides numerous source options. Selecting Output 1 or 2 gives you access to a variety of useful video and audio source combinations and formats in Output Configuration. In addition, any single camera input can be designated as a source in Record Configuration.

Note that Output 1 and 2 can likewise be configured to use any single camera as source. However – when you opt to record an Output (1 or 2) using the Source selection menu, it may well result in a very different recording than if you directly select the same input as Source in the Record Configuration panel.

Consider an example:

 Perhaps Cam 1 is a 16:9 SD source

 Cam 2 is a 720p camera

 Cam 3 is 1080i

With Output 2 set (in Output Configuration) to display Cam 1, Cam2 or Cam 3 as 1080i, selecting Output 2 as Source for recording in Record Configuration will always result in a 1080i format file.

By contrast, directly selecting a Camera directly in Record Configuration captures files in the actual source format of that input (in our example, this would be SD 16:9, 720p, and 1080i respectively), accompanied by the original sound from matching (‘same number’) audio inputs.

Hint: This means you can record a given source more than once in Record Configuration, capturing it in multiple resolutions and formats simultaneously.

SAVE TO

The Save To drop-down menu allows you to select from available storage volumes as targets for the recording.

DEFAULT ENCODING

Notice that there is a Configure button (gear) at the right-hand end of the row for each recording. Clicking it reveals a menu listing optional encoding formats. The default file format for capture is Quicktime®, a popular and widely supported file format. For this and other reasons, we strongly encourage that you use this default encoding option.

Hint: Download free NewTek codec packs for Windows® and Apple® MacIntosh computer platforms from your personal ‘downloads’ page in the “Registration” area of NewTek’s website.

ALTERNATE FORMATS

For certain purposes, you may prefer to capture one or more files in alternative formats.

Note: Some TriCaster features do not provide full functionality for some of the alternate formats. For example, certain of the formats do not support embedded timecode.

Let’s consider TriCaster’s two MPEG-2 formats first.

MPEG-2

TriCaster’s ‘double-rate’ MPEG-2 format for capture is comprised entirely of ‘I-frames’, resulting in excellent image quality. Two variants are provided; the choice principally affects color sampling applied to captured clips.

 MPEG-2 Compatibility encoding invokes 4:2:0 color sampling (similar to that of the popular ‘DV’ and ‘HDV’ formats).

 MPEG-2 High Profile encoding raises color sampling to 4:2:2. These files retain more color information than standard DV/HDV files as well as many other file formats. The increased color fidelity is especially valuable for chromakeying purposes. (Please see the notes which follow regarding file compatibility.)

FIGURE 324

The 4:2:2 sampling and high fidelity of the MPEG-2 High Profile format make it especially suitable for chromakeying applications.

Support for High Profile MPEG-2 files by various applications is not universal, however. It would be prudent to test file compatibility with your favorite third- party programs before making extensive use of this option.

Note: TriCaster’s High Profile MPEG-2 files meet the “High Profile” MPEG-2 definition established by the Moving Pictures Expert Group (MPEG). Please see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mpeg2 for more detailed information on High Profile MPEG-2 encoding.

SPEEDHQ AVI

Selecting AVI (.avi) encoding tells TriCaster to capture the designated source using NewTek’s native AVI format, called SpeedHQ. This is a high quality, 4:2:2 file format suitable for both SD and HD applications. (See the hint under Encoding above regarding NewTek codec packs to use this option with your favorite applications.)

H.264

Another important encoding type is H.264. TriCaster supports two different bitrates, designated High Quality and Web Quality. The former uses 8 Mbit/sec CBR encoding and session format, while the latter option uses a *2 Mbit/sec bitrate.

* Note that, to maintain good image quality at low bitrates suitable for online use, Web Quality recording is always standard definition format.

Note: H.264 encoding is processor intensive. To avoid dropped frames, this format should only be used to encode one video stream at any time. Also, be aware that if an unexpected condition (such as a power outage) should interrupt recording, incomplete

H.264 files cannot be repaired. For this reason, we recommend Quicktime or MPEG2 formats for critical mission capture, with H.264 used only for redundant recordings.

SECONDARY RECORDINGS

NewTek’s IsoCorder™ technology provides additional capture capabilities to all ‘Pro’ models. Additional sources for capture can be individually added in the Secondary Sources pane of the Record Configuration panel. A Switch next to the Secondary Sources label toggles the operational state of all recordings configured below.

FIGURE 325

Click the Add Source button to place an additional entry into the list (up to eight sources in total for 8-input TriCaster models, counting the Primary). To remove an entry, click the corresponding [X] button at left. Secondary recordings are configured in exactly the same manner as the Primary source discussed previously.

Caution: It is recommended that any single drive be tasked to capture one or two video sources at most. A warning message is displayed if you exceed this number when assigning Destination settings. TriCaster does not prevent you from exceeding this limit, however, when you are confident that very fast volumes are capable of handling the load.

< Previous | Contents | Next >