Imagine enables BBC Studioworks Television Centre
Details
Michelle Clancy
| 31 January 2017

Imagine Communications is providing its Platinum IP3 technology for the core routing infrastructure at BBC Studioworks' Television Centre.
The recently redeveloped Television Centre, the BBC's long-term home, includes three large studios and post-production facilities integrated into a mixed-use site. The new studios are part of a greenfield development, and BBC Studioworks selected the Platinum IP3 router from Imagine as a hub for managing SDI video and AES audio signals in the complex.

In addition to its core signal distribution functionality, the Platinum IP3 supports audio multiplexing and de-multiplexing, flexible and integrated multiviewer, and discrete AES or MADI signals. It is designed to work in a hybrid SDI-IP environment, with transparent operations across the two signal formats, and seamless and synchronous switching between SDI and IP domains. It also supports a control layer through the Magellan SDN Orchestrator, a software control system for hybrid SDI-IP facilities that enables the IP3 to be integrated into a service-oriented architecture.

“From our technology reviews, we felt that the Platinum IP3 gave us important benefits in system design,” said Elom Bell, who is leading the technology procurement for BBC Studioworks. “Studio TC1 will be capable of producing 4K content from day one, and we see high dynamic range (HDR) production as an early opportunity. The Platinum IP3 is ready for that, and for IP connectivity, which we are also working on.”

The new systems are being implemented on site at Television Centre in West London and at the workshops of systems integrator Dega Broadcast. The studios and post production facilities will open its door on 1 September 2017.