TV Asahi Case Study | Google Cloud

Google Cloud results

Increased redundancy by making cloud switchers work on multi-cloud
Built a production environment that can switch connection destinations and continue live production even in the event of a failure, improving live production continuity
High affinity with Google Workspace, including Google Sheets, was the decisive factor in adoption

Enables alternative cloud environment for switcher failures to support system overload

TV Asahi is currently developing a 360° Strategy to distribute content in a variety of fields, including satellite broadcasting, the Internet, and the company's Media City, in addition to terrestrial broadcasting. As a part of its strategy, the company operates video streaming service ABEMA, where it distributes sequels and spin-off projects of TV Asahi production programs in addition to originals.

The technical team behind ABEMA's news channel (ABEMA NEWS), has been actively promoting the distribution of content to other video streaming services, such as YouTube and Nico Nico Douga. Among them, an issue that has come up is the increase in live production costs due to the diversification of distribution channels.

At live production sites, multiple cameras and microphones are connected to dedicated equipment such as switchers, which are video switching devices, and mixers, the devices that adjust multiple sounds, to switch inputs and insert effects to create realistic images. Technical teams have to bring these hardware to each site and set it up each time there is a live streaming, which means the more diverse the variations of streaming are, the higher the cost.

To solve this problem, the team focused on moving production equipment to the cloud. Akinori Moriyama, from the Equipment & Operation Management Center of TV Asahi Engineering & Technical Operations Division says, "Recently, switchers and mixers have become more software-based, so if we can take them to the cloud and operate them remotely, we can minimize the amount of equipment used on-site, which will lead to cost reductions. That's why we developed the cloud switcher as an experiment."

A switcher is a device that selects and switches video and audio output from multiple cameras. TV Asahi used vMix, which generates the switcher functions in the software. However, relying on a single cloud was not enough due to the risk of system failure during live production, says Takuro Yokoyama of the TV Asahi INTERNET OF TELEVISION Division, Business Solution Headquarters and Systems Development & Technical Maintenance Center.

"Since the switcher is a key equipment for the live streaming, any small system failure with the equipment will lead to the halt of the live streaming, and we could not afford to let it happen. To avoid this, we reduced the risk by creating alternative methods, implementing cloud switcher on both Google Cloud and another cloud provider's environment so that it enables the continuity of streaming even in the event of a failure on one cloud. This is an extremely important factor for broadcasters who distribute news."

"Since the switcher is a key equipment for the live streaming, any small system failure with the equipment will lead to the halt of the live streaming, and we could not afford to let it happen. To avoid this, we reduced the risk by creating alternative methods, implementing cloud switcher on both Google Cloud and another provider's environment so that it enables the continuity of distribution even in the event of a failure on one cloud."

—Mr. Takuro Yokoyama, Systems Development & Technical Maintenance Center and INTERNET OF TELEVISION Division, Business Solution Headquarters, TV Asahi Co., Ltd.

Yokoyama shares that his familiarity with Google Workspace and the broader Google services played a role in his decision to adopt Google Cloud as one of the cloud infrastructures in this multi-cloud configuration.

"With vMix, we can do more than just switching, but also creating and adding captions in real time by linking with Google Spreadsheet and API, Apps Script, Firebase, and many other services that are familiar to us. The sense of familiarity we have with these tools is one of the advantages of using Google Cloud. In addition, since YouTube is usually the streaming destination, the highly reliable connection between Google Cloud and YouTube coupled with the fact that there is no charge for traffic between the two platforms was an attractive benefit. I have high hopes that it will also work with services like Speech-to-Text."

"With vMix, we can do more than just switching, but also creating and adding captions in real time by linking with Google Spreadsheet and API, Apps Script, Firebase, and many other services that are familiar to us. The sense of familiarity we have with these tools is one of the advantages of using Google Cloud."

—Mr. Takuro Yokoyama, Systems Development & Technical Maintenance Center and INTERNET OF TELEVISION Division, Business Solution Headquarters, TV Asahi Co., Ltd.

Staging a smooth transition by maintaining the operability of physical switchers

The cloud switcher built by TV Asahi deploys a Windows virtual machine with the switcher software vMix installed on the cloud, and transfers video signals from the production site via VPN. By preparing the same environment for multiple cloud services, even if one of them fails, you can immediately switch the connection to another cloud and continue delivery.

According to Yokoyama, the challenge in using the cloud was reducing the delays that occur in the encoding and transfer of video signals.

"Most broadcasters use SDI standard video signals, but in order to use them in the cloud, you have to install an encoder and encode them into signals for distribution. Our challenge was to minimize the latency for uploading to the cloud, while ensuring real-time performance. Securing a high transfer speed also meant sacrificing some video quality, so it was important to find the right balance."

According to Moriyama, with the switcher being cloud-based, it is important to also consider the ease of operation for on-site staff, who may not have engineering backgrounds. For that reason, the switcher is operated using a USB-connected control device instead of a software console.

"The production staff should just be required to operate the control device, and the input signal is then transferred to the VM on the cloud side using a USB device sharing software called VirtualHere. As the on-site staff are not all engineers, we cannot expect them to use a VM console to operate the switcher on the cloud. We devised a way to operate the switcher on the cloud with a simple device in the same way as operating the switcher at hand, without compromising on operations."

Improving stability with automatic video synchronization and operation

Moriyama says that having a multi-cloud configuration system improves the continuity of distribution.

"The goal is to reduce costs by moving the production environment to the cloud, but in order to do that, it is essential to build an environment that does not stop existing distribution. We were able to demonstrate that it is technically possible through the use of Google Cloud. Being able to build a production environment on the cloud means that we are freed from restrictions on the number of physical equipment and installation locations, and the options available for distribution have increased significantly. We had to prepare all the equipment and personnel for each production site, but with the cloud, we can freely increase equipment and work remotely, so we can say that this is a great achievement."

"Google Cloud gives us a lot of flexibility to create what we want. At the same time, we receive a lot of advice and support from the team and would like to continue working together and testing any new features or methods unique to the platform."

—Mr. Akinori Moriyama, Equipment & Operation Management Center, Engineering & Technical Operations Division, TV Asahi Corporation

While they were able to achieve their goal of building a highly reliable live distribution environment, there are still issues to be resolved. Yokoyama mentioned automatic switching between connected clouds as one of them.

"With the system we built this time, we had to manually switch the cloud service to which we were connecting. Ideally we would want to automate this operation, so that we can react quickly in the case of system failure to further improve the stability of the distribution. However, currently the video is switched manually because the video signals are not synchronized between cloud services. If we choose to switch automatically with our current structure, there is a possibility that a delay or a gap will be generated in the distribution due to the non-synchronized videos. This is why we need to consider ways to synchronize the video signals in frame between the two cloud environments."

"In addition, we would like to take on challenges such as realizing a mechanism that allows video to be sent directly from a mobile device to a cloud switcher, and also supporting the HEVC (High Efficiency Video Codec) format to reduce communication traffic."

Yokoyama says that the high degree of freedom is one of the great attractions of Google Cloud, and that he would like to explore various ways to use it in the future.

"Google Cloud gives us a lot of flexibility to create what we want. At the same time, we receive a lot of advice and support from the team and would like to continue working together and testing any new features or methods unique to the platform," adds Yokohama.

TV Asahi: Preparing multi-cloud redundancy for switcher failures during live production

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Google Cloud results

Staging a smooth transition by maintaining the operability of physical switchers

Improving stability with automatic video synchronization and operation

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About TV Asahi