Cobalt Digital to Demonstrate New Gear at BroadcastAsia 2011

Cobalt Digital will underscore its support of the Asian market by presenting a complement of products that address the region’s requirements at BroadcastAsia2011.  Chris Shaw, senior vice president of sales & marketing, announced the Company’s intentions to exhibit its newly expanded 3G/HD/SD-SDI conversion gear in Booth 4M2-06, a space shared with Gencom Technology, a New Zealand-based systems integrator with numerous offices.

Highlights will include solutions and enhancements to their Fusion3G and COMPASS series of multi-functional, multi-featured cards that offer solutions to all of today’s signal processing challenges, including Loudness Processing, Audio Loudness Metering, Dolby Encode and Decode, Color Correction, Fiber Transmit and Receive, and Up/Down/Cross Conversion.  The range supports openGear, an architecture platform that handles 3G/HD/SD video and audio processing cards, from multiple manufacturers in the same frame.

Loudness Processing

9086 Cost-Effective Embedded Loudness Processor

Cobalt’s new 9086 embedded loudness processor will be prominently featured at BroadcastAsia2011. The latest addition to the Company’s 9000 series of COMPASS® cards provides integration for embedded audio environments requiring loudness processing. Featuring Linear Acoustic AEROMAX technology, the 9086-SD offers stereo loudness processing for embedded audio on SD-SDI.

Dolby Transcoding on Cobalt Digital Fusion3G Series

Cobalt has made Dolby Transcoding available on all their Fusion3G cards. The enhancement will allow a Dolby E stream to be decoded to baseband (and channel-swapped or optionally loudness-processed) and then re-encoded into Dolby Digital or Digital Plus.

EAS Audio Ducking on all Cobalt Digital Fusion3G Cards

EAS Audio Ducking is also now available on all Fusion3G cards via input mixing that allows the set up of ducked mixing 5.1 or stereo program audio and EAS audio. A custom mix can be saved on the card and then recalled using the card’s GPI input. When a GPI trigger occurs, the card goes to the ducked mix; when the trigger clears, normal routing is restored. Clean, glitch-free switching in and out of EAS is performed, with response time of under 1 second.

Logging and Graphics Upgrades to Loudness Metering System

Cobalt Digital is now offering logging and graphics capabilities on its loudness metering system.  The easy to use, yet comprehensive option ensures thorough audio level and LKFS assessment, and is ITU BS.1770, ATSC A/85, and EBU R128 compliant.

Cobalt’s loudness meter software integrates with the Company’s Fusion3 Grange and most 9000-series COMPASS cards, and works with the OGCP-9000 Remote Control Panel to provide a flexible, complete solution for ingest or on-air loudness metering and assessment.

An intuitive touch screen control interface offers “pushbutton” session start and stop along with clear-cut clear pass/fail LKFS assessment for QC operators. True peak level detection, error tracking and logging, and other detailed criteria offer detailed assessments for admin/engineering. Configurable timecode range and signal level-based automatic triggering allows automation-based control. Because cards forward the audio measurement data to the control panel over the plant’s Ethernet network, the control panel does not need co-location or insertion within the video/audio stream.

TIMECODE AND LTC EMBEDDING/DE-EMBEDDING

+LTC – Timecode Prioritization and LTC Embedding/De-Embedding Solution

Cobalt is enhancing the capabilities of their 9000 series COMPASS and Fusion3G cards by offering options for a complete timecode prioritization and LTC embedding/de-embedding solution.  The new option, +LTC, allows bidirectional transfer and conversion between VBI timecode formats and audio LTC, as well as RS-485 LTC. Audio LTC can be received over selected balanced analog audio, embedded or AES input channels, and sent as digital audio over selected embedded or AES output channels. End-users can easily set timecode priorities via the DashBoard GUI. If preferred format is detected, it is automatically selected. If not, another format is used as previously established in a priority list by the end-user.

Keying/Wings Insertion for Fusion3G

Keying Option

Cobalt’s new keying option uses independent SDI inputs for key and fill signals. The chroma key region can be defined using manual controls or an auto-detect function. A separate preview SDI output is provided for observing key results before applying to program video output.

Wings Insertion Option
The wings option allows a symmetrical left-right wings insertion to be integrated into the program video output. Wings video is accommodated using a separate SDI input. The user interface displays timing relative to the card output video, allowing wings timing offset to be adjusted and correctly framed.  The wings left/right insertion width can be manually configured, or can be set to automatically track with aspect ratio as set by the host card.