Broadcast Tough
Audio mixing consoles/surfaces. IP routing and control. Audio processors. Digital editing tools.
Wheatstone's products and studio systems are designed and built specifically for the demands of broadcasting. They cover a range from smaller single-station studios to large multi-studio, multi-station complexes with a million cross-points and dozens of mixers, talent stations, and elements connected across a region.
A RIVER RAN THROUGH IT
On September 13, 2018, water from the Neuse River spilled into Curtis Media’s facility in New Bern, North Carolina, depositing 36 inches inside the studios. The consoles, the equipment, the furniture, all the wiring was completely awash in soot, debris and floodwater pushed inland by Hurricane Florence. Even the backup generator was lost to the flood.
Then the water receded, and the real nightmare began.
Processing For Streaming
The pyramid of conflict says you can have good, cheap or fast, but not all three.
Streaming is a textbook case of this. We have seen data transfer rates rise and connectivity prices fall, which recently got us wondering about streamed music quality.
We wondered: Could we combine what we know about AoIP with what we know about on-air audio processing to improve the quality of streamed music? Could we give streamers a fuller sound and bring out those crisp highs, that deep bass like we’ve been able to capture with our new X5 FM/HD audio processor? And, could we then push all that through a codec whose job is to lose as many bits as the pipe can handle, often indiscriminate of which ones?
We not only could, but we did. StreamBlade was introduced at IBC this month as a multi-stream appliance for our WheatNet-IP audio network that has selectable Opus, AAC and MP3 encoding and AGC, peak limiter and other processing tools specifically designed to optimize the sound quality of encoded audio content.
It turns out that with the right amount and type of audio processing, you can play to the psychoacoustical characteristics of lossy codecs to get that fuller sound, crisp highs and deep bass. Here are six things to keep in mind.
MEET THE STREAM GUYS
Streaming. Everyone’s doing it, but as we quickly learned from our friends at StreamGuys, there are a few things that divide the men from the boys.
StreamGuys is an industry-leading service provider of live and on-demand streaming, podcasting delivery, and software-as-a-service (SaaS) toolsets for enterprise-level broadcast media organizations. We got to know the guys at StreamGuys while developing StreamBLADE, our new WheatNet-IP audio network appliance with selectable Opus, AAC and MP3 encoders as well as AGC, peak limiter and other audio processing designed to optimize the performance of encoded audio.
Here, in a recent conversation with SteamGuys’ Tim Labelle, we talk about the tools and trade of streaming for broadcast.
WS: What do you make of the state of streaming today? Do you think streamers are thinking about audio quality now that we’re seeing developments like smart speakers bringing music back into the home?
TL: Processing always comes up when we talk to clients. And it’s clear that there’s some education that needs to take place, especially for those who don’t come from radio where there’s an obsession with quality. Often, it’s the digital media guy who’s managing the streams and he knows about bitrates and codecs but he doesn’t have much experience with signal processing and audio quality. Radio is way ahead of the regular streamer or podcaster in that regard.
Video Spotlight: 365 days of studios from around the world
Customer appreciation tour 2018/19, put together by our Jay (Ken Burns) Tyler when he was perusing his photo collection and discovered just how prolific Wheatstone is in the broadcast world. See yourself in this video? If not, there's still time to get Wheatstone installed and be in next year's!
Wheatstone attends many trade shows and meetings around the world every year.
Here's where you'll be able to find us:
European Radio Show: Jan 24-26 - Paris, France
SCBA Winter Conference: Jan 31 - Columbia, SC
MSBC: March 15 - Atlanta, GA
NRB: Mar 26-29 - Anaheim, CA
NAB Spring Show: Apr 8-11 - Las Vegas, NV
LAB/MAB: May 29-30 - New Orleans, LA
SMPTE Australia: Jul 16-19 - Sydney, Australia
MediaTech Africa: Jul 17-19 - Johannesburg, South Africa
Texas Association of Broadcasters: Aug 7-8 - Austin, Texas
AMITRA: Aug 22-25 - Acapulco, Mexico
SET Expo: Aug 26 - Sao Paulo, Brazil
IBC: Sep 13-17 - Amsterdam, Netherlands
NAB Radio: Sep 24-27 - Dallas, Texas
CCBE: Sep 26-29 - Toronto, Canada
Media Resource Expo: Oct 1 - Boston, Massachusetts
WISCONSIN WBA Clinic: Oct 15-17 - Madison, Wisconsin
NAB-NY: Oct 16-17 - New York City
WABE Annual Conference: Nov 3-5 - Calgary, Canada
ABA Convention: November 14-15 - Anchorage, Alaska
KPB: Nov 10 - Philippines
Adding an FM Translator?
Click here. We've got some cool ideas for you.
Where Scripters Meet
Are you a ScreenBuilder or ConsoleBuilder power user? Register and log onto our Scripters Forum. This is a new meeting place for anyone interested in developing new screens and workflows for our WheatNet-IP audio network. Share scripts, screen shots and ideas with others also developing virtual news desks, control panels, and signal monitors.
You’ll find documents, starter scripts and a whole knowledge base available to you for making customized screens like those pictured.
RADIO AUDIO CONSOLES
Wheatstone is all about radio. Cool consoles and mixers. Intelligent audio IP studio networking and routing. PR&E Consoles. VoxPro recording and editing. AM and FM on-air processors that rock both loud AND clean.
TV AUDIO CONSOLES
When you think of TV audio, you think of Wheatstone. Our consoles are the control centers for the finest facilities in the world. WheatNet-IP audio networking is becoming THE standard for interconnect.
AUDIO PROCESSING
Only Wheatstone offers processors with the surgical precision of 31-band processing! Sound shaping for FM, AM, HD, television, webcasting, podcasting, mastering or live audio.
VOXPRO AUDIO RECORDER & EDITOR
For live, on-air recording and real-time editing, there's no better solution than VoxPro.
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