Telestream® (stand N22), a provider of digital media tools and workflow solutions, will use BVE 2017 (Feb. 28-March 2) to provide UK debuts for significant new developments in both hardware and software products for streaming and workflow automation. Furthermore, it will be the first UK trade show since Telestream acquired file-based quality control specialist, Vidcheck. The company will showcase the integration between Vidchecker and Vantage, highlighting latest updates in Vidchecker, and the operational efficiencies these two platforms bring to their users.
Forming the centerpiece of its technology showcase, Telestream’s Vantage® Media Processing Platform is the foundation for a broad range of enterprise-class transcoding and workflow automation software products that allow content owners, producers, and distributors to realize significant savings and efficiencies, elegantly streamlining discrete media processing tasks. At BVE, Telestream will spotlight new ways in which Vantage supports a diversity of trending technologies and standards. New at the show is a no-charge update to Vantage Timed Text Flip, which adds support for DVB subtitle conversion and insertion. In addition, Telestream will demonstrate how Vantage 16 bit video processing pipeline supports the emerging HDR (High Dynamic Range) formats. Telestream has long been a supporter of the Digital Production Partnership (DPP) and at BVE will be demonstrating continued Vantage support for the new DPP delivery specifications, along with support for the emergent IMF standards at both the simple and complex levels.
A particular focus for Telestream at BVE will be live video streaming. Telestream has been developing streaming solutions since 2009 and has over 50,000 active licence holders of its Wirecast live streaming production platform, which last year became one of the first streaming platforms to support Facebook Live. Response to this feature has been significant as Wirecast is allowing users to build bigger audiences with Facebook Live broadcasts that are richer in both style and content.
Also at BVE, Telestream will provide a UK debut for its Lightspeed Live Stream enterprise-class live multiscreen encoding, packaging and distribution system. It can be deployed as a standalone solution for live multiscreen streaming services or combined with the Vantage Media Processing Platform via the optional Lightspeed Live Capture product.
“We live in a rapidly evolving digital environment where broadcasters and service providers must remain laser-focussed on production and delivery technologies in order to create efficiencies, increase reach and engagement, and maximize revenue,” commented Guy Elliott, region sales manager, EMEA at Telestream. “At Telestream, the last 12 months have seen some key strategic changes, both with the introduction of new products and the acquisition of Vidcheck. BVE provides a fantastic opportunity to present the new, richer offering of products and services to the UK and wider European market. We’re bullish about the strategic and tactical advantages we can provide our users: look forward to some exciting discussions at BVE.”
Review: Malcolm Washington Makes His Feature Directing Debut With “The Piano Lesson”
An heirloom piano takes on immense significance for one family in 1936 Pittsburgh in August Wilson's "The Piano Lesson." Generational ties also permeate the film adaptation, in which Malcolm Washington follows in his father Denzel Washington's footsteps in helping to bring the entirety of The Pittsburgh Cycle — a series of 10 plays — to the screen.
Malcolm Washington did not start from scratch in his accomplished feature filmmaking debut. He enlisted much of the cast from the recent Broadway revival with Samuel L. Jackson (Doaker Charles), his brother, John David Washington (Boy Willie), Ray Fisher (Lymon) and Michael Potts (Whining Boy). Berniece, played by Danielle Brooks in the play, is now beautifully portrayed by Danielle Deadwyler. With such rich material and a cast for whom it's second nature, it would be hard, one imagines, to go wrong. Jackson's own history with the play goes back to its original run in 1987 when he was Boy Willie.
It's not the simplest thing to make a play feel cinematic, but Malcolm Washington was up to the task. His film opens up the world of the Charles family beyond the living room. In fact, this adaptation, which Washington co-wrote with "Mudbound" screenwriter Virgil Williams, goes beyond Wilson's text and shows us the past and the origins of the intricately engraved piano that's central to all the fuss. It even opens on a big, action-filled set piece in 1911, during which the piano is stolen from a white family's home. Another fleshes out Doaker's monologue in which he explains to the uninitiated, Fisher's Lymon, and the audience, the tortured history of the thing. While it might have been nice to keep the camera on Jackson, such a great, grounding presence throughout, the good news is that he really makes... Read More