Sony Pixel Power calrec Sony

GhostFrame Tech Proves Powerful for Regional Feeds, Shoots Without Reblocking, and More

16/05/2023

GhostFrame Tech Proves Powerful for Regional Feeds, Shoots Without Reblocking, and More Single LED wall can be used to create multiple simultaneous outputs By Ken Kerschbaumer, Editorial Director

Tuesday, May 16, 2023 - 9:19 am

Print This Story | Subscribe

Story Highlights

In recent years, the capabilities of virtual studios, green-screen studios, and LED walls have expanded exponentially, thanks to increasingly powerful graphics engines, better graphics tools, and improved tracking. Such developments are also spurring production personnel to look for new ways to derive as much as possible from those elements, and that is one reason a relatively new production toolkit from GhostFrame is beginning to resonate with U.S. broadcasters, Fox Sports among them.

It's a toolkit that enables you to hide video content in an LED wall, which is invisible to the naked eye but visible through a camera, says Peter Angell, CEO, AGS AG, a GhostFrame partner. Each frame is sliced into a number of subframes. Those subframes include the frames that are supposed to be visible on each of the feeds as well as other frames that are used to visually delete the frames not relevant to each output.

We do that by showing the inverse image, he continues. The simplest way to explain that is with a green screen. We want you to see the green-screen frame on camera, but then we insert a frame that is magenta, the opposite of green, and they are played back so quickly your eye doesn't see either green or magenta. Instead, you see gray.

GhostFrame allows each of four feeds to have a separate background behind a presenter or talent.

The trick is in orchestrating the subframes in such a way that the overall light cycle of the frame appears to be one-60th of a second, eliminating flicker or motion disruption.

The end result is a system that allows a single LED wall to be used to create multiple simultaneous outputs. For example, a single presenter can stand in front of an LED wall announcing sports scores, and a single camera and the single LED wall can output feeds that have a different look or branding, making it much easier to embrace a future that is increasingly going to require personalized content. Even the studio audience could have a different experience.

They could see something completely different from what those watching the broadcast or stream see, Angell notes. A sports studio show could be regionalized or have a different feed for the home and visiting teams.

GhostFrame can make it easier to create regional feeds or to produce content with less need for reblocking.

GhostFrame's secret sauce is not hardware but firmware sent to the LED wall (currently, it is compatible with LED walls only from Roe Visual LED Display Solutions) and LED-wall-control systems from Megapixel. The firmware is licensed, either on a yearly basis or for a shorter period.

We do provide initial support as it can be quite hard to set up, adds Angell.

At the core, he adds, the system is all about the mathematics of camera frame rates and the refresh rate of the LED wall. The LED wall on show at NAB 2023, for example, refreshes around 14,000 times a second while the camera records at 240 fps.

If we are using a camera with global shutter, says Angell, we can sync the camera to the wall, run it at exactly the same rate, and then carve out the individual frames. If we are running at 240 fps, we can get really clean definition for all the frames because all four of the outputs will be 60 fps.

Other applications can help reduce the time required for resetting a scene or allow the LED wall or floor to display blocking instructions and even scripts to those in the studio while viewers at home see graphics or video elements (think footsteps visible only to talent so they can know where to walk). Camera tracking patterns can also be hidden, allowing the system to be used in a fully enclosed volumetric studio without the need for physical markers.

We can put the marker invisibly onto the wall, Angell explains. Wherever you point the camera, there are markers and physical points that are integrated with TrackMan. When you add it all up, you can do four things at the same time because the LED wall can have four realities.

The most interesting aspect of the demo at NAB 2023 involved shooting a daytime and nighttime scene at the same time. Three lighting panels around the small set were set up to light a daylight scene; three others lit a nighttime version. With the light panels controlled via the same controller as the LED panel, the subframes for the day scene were synchronized with the daylight panels, the subframes for the night scene with the nighttime panels. The result was one output that looked as if the subject was in daylight and one where the subject seemed to be outside at dusk.

This is crucial, says Angell, because you can light all your realities simultaneously and don't need to reblock or reshoot or reset the lighting. That's a real production benefit because you can do three or four things at once without changing anything.
LINK: https://www.sportsvideo.org/2023/05/16/ghostframe-tech-proves-powerful...
See more stories from svg

Most recent headlines

05/01/2027

Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be demoed at CES 2026

Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...

04/08/2026

Dalet Announces Commercial Availability of Dalia, Bringing Media-Aware Agentic AI to Enterprise Productions

Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...

04/07/2026

Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in Dolby Cinemas Across Japan, Presented in Dolby Atmos and Dolby ...

April 7 2026, 19:00 (PDT) Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in...

01/06/2026

Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026

January 6 2026, 05:30 (PST) Dolby Sets the New Standard for Premium Entertainment at CES 2026 Throughout the week, Dolby brings to life the latest innovatio...

02/05/2026

Dalet Flex LTS Delivers Smarter Search, Faster Editing, and an AI-Ready Foundation for Modern Media

Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...

01/05/2026

NBCUniversal's Peacock to Be First Streamer to Integrate Dolby's Full Suite of Premium Picture and Sound Innovations

January 5 2026, 18:30 (PST) NBCUniversal's Peacock to Be First Streamer to ...

09/04/2026

ENCO to Showcase New aiTrack Capabilities at 2026 NAB Show

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

09/04/2026

LTN Unveils Network Enhancements in Advance of C-Band Changes

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

09/04/2026

FOR-A Buys Tamura Corp. Information Equipment Business

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

09/04/2026

Imagine Showcases Expanded Multiviewer Portfolio at 2026...

Purpose Built Monitoring From Live Production to Master Control to OTT, Across On Prem and Cloud Environments At the 2026 NAB Show (April 19-22, Las Vegas Con...

09/04/2026

Harmonic Extends Hybrid Streaming Leadership with AI and...

Purpose Built Monitoring From Live Production to Master Control to OTT, Across On Prem and Cloud Environments At the 2026 NAB Show (April 19-22, Las Vegas Con...

09/04/2026

LTN unveils network enhancements as broadcaster satellite...

New advances meet surge in demand for broadcast-grade IP migration as C-band spectrum auctions approach LTN announces major enhancements to its purpose-built g...

09/04/2026

Hitomi Broadcast Expands Sales Team with Nicola Milburn

Hitomi Broadcast has expanded its sales team with the addition of Nicola Milburn as Technical Sales Manager. In this role, Nicola will work with customers and p...

09/04/2026

Layercake and Ceeblue Announce Strategic Integration to D...

Revolutionary combined solution brings sub-second latency, resilient delivery, and workflow orchestration to global broadcasters and digital platforms Layercak...

09/04/2026

BIA Increases 2026 Local Ad Forecast to $184.5 Billion

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

09/04/2026

Yospace surpasses 10 billion ads stitched in a single mon...

Yospace exceeded 10 billion dynamically stitched ads in a single month, reaching 11.6 billion as ad-supported streaming surged. Driven by a packed global sports...

09/04/2026

Bitmovin Expands Live Encoding and Observability Solution...

Bitmovin has expanded its Live Encoding and Observability solutions to provide true end to end, real time insights across live streaming workflows, from encodin...

09/04/2026

Leyra Powers the Launch of Icelandic Broadcaster RUVs Str...

Leyra has announced the launch of Icelandic public broadcaster R V's streaming service on Samsung and LG Smart TVs. R V is the first public broadcaster to d...

09/04/2026

3Play Media Launches AI Dubbing Solution for YouTube Crea...

3Play Media, a global leader in video accessibility and localization, today announced an AI Dubbing solution purpose-built for YouTube creators. The company, wh...

09/04/2026

Big Blue Marble Recognized as AWS Managed Services Provid...

Big Blue Marble, a provider of broadcast-grade, cloud-native video solutions, has been recognized as an Amazon Web Services (AWS) Managed Services Provider (MSP...

09/04/2026

PDC Cleeng and Urban Zoo partner to launch new global str...

The Professional Darts Corporation (PDC) has officially launched its revamped global streaming service, PDC TV, in collaboration with Cleeng and sports technolo...

09/04/2026

Cleeng launches industry first cross-platform AI agents t...

Cleeng, the Subscriber Retention Management (SRM ) pioneer, today announced a raft of new AI agents for its AI Assistant to accelerate decision-making and autom...

09/04/2026

Hearst Taps Merzigo to Expand Presence on YouTube, Facebook

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

09/04/2026

Fox Jumps Into Prediction Markets with Kalshi Integration

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

09/04/2026

NAB Show: Kokusai Denki To Feature New, Affordable 4K Broadcast Camera

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

09/04/2026

Corus Taps Appear for IP-First Operations

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

09/04/2026

2026 NAB Show Exhibitor Insights: Big Blue Marble

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

09/04/2026

FCC Extends Audible Crawl Rule Waiver for 18 Months

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

09/04/2026

Pliant Technologies Showcases Expanded Accessories at NAB...

New Charging, Connectivity, and Mounting Solutions Now Available LAS VEGAS, APRIL 8, 2026 Pliant Technologies will highlight a range of new accessories at th...

09/04/2026

Media Links Brings Ultra Resilient IP Transport Proven at...

As live production continues its shift to IP, the challenge is no longer adoption it's reliability. At NAB Show 2026 (Booth W2033), Media Links will demon...

09/04/2026

QuickLink Launches StudioPro Town Hall at 2026 NAB Show

QuickLink, a leading provider of award-winning video production and remote guest contribution solutions, launches its new AI-powered add-on for its StudioPro p...

09/04/2026

The Hive Group Releases White Paper on the FCC Upper C-Ba...

The Hive Group has published a new white paper, No Safe Harbor: Why the FCC's Upper C-Band Auction Demands Early Action from Broadcasters ahead of NAB Sho...

09/04/2026

Saranyu Technologies Renews VisualOn Optimizer VoD Subscr...

Saranyu Technologies today announced the renewal of its Optimizer VoD subscription with VisualOn. The announcement coincides with NAB Show 2026, taking place Ap...

09/04/2026

Brian Fenton Joins RT Sunday Game GAA Panel for 2026 Championship

RT Sport has announced Brian Fenton will join its Sunday Game GAA punditry panel for the 2026 Championship, featuring across video, audio, online including the...

09/04/2026

Time for some fresh air: Tracks & Trails is back

Doireann N Ghlac in returns as presenter, with the first episode airing this Friday at 8.30pm on RT One and RT Player The beloved walking series Tracks & T...

09/04/2026

Strength and Destiny Collide: Samson: A Tyndalston Story' Arrives in the Cloud

A timeless story of grit, faith and rebellion takes center stage as Samson: A Ty...

09/04/2026

April 08, 2026

New technique for synthesizing branched molecules could accelerate the development of future medicines Scripps Research chemists solve a longstanding problem in...

08/04/2026

SVG College Sports Media Awards 2026: Entry Deadline is Monday, April 13

The deadline to enter the 18th Annual SVG College Sports Media Awards in association with NACDA is rapidly approaching! Submit your entries to this year's c...

08/04/2026

SVG Campus Shot Callers: Trever Sheets, Senior Director, ACC Network, Virginia Tech

The Pittsburgh product helps lead more than 100 annual ESPN broadcasts as part o...

08/04/2026

SVG Sit-Down: Harmonic's Jean Macher on Turning Live Sports Content Into a Smarter Monetization Engine

Dynamic ad insertion, AI-based technologies, programmatic advertising are some o...

08/04/2026

Announcing the 2026 Fellows for the Sundance Institute Cultural Impact Residency on Sundance Collab

Seven Fellows Selected for Second Year of Residency in Honor of Social Justice L...

08/04/2026

From Tokyo to the World: Watch Bad Bunny's Billions Club Live Concert on Spotify

On March 7, Bad Bunny made history with his first-ever performance in Asia, taki...

08/04/2026

De Tokio para el mundo: Mira el concierto Billions Club Live de Bad Bunny en Spotify

El 7 de marzo, Bad Bunny hizo historia con su primera presentaci n en Asia, subi...

08/04/2026

Tube Lab from Fuse Audio Labs

New channel strip plug-in revealed The latest plug-in to be added to the Fuse Audio Labs line-up emulates a selection of vintage hardware units, combining c...

08/04/2026

Blue Cat Audio release Axiom 2.3

Guitar & bass multi-effects software overhauled Blue Cat Audio's flagship guitar and bass multi-effects software has recently received a significant upd...

08/04/2026

Merging Technologies launch Pyramix 16

PanNoir mixer integration, Dolby Atmos Renderer & more Merging Technologies have just launched Pyramix 16, the latest major update to their renowned DAW sof...

08/04/2026

Updating QUARTZ Router Module Firmware Over-The-Air

Applicable Products Part number Description QUARTZ-22-LTE (EU) Dual Port Dual SIM LTE Router (EU) QUARTZ-COMPACT-11-LTE (EU) Single Port Compact LTE ...

08/04/2026

YEP September 2025 Newsletter (2)

The September 19, 2025 YEP Newsletter highlights a group visit to the Academy Museum of Motion Pictures, where participants explored exhibits showcasing the art...

08/04/2026

Proven On Orbit: L3Harris Congratulates Missile Defense Agency for Receiving Top Defense Honor for HBTSS

The L3Harris HBTSS satellite is proven on orbit, successfully demonstrating trac...

08/04/2026

From Earth to Mars: Resilient Communications Powering the Space Economy

Image Credit: NASA. Artist rendering of a space communications satellite in orbit, representative of the resilient, multiband infrastructure supporting mission ...