Tieline and CNW Deliver for IHB at Asian Games

Tieline’s South Korean representative, Mr. Hyung-uk Sheen from Coil and Wire (CNW), worked closely with IHB to ensure the event was a success. “AIMAG was an important event for the Incheon Asian Games committee to simulate sports coverage at the Incheon Asian Games and prepare all the broadcast stakeholders,” said Sheen.

“Originally IHB planned to use ISDN and internet IP services for carrying program audio circuits at AIMAG 2013,” he said. “However, SK Telecom, who was appointed as the Telco service provider at the event, did not have ISDN infrastructure available.”

	i-Mix G3 codec at the boxing venue at the Games

“IHB discovered ISDN circuits were unavailable just prior to the event,” said Sheen. “Time constraints meant it was impossible to find another Telco to provide ISDN circuits in time. As a result, IHB implemented a contingency plan reliant on IP as the primary transport for transmitting and receiving all broadcast audio.”

IHB installed the Tieline i-Mix G3 and Commander G3 as international commentary systems at AIMAG for events such as kickboxing, swimming and the opening and closing ceremonies.

“SK Telecom provided IHB with Public IP circuits between the Commander G3 codecs at the IBC and each of their commentary positions.” said Sheen. “We ensured SK Telecom provided each commentary position with a static public IP address, which made it simple to connect to the i-Mix G3 codecs at each venue and route all IP streams.“

	i-Mix G3 at the swimming venue commentary position

“One advantage of using the i-Mix G3 as a portable field audio codec is its advanced audio matrix routing technology. I met with the engineers in charge of each outside broadcast van before the event to assist with configuration of the Tieline codecs to suit the routing requirements at each venue. The i-Mix codecs also offer POTS 15kHz quality full duplex transmission capability, which delivered the flexibility required for the 2014 Incheon Asian Games.”

Tieline’s Merlin PLUS codec was also tested and used successfully at AIMAG 2013 for routing IFB circuits. Merlin PLUS was used to supply up to 6 independent bidirectional IFB circuits to reporters and announcers via smartphones running the Report-IT Enterprise app over Wi-Fi and 4G-LTE.

“Based on this event, IHB used the i-Mix and TLR300B at the 2014 Incheon Asian Games for transporting commentary audio between the venue Commentary Control Room (CCR) and the IBC. They also used Merlin PLUS and Report-IT for bidirectional IFB circuits,” said Sheen.

AIMAG 2013 was an important rehearsal for IHB to ensure smooth planning for the 2014 Incheon Asian Games, one of the world’s biggest sporting events.

	i-Mix G3 at FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup 2016

“The Tieline codecs performed perfectly at AIMAG 2013. I believe IHB’s engineers were very impressed with the flexibility the codecs offered and I was able to accommodate all of their routing requests quite easily. For IHB this experience built confidence in using IP as the primary transport for transmitting broadcast audio. There is no doubt this led to Tieline IP codecs playing a more prominent role at the 2014 Incheon Asian Games and then subsequently at the FIS Alpine Skiing World Cup 2016 in Jeongseon, South Korea earlier this year. These positive experiences have built greater confidence in IP as a reliable transport within South Korean broadcasters.”

Merlin PLUS and Report-IT are also used by Seoul Broadcasting System (SBS) NQC for their main nightly SBS TV news bulletin at 8pm as an on-air monitoring system. The Merlin PLUS codec at the studio can connect and supply bidirectional communications to up to 6 TV news vans and LTE video news teams.