Magewell has announced two powerful new products designed to help users reliably bring traditional video signals into live, IP-based production infrastructures using NewTek’s royalty-free NDI^® technology. The new Pro Convert HDMI 4K Plus IP encoder hardware provides a standalone, plug-and-play on-ramp from HDMI sources to NDI-based production networks, while the Magewell Bridge software for NDI enables users of Magewell’s popular capture devices to convert one or more channels of source video into live NDI streams. Both products made their world premieres at the IBC2018 exhibition in Amsterdam, where Magewell is exhibiting in stand 8.A84.

Supporting the growing adoption of 4K video in professional production workflows, Magewell’s self-contained Pro Convert HDMI 4K Plus transforms sources up to 4K Ultra HD at full 60 frames per second into full-bandwidth NDI streams with extremely low latency. The Pro Convert is truly plug-and-play, with automatic input signal format detection and DHCP-based network configuration eliminating the need for manual setup.

Source video is converted at its native resolution and frame rate by default, while a browser-based interface offers users control of FPGA-based up/down/cross-conversion, de-interlacing, image adjustments and other video processing. Performing these functions within the Pro Convert HDMI 4K Plus hardware can reduce network bandwidth usage and processing requirements for subsequent tools in the production workflow.

For existing users of Magewell ingest products or customers who prefer a software-based conversion solution, Magewell Bridge for NDI allows video and audio from any Magewell capture device to appear as a live source to any other NDI-enabled software and systems on the network. Running on the Windows operating system, the software is compatible with Magewell’s USB Capture and USB Capture Plus external devices, Pro Capture PCIe cards and Eco Capture M.2 hardware.

The Magewell Bridge software supports all resolutions and frame rates available through the associated capture device – including Ultra HD video with Magewell’s 4K capture models – plus up to eight channels of audio. The software can convert multiple input channels to NDI simultaneously when used with multi-channel capture card models or several Magewell capture devices in the same computer.

“The use of live, IP-based media transport has expanded from its roots in content distribution to become an integral part of many professional production workflows, giving customers massive flexibility while helping reduce deployment costs. NDI has been one of the key enabling technologies driving this transition. While some new products such as cameras support NDI directly, many customers want to use their current equipment with NDI-compatible production software. The Pro Convert HDMI 4K Plus and Magewell Bridge for NDI give users a choice of easy-to-use, cost-effective and reliable hardware or software solutions to connect their existing sources to NDI-enabled networks, systems and software.” - Nick Ma, CEO and CTO at Magewell

NewTek’s NDI is a royalty free IP technology enabling compatible products to share video, audio, and data across a local area network. Using refined encoding and communication, NDI allows systems, devices and applications to identify and communicate bi-directionally with one another over IP, and to encode, transmit, and receive multiple streams of high quality, low latency, frame-accurate video and audio in real time. Integrated into thousands of products in the hands of millions of users, NDI is the leading standard for IP video production.

Read the complete press release at Magewell: Magewell Introduces Robust Hardware and Software Converters to Bring Video into NDI^®-Enhanced Live Production Workflows

Learn More:

• NewTek NDI^®
• NewTek free and commercial NDI^® applications

NDI, NDI Page, NDI Converters, NewTek Developer Network,

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