Behind every success is a story.

A story of failure, a story of anxiety, of courage, of passion. But what we faced, when the Covid -19 Pandemic hit, was a story unheard of. What emerged from it though, was a story beyond the ordinary.

For there is nothing ordinary in feeding content to 48-linear channels that includes international services and SonyLIV, handling few thousand hours of fresh content coming into SPNI; dispatching multiple thousand linear assets for playout; publishing SonyLIV content and handling hundreds of hours of Live Sports every month, along with successfully releasing our in-house production house, Studio Next’s first co-production, Scam 1992, at the peak of the pandemic!

And that is exactly what Broadcast Operations and Network Engineering (B.O.N.E), the activity hub for SPNI Linear Channels and the backend content operations for SonyLIV did. And it was no easy task. But it was the quick on the feet thinking and technology readiness, that got SPNI to function smoothly with BONE delivering creative services such as offline editing, online grading/compositing, audio mixing, technical and quality check besides a host of hygiene services like technical & quality check suits, transcoding farms etc. remotely over cloud.

We tackled each challenge as a team, using the right technology to help us achieve this mammoth task.

1. E delivery of TX masters: The BONE tech team already had an “anywhere to anywhere” file delivery mechanism in place. This was designed to enable syndication business to onboard/offboard content anywhere across the globe while ensuring file integrity. A few tweaks to the workflow enabled TX masters to be delivered from the production houses to SPNI.

2. Low Bandwidth at remote end: Typically, a home would have maximum 10 mbps internet connectivity within which we had to;

a. Share- desktop, keyboard and mouse data at a very low latency

b. Ensure that the video playback is seamless, in-sync with the keystrokes from the remote editor

For offline editors and graphic artists, this was resolved by implementing PCoIP based remote access to on prem systems, settings of which were fine-tuned to get optimal performance even at low bandwidth.

For Online Flame artists, all the systems were configured remotely to work using and existing proprietary remote desktop function that helped them executing daily sustenance promo work

3. Remote Systems: We created new edit systems on the cloud for the packaging teams. The cloud offers high end editing systems that could be configured with a wide choice of GPU’s, RAM and Storage. Their propriety remote desktop solution named Nice DCV took the desktop's pixels and then compressed, encrypted and transmitted to the Editor’s office laptop, thus fitting the data on a smaller bandwidth. Also, its bitmaps delivery protocol solved Video Playback issues and could handle multimedia and graphics-heavy applications too.

This was a new venture for us as we went from dealing to physical CPU’s on premises to creating virtual desktops in the cloud!

4. Collaborative audio work: The audio team created a simple central NAS storage at one of the engineer’s home. This NAS was used as repository of all Pro-tools sessions, audio stems etc. making it easy for audio engineers to work collaboratively.

5. Need for physical presence: While we managed to get the entire BONE on cloud, there were certain tasks that required certain teams to be on the premise, such as one working on Live Sports Edits.

Similarly, our tech infra team commonly known as C.A.R (central apparatus room) team, had to ensure 100% uptime of systems in office as they were being remotely accessed at home. Therefore, any glitch in providing remote to over 50 systems from the B.O.N.E facility demanded 24x7 support on the floor.

Also, due to the criticality of dealing with 6K Raw Grading where 6K videos had to be viewed physically for exact colour representation, 3 of our grading systems didn’t migrate to work from home. Scam 1992 was one such project where no one wanted to compromise on quality despite the fear of the pandemic.

For the same, a bio-bubble was created as the safety of our employees is of paramount importance. But this also meant that these employees could not see their families for weeks. However, our SPNI warriors shone through imbibing our spirit to Go-Beyond.

It is in times like this where something beyond the ordinary shines through. B.O.N.E on Cloud was one such story. A #StoryBeyondTheOrdinary.

Disclaimer: Views, thoughts, and opinions expressed in the blog are solely that of the author, and not necessarily of Sony Pictures Networks India and/or its subsidiaries and affiliates.