Multi-Source Video Stream Production With Controlled Delays
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Solution Overview
Problem
Existing digital video conference systems face challenges in producing synchronized and latency-efficient digital video streams due to varying latencies, frame rates, aspect ratios, resolutions, and encoding formats among different participant inputs, leading to poor user experiences, especially in complex multi-party meetings.
Innovation Solution
A method and system that collect multiple primary digital video streams, time-synchronize them using a common reference, and introduce controlled delays to produce a synchronized secondary video stream, which is then published with varying latencies to ensure smooth playback across participants.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If multiple digital video streams with different latencies, frame rates, aspect ratios and resolutions are collected and processed, then a well-formed user experience is achieved, but latency increases and synchronisation becomes difficult
Solution Approach 1:
The system segments the video processing into separate tracks: a first produced video stream with low latency for immediate viewing, and a second produced video stream with added delay for synchronisation. This allows different parts of the system to operate with different latency characteristics simultaneously, resolving the contradiction between quick response and temporal alignment.
Solution Approach 2:
The system performs preliminary action by collecting and buffering multiple input video streams before producing the output. The second produced video stream intentionally introduces a time delay during this buffering period, allowing the system to synchronise multiple sources with different latencies before delivering the final synchronized output, thus achieving both low latency viewing and proper synchronisation.
2Measurement precision
If digital video streams are time-synchronised using a common reference, then synchronisation accuracy improves, but processing complexity and required hardware increase
Solution Approach 1:
The system introduces a common reference clock as an intermediary mechanism that all input video streams synchronize to. This mediator provides a universal time baseline that simplifies the complex task of synchronising multiple streams with different latencies and frame rates, reducing processing complexity while maintaining accuracy through the standardized synchronization protocol.
3Adaptability or versatility
If variable connectivity and reconnections are handled dynamically, then system adaptability improves, but latency and synchronisation stability deteriorate
Solution Approach 1:
The system applies beforehand cushioning by buffering video frames in advance during stable connection periods. When connectivity issues arise, these pre-buffered frames provide a cushion that maintains synchronisation and reduces the impact of reconnections. The buffering mechanism absorbs the variability of connectivity changes, allowing the system to adapt dynamically while maintaining synchronisation stability through the protective buffer.
Data Source
AI summary
Method, system and computer program product for providing a second digital video stream. In a collecting step, a first and a second primary digital video stream are collected from at least two different digital video sources. In a first production step, a first produced video stream is produced based on the first and second primary streams. In a second production step, the second stream is produced based on the first produced stream and also based on the first and second primary streams. In the second production step, the first and second primary streams are time-delayed so as to time-synchronise them with the first produced stream, taking into consideration a latency of the first produced stream resulting from the first production step, the second produced stream being produced based on the time-delayed first and second primary streams.