IBC 2013: Blue Lucy Media partners with Sony for bulk ingest

Blue Lucy Media (BLM), a UK-based software development leader in the field of production workflow modernisation for IT environments, has announced the release of a workflow interface to Sony’s Media Backbone Conductor (MBC).  BLM’s new interface “Concerto” provides for a general purpose interface between MBC and the Blue Lucy Asset Manager (BLAM).

 Sony’s MBC is an enterprise-level workflow automation platform that simplifies and harmonises the integration of software applications and production platforms in broadcast and post production facilities. It is a key part of Sony’s on-going tapeless initiative based on Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) integration principles.

As part of its tapeless initiative, Sony looks to integrate best-of-breed partners to meet the growing demand for complete tapeless solutions. For bulk tape/linear content ingest – the inevitable first step on the tapeless road – Sony has partnered with BLM develop BLM’s Concerto interface, which enables access to BLM’s range of software-based video processing service components.

The Concerto interface enables BLM components such as its linear Ingest Service to be “slaved” to the MBC, thereby enabling tasks such as tape ingest to be assigned from within the MBC environment.

BLM’s Concerto provides full integration with MBC so more complex tasks such as bulk tape digitisation utilising Flexicart tape robots can be posted for autonomous operation. During execution, job status updates are posted by Concerto back to the MBC for accurate, clear progress visibility.

BLM CEO Julian Wright comments: “Our all-software approach to asset management enables us to offer a lease/licensing model that is proving to be exceptionally popular with content owners and service providers who need video asset processing and management services that are powerful, yet scalable and easy to use. Our deployment of BLM software for use with Sony’s MBC is but one example of many worldwide who are rapidly taking notice of what BLM has to offer.”