PROactive Results
PROactive Results
Sequence was contracted by global business communications company On Screen Productions to undertake the live webcast transmission of the findings from the PROactive study, presented at the 41st meeting of the European Association for the Study of Diabetes (EASD) in Athens.
The study demonstrated that ACTOS® (pioglitazone HCl) significantly reduces the combined risk of heart attacks, strokes and death by 16% in high risk patients with Type 2 diabetes. Given the revolutionary content of these landmark findings and the impact they would have on the medical community, On Screen Productions Ltd approached this with the professionalism and attention to detail that any major political, sporting or corporate broadcast would demand. The webcast event can be viewed via the PROactive website.
On Screen was commissioned by the PROactive Study (supported by an unrestricted educational grant from Japanese and US pharmaceutical giants Takeda and Eli Lilly) to deliver these exciting results to the world — a campaign that included the live satellite and web broadcasting of the press conference, main results plenary session and numerous interviews to television networks across Europe.
The job consisted of two individual webcasts – the first was a secure press announcement, which saw the live announcement of the results to the eager press and media community, the second was the open plenary session that saw the results being literally shouted to the World.
Sequence deployed two of its broadcast quality encoder rigs for the project. The first primary rig was located onsite at Athens, taking feeds directly from 021 Television’s Unit 33 (an Outside Broadcast (OB) truck normally used for sporting events and featuring a built-in BT powered satellite up link). The second ‘backup’ rig was located at Sequence HQ in Cardiff, and received a live satellite feed down linked by radiolinks company TVL from the Eutelsat ‘bird’.
The rigs deliver state-of-the art encoding using redundant, APC UPS protected Dell PowerEdge encoders, built using ViewCast capture cards,
receiving Composite video and balanced audio from Kramer matrix DAs. The four encoders are linked to Gigabit LAN, which in turn establishes an ‘unlink’ via a fifth router computer to the Content Delivery Network (CDN) via either a dedicated 4 port BRI ISDN card, or using the routers in build Gigabit NIC. Two encoders were ‘prime’ and the other two were running as hot swaps should the primary feed fail.
Sequence delivered the proceedings simultaneously in all three common web casting formats; Windows, Real & QuickTime – with the live video / audio being synchronised with the ‘pushing’ of the PowerPoint slides, geared to giving the virtual attendee as close to an ‘in-the-room’ experience as possible. Multiple bit rates or speeds of video were provided seamlessly to only give the viewer a ‘size’ of video that their equipment and video connection would support.
Given the concerns about the reliability and performance of local connectivity, the second rig (located in Cardiff) was configured to provide backup should the primary rig fail for any reason. Should internet latency prove too great, or the backup ISDN circuits not be reliable, coverage would have been switched over extremely quickly with minimal impact to users. However, as it was presumed, the provided broadband SDSL link at the venue were more than adequate.
A team of four from the webcasting crew at Sequence joined the On Screen production team and 30 other technicians bringing together over 42 kms of cable and 12 cameras to deliver three hours of live television. 3,600 delegates were present in the hall, joined by a further 5,500 watching on giant screens in neighbouring venues, who lapped up the groundbreaking results. 161 TV stations took the programme from the satellite feed relayed via BT tower in London, and over 21,000 webcast viewers witnessed the impact of the study results first hand from practically every country in the World.
After the event Sequence edited the live presentations, and worked around the clock to publish ‘on demand’ archives of the days proceedings, and even a month after the event thousands of physicians and patients across the globe are still making time to view what was a truly unique webcast, put together by a team of broadcast and internet professionals.
Highlights of the PROactive webcast are available on the PROactive results website.
Picture Top Left - Delegates arriving at the EASD Conference in Athens. Picture Middle Right - 021's Outside Broadcast Vehicle. Picture Bottom Left - The Primary Encoder in action.