Contribution · venue to cloud
Getting an 8K picture off the camera and into AWS
The venue side: a Windows encode box with a DeckLink 8K Pro G2 and a Blackwell GPU, pushing SRT over the site uplink to a listener in the cloud.
- Solid
8K59.94 real-camera capture and encodeRED Raptor via the CCU's SDI, one 7680×4320 device, HEVC p4 at 140 Mbps, 60 fps at speed 1.00 for ten-minute runs. Proven on the show day, 2026-08-22.
- Solid
SRT ingest railA fixed address (ingest.prismstream.link:9000), arm and disarm from the console, a contributor's own address admitted for two days, session and window reports. Idle crash-loop fixed 2026-08-04; a venue push reached the rail in 13 s on 2026-09-30.
- Solid
Open-ended transmission modeRuns for hours, restarts the relay on a drop and counts the gap honestly. A 20 s mux outage became one counted 26 s drop (2026-07-29).
- Solid
Audio: two 5.1 tracks, channel identity proven6 of 6 channels identified through the origin and the CDN at 140 and 300 Mbps (2026-09-12). A file's own audio can ride instead of the test tones since v2026.9.7.
- Issue
Remote start of the venue box from the consoleThe box's own engine refuses its agent at its login wall, so a start from the console reads "applied" and nothing runs (found 2026-09-30). Until fixed, a broadcast is started on the box itself.
- Issue
8-channel audio from the fleet encoderIts ffmpeg build cannot write a self-describing 8-channel layout. 5.1 works; 8-channel works from the venue box.
- Queued
Capture card as a lab sourceBuilt behind a flag, dark until the next camera test. Camera audio passthrough and a QR overlay on live input are queued with it.
Delivery · cloud
Mux, low-latency origin, CDN, recordings
The cloud half: a GPU mux, our own low-latency packager and CloudFront in front of it. MediaPackage was retired on 2026-09-13 once this lane beat it on every number.
- Solid
Mux with the 4-rung GPU ladderThe 8K picture copied untouched; 4K HEVC, 1080p and 720p H.264 added on an L4, all leaving as one stream to the origin.
- Solid
Self-hosted low-latency origin (LL-HLS + LL-DASH)Live since 2026-09-12. 1.0 s encoder to origin at 140 Mbps, 300 Mbps with zero refusals, `hvc1` everywhere, Apple validator clean, LL-DASH anchored on the packaging clock (3.7 s glass to glass through the CDN).
- Solid
CloudFront delivery with partner tokensEdge adds about 0.1 s. Forwards the partner's playback token and Authorization header (2026-09-22) for Supanova viewers in London.
- Live
Always-on test streamloop.prismstream.link since 2026-09-23: all four rungs plus stereo on a seamless 464 s loop, open, for partners' decoder acceptance.
- Live
Recordings (VOD)Masters stream straight to S3 during capture, with integrity hashes; a library with preview, download and guarded delete. Retention sweep and an 8K preview are queued.
- Works
Long-run soak and fan-in under loadThe 4-hour soak has never been run; fan-in with hundreds of players and a real venue media server are still to exercise.
- Queued
Shorter segments for a faster 8K viewer1 s segments and a 2 s player target at 4K are the untried levers; one fleet hour on the GPU box.
Measurement · T0 to T6
Knowing the latency at every hop, not guessing it
A timecode burned into the picture at the lens, read back by probes at each stage, with every clock synced to the microsecond.
- Solid
Instrumented chain with gatesQR timecode read 600 of 600 frames (gate R1), a known injected delay recovered exactly (gate R4), optical slate and encoder stamps told apart, implausible readings counted and shown rather than dropped.
- Solid
Probes at the encoder, mux, origin and three CDN regionsOregon, Virginia and Frankfurt edges; per-stage medians are the authoritative numbers in the console.
- Works
The 8K viewer (T6)A Windows GPU box with Chrome is the only machine that plays the 8K rung. It reads 5.7 s because the player's own 3 s live target and its stall rule sit on top of the 1.1 s lane. The player round (8K-aware targets, join at the edge, a level lock) is queued.
- Solid
Picture quality reference (VMAF)Preset matters more than bitrate at 8K: p4 at 140 Mbps wins and holds 60 fps (2026-08-04).
- Queued
Readings that survive a console restartA show-night redeploy (2026-08-23) wiped the in-memory latency graph and a session report. A deploy must never eat a measurement.
- Parked
Second and third timestamp carriersA wall-clock timeline riding with the video and an audio-channel modem, to cross-check every probe and measure lip sync. Proven on the laptop, on hold since 2026-09-13.
Console · control plane
Run the fleet and the show from one screen
console.prismstream.link: the operator's instrument. It books and boots the AWS boxes, runs campaigns and transmissions, and keeps the records.
- Solid
Fleet lifecycleStart and stop by tag, capacity-aware boot retries, an idle watchdog that counts a live contribution as activity. AWS GPU capacity in Oregon is the recurring external risk (two hours without an encoder on 2026-09-30).
- Solid
Test lab, Live ops, Reports, Confidence monitorEvery report kind renders as one document with PDF export; reports federate and diff across runs; the slate page holds the stamp for the camera.
- Solid
Accounts, roles and auditPartner, operator and admin roles with every action logged; machine clients use their own key. Self-service password reset.
- Solid
Release machineryDated version tags, release notes checked at the cut, 817 automated tests plus GUI, parity and panel gates before any merge; every box deploys a pinned tag.
- Works
v2026.9.8 waiting to shipFixes the partner state document, which has read "offline" on production since 2026-09-22 (a loop-library difference between tests and production), and applies the scope ruling below.
Partner API · Supanova
The bridge to the venue's media servers
What d&b's Supanova reads and controls: contract supanova/1.2, documented at api.prismstream.link, live on production since 2026-09-29.
- Live
State document, sessions, events, recordings, healthA revisioned document with long-poll; signed playback at the origin (their JWT, our verification); viewer sessions with a partner-side revoke; webhooks with signed retries; repeat-safe commands.
- Live
Footage reports as a partner catalogueEvery published angle-research review, with stills, previews and masters behind signed links.
- Decided
Scope: cloud test stream only2026-09-30: a Start or Stop runs the cloud test stream and nothing else. A venue broadcast appears in the document on its own when it reaches the ingest rail; the API never touches venue equipment.
- Works
Going live with SupanovaWaiting on their JWKS address, then the live check together, then token enforcement after 14 days' notice. A staging key is theirs to mint.
- Queued
supanova/1.3 and phase 2JWKS registration through the API (accepted as specified), per-session playlists, timed metadata when a rig moves, the venue decoder agent.
Tools · research
Around the platform
The products crews and partners use day to day, and the research spikes that may become features. All links on dashboard.prismstream.link.
- Live
Angle research, report library, checklist, dashboardShot planning on venue maps; the footage reviews for Croke Park, the US Open and T-Mobile Arena; the crew's test-day protocol; the product hub.
- Live
mOre screen lens study and 3D simulatorWhich lens fills all four screens and how well: Canon RF 7-14 at about 13.3 mm, +25° tilt, every figure computed live. Open threads: grid-chart calibration, the perceptual test.
- Works
Rig monitorLive CPU, GPU and fan control for every box on the test LAN. Works on the LAN only; a relay for use from a phone during a show is queued.
- Works
Active-zone super-resolution (spike)A moveable zoom zone with AI upscaling inside it, real time at 8K60 on the encode box (66 fps, 2026-09-26), with a live demo page on the LAN. Not in the product yet.
- Parked
Live 3D graphics over the picture (Unreal)Calibrated-camera graphics, animated bands and an automatic sky replacement, previewed on the laptop. Tabled 2026-09-29 for the API work.