In rolling out Adobe Flash Media Server 3.5 software, HD Cloud customers will be able to take full advantage of cloud-based services for H.264 encoding, bandwidth optimization, dynamic streaming for multiple renditions, interactivity, pre-built services for live and on-demand streaming, and other capabilities to deliver the highest quality end user experience for their online video content. HD Cloud recently unveiled a new technology, HD Accelerate, that was specifically created for large-scale video libraries and rightsholders that need high-capacity session control. The concept was married with another HD Cloud innovation, a security strategy in which proxy files are wiped from the server cloud once files are encoded, adding another layer of protection for customers.
HD Accelerate has performed 4,500 video encodes at 100 megabits per second (mb/s) each in a 20-minute period using 900 processors, which is believed to be an industry record. HD Cloud handles large video files and high bit-rate content (up to 1080p and 100 mb/s), offering customers a premium-quality video encoding experience with a superior return on investment. HD Accelerate is a series of proprietary video scaling algorithms that HD Cloud has engineered for enhanced video transcoding throughput, particularly for on-demand video services. The company has typically performed 900 simultaneous encodes, and its recent enhancements to HD Accelerate enable far greater scalability and capacity for its cloud computing-based service. HD Cloud currently performs terabytes of transcoding sessions for customers, applying metadata to completed files and automatically distributing files to destinations ranging from syndication web sites, content delivery networks (CDNs), local archives, content management systems (CMSs), and local drives.
Since its launch, HD Cloud has increased its technology profile to address feature-film distributors’ needs for in-the-cloud transcoding on on-demand feeds. The company’s model of offering lower-cost, high-definition video encoding for large-scale media firms is gaining acceptance with known brands, including the likes of WeatherChannel.com, New York magazine and Zappos.com (through a partnership with Magnify), among others. HD Cloud, which uses Amazon’s Elastic Cloud Computing (EC2) service, supports a wide range of video formats — from H.264 to Real Video and Windows Media — and supports up to 1080i/p resolution and 100 megabits per second (mb/s) throughput. The company employs an innovative security strategy in which proxy files are wiped from the server cloud once files are encoded, adding another layer of protection for customers. HD Cloud offers various video input formats, including H.261, H.263, H.264, MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MJPEG, On2 VP6, Real Video, Windows Media (AVI/WMV), and 3GPP. Output formats include H.261, H.263, H.264, MPEG-2, and 3GPP. HD Cloud also provides a RESTful API for integration with other systems, including VMS providers, file transfer accelerators, CDNs, security vendors, and legacy transcoding systems.