As LED-based XR is becoming increasingly used, Brainstorm has developed new features that allow for easier, faster and more integrated creation of immersive XR content specifically designed to be displayed on large LED videowalls. With these features, Brainstorm’s clients will see their XR content creation significantly accelerated when creating in-context AR in LED walls, XR Set extensions, or even backgrounds for film and drama production. Suite 5 has a dedicated interface for creating XR installations, which allows for modelling any kind of video wall, including curved, shaped and corner installations, and map the desired 3D content in such model. This facilitates the creation of virtual AR content to be directly displayed and seen by the camera with the correct perspective at all times. Also, by taking advantage of the Layers and Stacking features of InfinitySet, different renders, even with different resolutions and aspect ratios, can be mapped in a canvas of any size and aspect.

In addition, the unique integration of InfinitySet and eStudio with Unreal Engine is now even tighter, allowing for the inclusion of fully editable Brainstorm scenes and templates within an Unreal project, and vice-versa. This is especially useful when creating AR projects within Unreal, which benefit from Brainstorm’s advanced data-driven graphics and broadcast workflows compatibility. This is coupled with the acclaimed UnrealControl feature which supports editing the Unreal Projects directly within InfinitySet’s familiar interface with total ease and control of blueprints, objects and parameters. Suite 5 also features a new, redesigned internal chroma keyer that includes a new mode that embeds the Unreal Engine chroma keyer directly into InfinitySet. Brainstorm Suite 5 is fully compatible with Unreal Engine 4.27 and will be with UE 5.

“Brainstorm has been deeply involved with Augmented Reality and Virtual Production for decades now, and Suite 5 is the result of applying our expertise to the new display methods that broadcasters and filmmakers are introducing into their workflows” says Hector Viguer, Brainstorm’s COO and Engineering Director. “The advanced features of Suite 5 will allow any user to comply with any kind of VR/AR/XR requirement, regardless of how complex it is, and leaving them free to choose the production workflow they feel is best for their production, whether LED walls or chroma keying. We want to be agnostic so we can provide a solution for any requirement.”

Some other features are included, like improved HDR workflows, and better integration with robotic heads from manufacturers such as Panasonic or Sony. Also, Edison, the company’s virtual studio in a box product designed for live events and presentations, will also benefit from some of the above plus its own features as a result of its upgrade to V5.

Brainstorm Suite 5 will be available on March 1st, and will also be demonstrated at NAB 2022 at the Brainstorm booth N2608.

What started as a discussion concept between BBC and MOOV before the cancellation of Wimbledon 2020, developed into a full-blown project as a result of a drive to maximise the available time ahead of the 2021 Championships, bringing the focus onto the virtual facilities rather than BBC Sport to rethink the way the coverage was managed and so provide better stories, data and graphics.

Built around a green screen studio, the Wimbledon studio virtualisation effectively extended the space available far beyond its physical limits, providing new virtual spaces around the real desk, which in effect created a 360 studio. There were also new and alternative camera angles, more room to add infographics, and of course additional Wimbledon branding. The added bonus was the flexibility to change, adapt and make adjustments on demand that InfinitySet provided.

“We managed to create a virtual space that allowed for a dynamic coverage of the tournament which seamlessly combined real and virtual imagery in a way that significatively enhanced the story and audience engagement” says Nev Appleton, director and co-founder at MOOV. “This was a particularly challenging project, not only due to the time constraints, but also because of restrictions on people on-site as well as technical issues such as the requirements to re-purpose the studio for the daily highlights. But, despite the challenges, the really great results reinforced our commitment to use virtual technology for enhancing live events”.

The project had to be produced in record time, as the set designs were available only at the end of April 2021. MOOV worked closely with BBC Sport as well as with a team of talented artists, and also relied on Brainstorm’s InfinitySet to create the virtual set and AR tracking, using Unreal Engine. As the studio had five cameras, including pedestals, jibs and PTZ, to ensure the output quality required, each camera was equipped with a Brainstorm InfinitySet system with Unreal Engine. The final output combined the real set with a desk for the presenters, with actual windows looking out to show the courts, and integrating the virtual world to enable the graphics and AR information to be displayed on demand.

David Alexander, Brainstorm’s Commercial Director, adds: “Together with Paul Vanlint of Storm Broadcast, our reseller in the UK and Ireland, we’ve worked with MOOV on a number of projects but what was done at Wimbledon 2021 was at another level altogether! MOOV have a really talented team who have an in-depth knowledge of our products and how to get the most out of their rich feature sets and capabilities, whether it’s the InfinitySet or our Aston 3D motion graphics system, through to our Neuron, which integrates graphics and their management into NRCS systems. So, we were very pleased to work with the MOOV team on the BBC Sport project for such a prestigious and world renown sporting event”.

Based on Brainstorm’s real-time 3D technology, Edison PRO allows broadcasters, corporate, live events, education, houses of worship, influencers and online content providers to turn a simple presentation into a complete interactive show through an affordable and easy-to-use platform that does not require expensive hardware or a studio setup. A complete standalone system featuring future-proof hardware, Edison PRO is ready to work out of the box — all that is required is a camera and a portable chroma set to include the presenter in the virtual world with the presentation.

By using drag-and-drop operation, Edison can be used by anyone, and ships with a library of pre-defined templates, scenes, furniture, pointers, screens, and other objects to populate the scene, plus a number of interactive templates for quizzes and polls to further customize the event. It is also fully compatible with Unreal Engine, allowing Unreal’s photorealistic scenes to be used as 3D backgrounds for a presentation, enhancing the looks of your presentations. An optional Edison UC (Edison Unreal Control) plugin allows for controlling and editing the blueprints, objects, and properties of the UE scene directly from Edison’s own, user-friendly interface.

Installation, training, and support are straightforward, ensuring a rock-solid operation even in highly demanding live production environments. Edison PRO can be customized with options to match any customer requirement, present or future.

“By coupling advanced technology with extremely easy operation, Edison PRO helps users to bring their live and online presentations to a whole new level,” comments Brainstorm CEO, Ricardo Montesa. “It has been developed to bring the high-end quality of broadcast shows to users at a whole new price point, leveraging our more than 25 years of broadcast experience to create impactful presentations using pre-existing content, without requiring the expensive and time-consuming ad-hoc generation of new assets.”

The project was initiated at the end of 2018 by VIDEOMEDIA, Brainstorm’s reseller in Chile, and executed by Warner Media in mid-2019. The regional guidelines have been led by Alexis Collao, Director of Broadcast Technology of WarnerMedia in Latin America, who, together with an interdisciplinary team, projected the use of virtual studios as a medium and long term solution as a mechanism to achieve greater efficiency in the ROI related to content production. In an effort between the Graphics Area (which already provided solutions to all areas of the channel), the Engineering Department and the collaboration of Brainstorm, two laboratories were set up over the last two years, with the aim of practising, evaluating the possibilities and tacitly comparing each virtual tool available on the market.

The first augmented and virtual reality lab was so successful that the channel’s management decided to allocate a budget to the project. The equipment supplied is identical and in both Chile and Argentina consists of three InfinitySet +Track with Unreal Engine, an InfinitySet Controller with Unreal Engine, two design systems with InfinitySet Edit with Aston Designer and Unreal Engine, and an OnDemand.

The graphics team focused on generating an efficient production pipeline for set development in Unreal Engine 4, assigning a team of five designers to generate multiple exterior and interior virtual sets. The approval of the budget and the purchase of Brainstorm’s solutions meant leveraging a figure that linked the real-time potential of Unreal Engine through photorealism and top-level blueprints with the operability of Infinity Set.

The second laboratory, started at the end of 2019, provided Warner Media with a range of possibilities to articulate the figure of this Unreal Engine 4 + InfinitySet integrator, which resulted in the first on-air broadcasts with a case of Fernanda Maciel and Congressional Data for CNN Chile and Chilevisión, in trackfree mode.

At the beginning of 2020, WarnerMedia defined the physical location where the virtual production set would be installed: a space that was destined for props storage, but was reassigned due to the good results of the second laboratory. In February, Brainstorm provided the Warner Media operators with training and installed the final equipment along with the integration of Ncam.

In October, WarnerMedia broadcasted for the first time a live preview of the Chile-Uruguay football match, using UE4 scenery, actors, cameras and screens integrated from InfinitySet and a camera with Ncam tracking, proving WarnerMedia’s leadership with its TNT Sports-Chilevisión channels. The impact was such that the heads of the drama area of teleseries have been very interested in this solution, expanding the future possibilities of the project.

“In the more than 2 years that we have been working with the implementation of virtual studios, we have advanced considerably until we have reached the maturity of the project, so that we have already launched programmes with virtual scenery on air with great success. In the USA, Virtual Studios have become an industry standard and this year in particular, one of the strategic priorities of WM’s International Technology area is to adopt these technologies locally, which is a challenge that we have been able to develop successfully in the region,” says Alexis Collao.

According to Sergio Amuchastegui, responsible for Brainstorm sales in the region, “at a strategic and commercial level we are very pleased with the results obtained so far by our business partners, which have been achieved with local support by César Núñez, a key element in this implementation. During the pandemic we have provided them with more than 15 Brainstorm Suite licenses across Chile and Argentina as extraordinary support so that those involved could work from home; we expect to be able to reactivate the second and third stage in 2021 according to the information WarnerMedia have provide us with”.

In the words of Borja Chirivella, Brainstorm’s Commercial Director for Latin America, ‘the key elements to successfully complete this regional project have been mainly the impulse and trust put in Brainstorm at all times by Alexis Collao and the great internal professional talent of the creative and technological areas, who have worked in complicity showing a total cohesion and understanding in the resolution of the obstacles that have appeared along the way and in the achievement of the common objectives’.

Brainstorm is pleased to announce that it has been awarded a MegaGrant from Epic Games for the development of Edison, a new Unreal Engine-based template and AR solution targeting the education sector. This new solution will further extend the already deep integration of other Brainstorm products with Unreal Engine, especially InfinitySet, for photorealistic virtual sets and augmented reality applications.

Edison is a new approach to education and the world of presentations as it is designed with ease of use in mind, giving non-expert users the flexibility and freedom to build highly advanced and visually engaging presentations. Edison enables presenters to use existing PPT or PDF files in immersive environments with photo-realistic backgrounds and augmented reality content. Key to the creative powers of the Edison is that it allows the presenters to also be included in such 3D environments with total ease.

Edison is the brainchild of 25 years of experience that Brainstorm has built up in broadcast quality virtual sets and real-time 3D graphics. This new audience is a wide-ranging user base consisting of teachers, lecturers and educators of all kinds and extends out to include those involved in live events and corporate presentations, and all the way through to YouTubers and internet entrepreneurs across multiple sectors. This breadth of user profiles have the same essential need – a sophisticated, yet simple to operate, toolset which will empower them to greatly enhance their presentations, with the objective of better informing and educating their audiences in captivating ways.

According to Ricardo Montesa, Brainstorm’s CEO and founder, “we are delighted with our existing partnership with Epic Games and the integration with Unreal Engine for our current product range, and so excited to receive this MegaGrant for developing Edison. We are sure this product will revolutionize education by using advanced, photorealistic AR, and will also provide new virtual presentation capabilities to other markets such as events, corporate and live presentations, which will benefit greatly from Edison’s advanced features, only previously available in large budget professional solutions.

MegaGrants are financial grants destined to fuel up creative, noteworthy, and innovative projects built in and around Unreal Engine or projects that enhance the open-source 3D graphics ecosystem, and cover a variety of endeavors from game development, architecture projects, and film production to academic uses and software tool development.

Brainstorm Virtual Weeks include virtual live and recorded sessions on Brainstorm’s advanced technology, products and solutions, with special emphasis on the latest developments and achievements by the company. All Brainstorm Virtual Week editions are open to anyone willing to learn how Brainstorm’s technology can help their business in these harsh times, using virtual technology with innovative solutions for broadcast, content creation, virtual events, virtual production and much more.

The upcoming Brainstorm Virtual Week will showcase a number of public and private sessions starting Monday, September 14^th, through to Friday, 18^th, with dozens of online webinars in different time zones. The webinars will be focused on InfinitySet’s photorealistic virtual sets and augmented reality, including Unreal Engine, broadcast virtual set workflows using InfinitySet as a hub for a number of technologies, and Aston as the most versatile 2D/3D motion graphics creation, CG and playout system, with special interest in graphics workflow environments.

Brainstorm will also showcase virtual production demonstrations streamed live, twice a day, on the company’s YouTube channel. This production will show photorealistic virtual production with two presenters located in different cities miles away from each other, and using a simple yet powerful state-of-the-art virtual production system consisting only of an InfinitySet, Brainstorm’s all-in-one virtual set and real-time 3D graphics solution, with Unreal Engine and a consumer camera. The result is a dynamic show that demonstrates InfinitySet’s ability to integrate different technologies and produce excellent results no matter the limited resources available, even creating photorealistic virtual productions and showcasing complex events like live tele-transportations of presenters, placing them together in the virtual studio simultaneously and with no noticeable time lag.

With webinars focused on its products and solutions, as well as the virtual production demonstrations, Brainstorm demonstrates how virtual technology allows broadcasters and production companies to maintain, or even increase, their high standards of content creation and storytelling not only under normal conditions but also when travel restrictions and social distancing apply. On top of al the above, users can also request specific one-to-one demos.

According to David Alexander, Brainstorm’s Commercial Director, “we want to ensure that our customers, users and the market worldwide can receive immediate, comprehensive and updated information on our innovative solutions and cutting-edge product range and, most importantly, accessible on demand. Now that many companies impose restrictions in social contact and working conditions, so people avoid attending the usual events in person and the events themselves still get cancelled, Brainstorm wants to maintain the communications open and the conversations flowing”.

The Brainstorm Virtual Week will allow attendees to see the products in action and hold conversations not only with Brainstorm sales representatives, but also with demo and Production Services staff. Registration is available at www.brainstorm3d.com/virtual-week.

“Our clients have increasingly demanding requirements for graphics and virtual reality, and we found Brainstorm the perfect partner to fulfil such needs” says Nevil Appleton, Director and Co-founder of MOOV. “Along with its flexibility, reliability and clever integration of Unreal Engine, Brainstorm also has proven and robust data integration which allows us to further expand the system’s capabilities and match our requirements.”

With arguably the most advanced real-time 3D motion graphics feature set, Brainstorm’s Combined Render Engine with Unreal Engine is unique in the industry as it seamlessly combines the most advanced data-driven graphics creation with the photorealistic backgrounds rendered with Unreal Engine, all in a simplified workflow involving a single workstation. Also, the ability of Aston to render PBR materials allows for CG and motion graphics to matching the hyper-realistic results obtained with Unreal Engine, which results in a seamless integration between the different objects from different applications.

According to David Alexander, Brainstorm’s Commercial Director, “Our heritage and experience of over 25 years in developing advanced real-time graphics and virtual sets applications were crucial in achieving this agreement. In essence, Brainstorm’s solutions, providing state-of-the-art, photorealistic results combining on-screen graphics and augmented reality objects in hyper-realistic virtual sets that are indistinguishable from reality, were key factors in reaching a decision to cement a long-term partnership between our two companies”.

Founded in 2000 by Duncan Foot & Nev Appleton, MOOV is a sports and events graphics company that delivers a high-quality, all-round graphics solution coupled with excellent multi-skilled operational staff. The company is recognised for its innovation and design, participating in high-profile sporting events including Wimbledon, The Grand National, Commonwealth Games, Winter and Summer Olympic and Paralympic Games. MOOV provides services to UK and International broadcasters such as BBC, BT Sport ITV, and Channel 4, to name just a few.

InfinitySet takes full advantage of the latest hardware developments announced by NVIDIA, such as NVIDIA RTX GPU, to deliver the best rendering quality available in the market. By using NVIDIA RTX GPUs, InfinitySet can deliver real-time ray tracing, which provides a much more accurate rendering, especially with complex light conditions. Ray tracing offers more natural, more realistic rendered images, which is essential for photorealistic content generation.

Using these technologies, along with other advanced rendering capabilities like the Combined Render Engine with Unreal Engine 4.22, PBR (Physically Based Rendering) materials or HDR (High Dynamic Range), InfinitySet can create virtual content which can’t be distinguished from reality. This opens the door for content providers to use InfinitySet to create amazingly rendered backgrounds and scenes for drama or even film production, significantly reducing costs while opening new sources of revenue. For other broadcast applications such as virtual sets or augmented reality, InfinitySet provides unmatched, hyper-realistic quality both for backgrounds and graphics. Aston, Brainstorm’s 2D/3D motion graphics creation, CG and playout, also takes advantage of the PBR materials, so its compositions can be integrated seamlessly into AR environments created by InfinitySet, matching the image quality obtained with InfinitySet.

Rendering quality not only delivers an enhanced visual experience for the viewers but also represents a significant cost saving feature when using virtual scenes that can’t be distinguished from reality. And going far beyond broadcast, InfinitySet allows for using this technology to get substantial savings in the costs of filming and post-production, ensuring the adjustment of different shots (chroma, camera movements, background tracking, etc). Once everything is prepared in preview, InfinitySet can export the camera data, tracking and movement of the set to enter postproduction in the final format required, either 4K or 8K, with full quality.