Blackmagic DIY "Tally"

Putting this out there for people who may have multiple ATEMs sharing multiple cameras, but would like tally to be functional for each ATEM without affecting camera control of the shared cameras.

This was my problem:
We present a live video streaming event that has three separate production lines each producing independent streaming broadcasts. These production lines, however, often share the usage of a subset of cameras (like a pair of jibs or three cameras in a caster’s lounge, for example).

In the Blackmagic ecosystem, since the camera’s tally and camera control are delivered via the SDI return of an ATEM switcher, only one of the production lines will enjoy the use of tally to the shared cameras, since the return can only come from one ATEM at a time.

I can use a router to send the program output of the other production line ATEMs to the shared cameras, but in practice this has negative effects. Most noticeably, it will affect the shading of the cameras. Matching the values of the cameras across three production line ATEMs, so that that the shading remains the same is not manageable in a fast paced environment.

Adding to the problem, my company did not purchase the viewfinders for the BM URSA cameras and only had 5” Atomos Shinobi monitors. And the tally is delivered view the viewfinders. So even if we created a gpio solution, there was nothing to display the tally to the talent.

It took me a good while to figure out a way to share tally across all three production lines using my client's existing equipment.

The answer lied in an old ATEM switcher we had laying around and Bitfocus Companion.

In terms of hardware we have:
• 8k Constellation ATEM servicing each production line (the “production line” ATEMs)
• an old 4k 2m/e switcher in the engineering rack (the “shared” ATEM)
• an 80x80 Videohub router
• Three BM URSA cameras (the “shared” cameras)
• Three camera-mounted 5” Atomos Shinobi monitors pointed at the talent

What I did was:
• run the shared camera sdi outputs into the Videohub first
• the Videohub then distributes the shared camera video to each production line ATEM as well as
• to the Shared ATEM. Shading of the shared cameras takes place here.
• the aux outputs of the Shared ATEM are run to Shinobi monitors mounted to the shared cameras

The return is then looped into the sdi input of the URSA cameras

o Aux Output 1 of the shared ATEM is sent to Shared Camera 1
o Aux Output 2 of the shared ATEM is sent to Shared Camera 2
o Aux Output 3 of the shared ATEM is sent to Shared Camera 3
• I set “color 1” on the Shared ATEM to Red.

I then set up Companion triggers to monitor the program bus of the production line ATEMs.

If Companion detects that one of the shared cameras has been placed in Program by any of the production line ATEMs, it sends Color 1 to the Shinobi monitor of that camera and Black to the other Shinobi monitors (see accompanying diagrams)

Since camera control is sent to the shared cameras via the Aux outputs of the shared ATEM, there is no interruption in the camera control

There is a button on the stream deck of each production line’s technical director that they press when they are going to route their program video to the caster’s confidence monitor in the caster’s lounge. I added a “reset” function to this button that sends black to all the shared cameras to “reset them”.

And there are other modifications that could be done based on the output capacity of the shared ATEM and the information you would like to send via the aux outputs (it can be any color or even messages).

The best thing is, once set up, this entire process runs in the background without engineer intervention, and since the production lines never use the shared cameras at the same time, there are no conflicts.

Hopefully this process could help others in similar multiple ATEM situations.

You have 3 Constellation 8k's?

I’m thinking you could do a similar reacharound by burning an ME on one of the 8ks.

Assign each camera to a keyer, K1-K3 in this case, Companion listens for the punch and turns on the key which then tallies the cam.

The problem here is that there’s not a simple way to untally. How do you separate the traffic? Is Companion contantly listening to the program state or is it action based?

Good Luck

Howard,
I considered that solution, but based on what we had on hand, went in my direction, especially since we typically run out of outputs on the Constellations.

Companion is constantly listening to the program state of all three constellations, so no human intervention is required.

Since we are sending colors to the monitors, we just send red to the camera that is in program and black to the cameras that are not in program, and that is our effective "un tally".

So far it has worked perfectly.

Great ingenuity using the tools at hand.

Using program tally state for your triggers, rather than program state would be more preferable. That would provide more accurate and complete tally information from your production line ATEMS.

How about:

• Prod1 ATEM Cam 1 tally ON > Shared ATEM M/E1 Prog > input 1
  Prod1 ATEM Cam 1 tally OFF > Shared ATEM M/E1 Prog > black
• Prod1 ATEM Cam 2 tally ON > Shared ATEM M/E1 DSK1 > input 2
  Prod1 ATEM Cam 2 tally OFF > Shared ATEM M/E1 DSK1 > black
• Prod1 ATEM Cam 3 tally ON > Shared ATEM M/E1 DSK2 > input 3
  Prod1 ATEM Cam 3 tally OFF > Shared ATEM M/E1 DSK2 > black
• Prod2 ATEM Cam 1 tally ON > Shared ATEM M/E1 USK1 > input 1
  Prod2 ATEM Cam 1 tally OFF > Shared ATEM M/E1 USK1 > black
• Prod2 ATEM Cam 2 tally ON > Shared ATEM M/E1 USK2 > input 2
  Prod2 ATEM Cam 2 tally OFF > Shared ATEM M/E1 USK2 > black
• Prod2 ATEM Cam 3 tally ON > Shared ATEM M/E2 Prog > input 3
  Prod2 ATEM Cam 3 tally OFF > Shared ATEM M/E2 Prog > black
• Prod3 ATEM Cam 1 tally ON > Shared ATEM M/E2 USK1 > input 1
  Prod3 ATEM Cam 1 tally OFF > Shared ATEM M/E2 USK1 > black
• Prod3 ATEM Cam 2 tally ON > Shared ATEM M/E2 USK2 > input 2
  Prod3 ATEM Cam 2 tally OFF > Shared ATEM M/E2 USK2 > black
• Prod3 ATEM Cam 3 tally ON > Shared ATEM M/E1 Supersource box 1 > input 3
  Prod3 ATEM Cam 3 tally OFF > Shared ATEM M/E1 Supersource box 1 > black
  
• M/E2 assigned to Supersource box 2
• All keys and supersource on-air

...or something along those lines

That would give complete and correct tally to your cameras.
Then you could simply use Shared ATEM M/E1 program tally state for each input to switch your 3 auxs:

• Shared ATEM input 1 tally ON > Shared ATEM Aux 1 > color 1
• Shared ATEM input 1 tally OFF > Shared ATEM Aux 1 > black
• Shared ATEM input 2 tally ON > Shared ATEM Aux 2 > color 1
• Shared ATEM input 2 tally OFF > Shared ATEM Aux 2 > black
• Shared ATEM input 3 tally ON > Shared ATEM Aux 3 > color 1
• Shared ATEM input 3 tally OFF > Shared ATEM Aux 3 > black

Blair,
Thanks for this! I've modified this concept into two variants.

Variant One is what I now call Fake Shared Tally when the shared cameras do not have built-in tally lights (like my original dilemma).

Variant Two is what I call Real Shared Tally, where the shared cameras have built-in tally lights.

The Companion triggers are detailed below.

In Fake Shared Tally, we don't really care about any off condition, we just care about what camera is live. This keeps it super simple and I can share any number of cameras limited only to the number of Aux outputs on the Shared ATEM.

In Real Shared Tally, I can give my talent both program AND preview tallies and there are no companion triggers required for the Shared ATEM.

Ideally, for our next big event, they at least rent the Ursa Viewfinders!