Expanding support for KLV metadata processing across AWS Media Services and AWS Elemental Appliances & Software

AWS is pleased to announce expanded feature support for Key-Length-Value (KLV) metadata processing in AWS Media Services and AWS Elemental Appliances & Software. While KLV has long been supported in AWS Elemental products and services, we’ve recently added new ways to carry KLV information in video workflows. If you are not already familiar with KLV, it is a well-defined specification by the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE), also known as SMPTE ST 336M. It offers broadcasters a standardized encoding framework to represent structured data in multimedia or data streams. It is ideal for carrying supplemental information associated to video content with low overhead. Given its versatility, KLV can be adapted to a variety of industries including Broadcast, Defense, Aerospace & UAS, Public Safety, and Scientific Research. Let’s take a closer look at the KLV updates below.

AWS Elemental Live

AWS Elemental Live introduced two new KLV feature enhancements in software version 2.25.1 GA (General Availability). First, adding input support for KLV carried in SMPTE-2038 ancillary data. Support for KLV in SMPTE-2038 is the latest addition to other previously supported input types that included MPEG Transport Stream (MPEG-TS) files, Serial Digital Interface (SDI) for uncompressed video, and MPEG-TS over UDP/RTP. Secondly, KLV is now supported in HLS outputs when using MPEG-TS as the container format. Support for KLV in HLS outputs joins other previously supported output types such as Archive/File, MPEG-TS over UDP/RTP, and Reliable-TS (Zixi/SRT).

AWS Elemental Link

The AWS Elemental Link family of devices introduced support for KLV metadata pass-through. This new feature allows embedded KLV metadata in the SDI input to be passed through to AWS Elemental Link outputs as SMPTE-2038 ancillary data when encoding. Link devices will connect your live video, audio, and KLV metadata to AWS Elemental MediaLive where it can be made available to a variety of supported MediaLive output groups discussed below.

AWS Elemental MediaLive

AWS Elemental MediaLive expands support for KLV inputs and outputs. First, adding input support for KLV carried in SMPTE-2038 ancillary data streams. This is useful when acquiring metadata from AWS Elemental Link connected devices. Other input types already supporting KLV ingest include UDP/RTP, AWS Elemental MediaConnect, and TS files. Secondly, AWS Elemental MediaLive adds KLV support to HLS output groups. Support for KLV in HLS outputs is the latest addition to other previously supported output groups such as UDP/RTP, MediaPackage, and Archive/File groups. The new feature enables preservation of KLV in HLS output groups when using MPEG-TS as the container format. This is beneficial when publishing HLS content with KLV to an origin such as Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3) for live streaming workflows.

AWS Elemental MediaConvert

Recently, AWS Elemental MediaConvert introduced two new KLV features to the service. First, preservation of KLV metadata during file transcodes that use MPEG-TS container formats. This is particularly useful when preserving metadata contained in transport stream files while exchanging media codecs (e.g. AVC/H.264 to HEVC/H.265). Additionally, the service supports preservation of KLV when transcoding from MPEG-TS to ISO Based Media File Format (ISOBMFF) used by CMAF and MPEG-DASH. This implementation of preserving KLV from Transport Stream to ISOBMFF is consistent with specifications found in MISB ST 1910, also discussed in the following article.

AWS Elemental MediaPackage

While not new to KLV processing, as a reminder AWS Elemental MediaPackage supports re-packaging live streaming content containing KLV metadata from HLS (HLS-TS) to MPEG-DASH (ISOBMFF). The feature works in conjunction with AWS Elemental MediaLive when using the “MediaPackage” output group. The services create an end-to-end workflow for live streaming while preserving KLV metadata through AWS Elemental MediaLive and AWS Elemental MediaPackage. Further, the implementation is consistent with the MISB ST 1910 specification.

Visit the AWS Media Services Resources and AWS Elemental Documentation pages to get more details about these new KLV metadata processing features. In an upcoming blog article, we’ll discuss some interesting use cases for KLV processing related to the Media & Entertainment industry—more specifically in broadcast sports applications.