How the cloud saved Grabyo’s Christmas

Authored by Scott Lunn, Head of Content at Grabyo. The content and opinions in this post are those of the third-party author and AWS is not responsible for the content or accuracy of this post.

With no office drinks, secret Santas, or Christmas jumpers, cloud video platform Grabyo turned to Amazon Web Services (AWS) for inspiration. The Challenge: A 70-person global team with video conferencing fatigue. The solution: a one-hour live Christmas special.

The set up was simple: Four employees working from their homes hosted an hour-long show, including live segments, a live DJ set, raffle, and real-time interaction, interspersed with pre-recorded content.

Grabyo’s production team needed a high-quality, low-latency solution to deliver a live, interactive broadcast and to enjoy the real-time feedback from its global audience. Grabyo used its own live broadcasting platform, Grabyo Producer, powered by AWS. Requiring only a laptop and a web-browser, Grabyo’s four co-hosts joined the broadcast using Grabyo’s remote contribution app, Producer Guest.

Grabyo added Amazon Interactive Video Service (Amazon IVS) to complete the solution. Amazon IVS is a managed live streaming solution that is quick and easy to set up, and ideal for creating interactive video experiences. You can ingest your live streams to Amazon IVS using streaming software and the service does everything you need to make low-latency live video available to any viewer around the world. Grabyo Producer and Amazon IVS feature pay-as-you-go pricing to deliver a low-cost, professional-grade global broadcast with no upfront cost or additional hardware.

Figure 1: Simple live workflow

To set the festive scene, the hosts created custom graphics and layouts to insert into the broadcast using Grabyo Producer while Christmas music played in the background.

Figure 2:  Live production screen capture

The broadcast also used Grabyo Producer’s new multiviewer, allowing the director to view multiple inputs on a single screen.

Figure 3:  Multiviewer and production setup

This end-to-end high-quality and low-latency workflow is easy to set up and manage. The team only needed to create an Amazon IVS channel, embed the HTML code to the microsite, and push the program from Grabyo Producer directly to the IVS channel. This workflow allows broadcasters, content owners, and publishers to quickly create engaging, cost-effective professional broadcasts for audiences around the world.

Visit us at https://about.grabyo.com/ to learn how some of the most recognizable sports, gaming, and enterprise brands in the world use Grabyo’s live production, editing, and publishing solutions on AWS.