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Delivering custom HTML graphics for live sports, news and weather channels

By - October 4, 2021
Delivering custom HTML graphics for live sports, news and weather channels

Explore how AccuWeather Now and Atmosphere News delight audiences with unique graphics experiences

With the US Free Ad Supported Streaming TV (FAST) market expected to reach over $4 billion by 2023, sports, news and weather will be among the winning genres gaining viewership on connected TVs.

Many news and sports brands have developed sophisticated graphics offerings for traditional linear TV. New technology has now enabled equivalent visual packages without the expensive graphics production tools of legacy broadcast control rooms.

Advanced secondary graphics such as a channel logo, a bug or a lower-third are an integral part of a video stream for FAST channels. Apart from providing viewers a glimpse into upcoming programs, ad-breaks and promotional teasers, graphics help package content segments aesthetically to deliver a seamless and rich viewing experience.

Amagi's unique ability to introduce custom HTML graphics has enabled our clients to achieve standout experiences in the FAST space with limited investment and rapid time-to-market.

While this is applicable to all content genres, live sports, news and weather channels also have a unique need for custom HTML graphics to render real time scores and data from external sources.

AccuWeather delivers real-time forecast data to FAST viewers

When AccuWeather launched AccuWeather Now - its new FAST channel now available on The Roku Channel - it was important that they created a unique visual approach for their ever-present weather data appearing on the screen.

Amagi huddled with AccuWeather’s design team and created a custom HTML5 application based on the customer’s advanced API set for proprietary weather data.

Amagi’s application queries the API every few seconds to fetch data points for each geographic region and passes this information to the on-screen ticker.

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Figure 1. AccuWeather Now channel

Atmosphere News delights out of home streamers

Atmosphere is the leading provider of streaming video to restaurants, airports, gyms, retail and other businesses. Audio is designed to be optional in these deployments, which makes rich onscreen graphics even more important to users.

Atmosphere News, which launched this week and is available to Atmosphere’s over 15,000 business customers across the country, tapped Amagi to create a unique graphics experience programmed in real time with the upcoming story list.

The channel is assembled using Amagi’s CLOUDPORT, and the next-up story queue is communicated automatically to the graphics application, creating a steady run-down for viewers.

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Figure 2 & 3: Atmosphere News

A key differentiator for Amagi

Amagi’s CLOUDPORT Linear Channel Playout Service with Advanced Graphics enables powerful HTML5 graphics rendering for any channel in a very short amount of time.

Bring us your vision and we’ll code it into existence, connecting to any external data source for real time relay of data powering tickers, lower-thirds, social promotions, and more.

If you are keen on knowing more about Amagi solutions, reach out to us at cloudandme@amagi.com

Read our blog on Advanced Graphics Automation HERE.

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