A few years ago, the idea of delivering digital video images over any type of local area network (Lan) or wide area network (Wan) link would have drawn scorn from many IT managers, with most either unable or unwilling to pay for the sophisticated equipment and high bandwidth required to support the medium effectively.
But a powerful combination of improved video compression technology, lower-cost network capacity, new traffic prioritisation and quality of service capabilities built into routers and switches has brought video over IP into sharp focus.
Also, a new generation of Ethernet cameras capable of sending high-definition colour images over IP networks has recently emerged, prompting many organisations to re-evaluate their attitude to video, and to explore new applications such as video over IP camera surveillance and video content analysis.
Simon Harris, research director at IMS Research, says the biggest market for video over IP surveillance is the retail sector, followed by commercial office security, banking and finance employee monitoring, government-related surveillance in prisons and town centres, and transport applications in railway stations and airports.
‘Video over IP lends itself particularly well to multi-site applications, such as in schools with campus-style layouts and lots of buildings to be connected.
‘Retail is another good example, where a firm has lots of shops across the country,’ says Harris.
Another advantage of IP networks is that they make it much easier to distribute video. In retail, for instance, each shop might have its own surveillance system that records and stores images locally, whereas using video over IP allows them to centralise that operation to deliver additional cost savings, says Harris.
‘Using digital images, retailers can do so much more, such as using the security cameras to collect marketing data through video content analysis software. This uses algorithms to detect customer behaviour in a shop, such as what displays they tend to look at, or what time of day they usually come in,’ he says.
In contrast, Irwin Lazar, a principal analyst and program director for collaboration and convergence at Nemertes Research, feels that the majority of demand for video over IP technology is derived from conferencing applications.
‘There is some interest in surveillance and one-way video distribution for training or staff presentations, but I do not consider any of these to be primary drivers for IP video in the enterprise,’ he says.
Historically, the use of video conferencing systems in Europe has been hampered by four principal factors. Unsurprisingly, image and audio quality and a lack of bandwidth have trailed behind the more insurmountable barriers of geography and social preference.
In the UK and Europe the distances between offices in different cities, regions and countries can be relatively modest. This means it can often be more cost-effective for employees to drive, catch a train or grab a low-cost flight to attend a meeting than invest in the latest in video conferencing or collaboration technology, even if resistance to a lack of human contact can be overcome.
Nor has the predicted shift to putting video conferencing systems on every desktop emerged. When firms have invested in collaboration solutions, they have been deployed either in the boardroom or other locations where a group of executives can hold a virtual meeting with another group over the network.
‘Suprisingly we have seen little interest in desktop video conferencing. The general consensus is that it just is not all that useful, and not worth the cost,’ says Lazar.
Some vendors, including Polycom and HP, have launched or piloted conference room collaboration solutions that combine high-definition video cameras with audio conferencing equipment and whiteboarding software, for example, that can broadcast lifesize images between two systems thousands of miles apart.
Currently available only in one standard configuration, each HP Halo room is set up for six people and consists of three plasma displays and studio-quality audio and lighting equipment. Three cameras reflect images on the middle, left- and right-hand sides of the room.
Running on a 54Mbit/s leased line, a typical Halo room is controlled via a
centralised software interface that allows participants to switch between rooms and enable documents to be shared directly from their notebook computers.
While Halo is perhaps ambitious in its scale, and subsequently generated a lot of headlines at its launch, other vendors complain that it is simply a new, proprietary take on traditional video conferencing that can be made to work with standard equipment using less bandwidth at a much lower cost.
Another recent trend in video conferencing solutions is the inclusion of telepresence technology. Before being hijacked by conferencing solution vendors, the term telepresence defined the remote operation of a robotic system with the aid of a human-like interface, such as head-mounted displays, body-operated remote actuators and sensors to control distant machinery.
In the video conferencing and collaboration context, however, it narrows its focus to a life-size image of a person on a screen whose words are delivered via a speakerphone over the network with little susceptible delay or latency, while alterations are made to documents displayed on a PC screen. In other words, it is technology designed to make participants feel that the person on the other side of the world is actually in the room with them.
None of this technology comes cheap, but for some firms the acquisition costs of the necessary cameras, microphones and software applications may pale into insignificance compared with the cost of upgrading Lan and Wan infrastructure to support it.
‘It depends on the company. Some have adequate network infrastructure to support video, some do not. It gets trickier when you look at high-definition video or telepresence, which have large bandwidth requirements,’ says Lazar.
In some cases, and depending on whether the application is intended as conferencing or surveillance, VoIP infrastructure is installed as a separate system. But converged voice-data network equipment designed to support VoIP is being altered to additionally handle video traffic.
‘In our experience, most video over IP surveillance applications run over a firm’s infrastructure, depending on how good that infrastructure is to start with. In some instances there is a dedicated video network, but mostly it is sharing video, voice and data on the same system,’ says Harris.
Lazar feels that the biggest network infrastructure issue remains the lack of good IP video management tools, while John Kelly, chief IT officer at Wansbeck District Council, is worried that combining voice, video and data traffic onto one network could lead to performance and business continuity issues.
‘Previously, we had three separate networks, now we have voice, video and data traffic on one. It was a bit of a nervous game to play, but now it is up and running it was definitely the right way to go,’ he says.
What the experts say
The key to return on investment for video over IP surveillance systems is being able to re-use infrastructure, provided a suitable network is already in place, and just overlay the video surveillance application on top of that. Doing that instead of using significant amounts of coax cabling for analogue CCTV delivers savings on installation costs.
Simon Harris, research director, IMS Research
We have seen considerable demand for video over IP from large multinational organisations across a variety of industries interested in replacing ISDN-based, room-to-room video conferencing with telepresence systems, mostly as a cost reduction by cutting the need for travel.
Irwin Lazar, principal analyst and program director for collaboration and convergence, Nemertes Research
All local councils are dealing with the ASBO agenda, and it is often inappropriate to go into an estate, put in CCTV and leave it there forever. With a wireless IP network covering most of the district, provided there is line of sight or near line of sight we can put in cameras that we can lift and shift as and when we need to.
John Kelly, chief IT officer, Wansbeck District Council
Because the IP cameras share the network with full voice over IP and data
services, it is very important that the backbone equipment can differentiate and
prioritise between voice, video and data traffic.
Richard Mumford, installation engineer, Rapier Systems
Further reading:
Case study: Wansbeck Council
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