pete10uk Posted October 30, 2012 Share Posted October 30, 2012 Hi All I'm after a simple solution to play a live news feed wrapped inside a company branded screen.I know I can achieve this with a digital signage box but I'm looking for a simpler and cheaper option, as I only require a single still image for branding in a reception area. I was under the impression that there was some screens which come with this option built in, but I'm drawing a blank. Any help appreciated. Cheers Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Owain Posted October 30, 2012 Share Posted October 30, 2012 The really simple solution is to use a smaller screen inside a wood surround, covered in large format printed sticky vinyl. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sleepytom Posted October 30, 2012 Share Posted October 30, 2012 What's your actual budget for this? when you say "live news feed" what do you mean? Live TV (freeview / freesat)? Live Webstream? BBC? Sky? Al Jazeera? It's quite possible to play some web streams with a logo overlay using nothing but VLC, you probably won't get BBC news like this (as they are restrictive with webstreams in an attempt to prevent viewing other than using iplayer) I just got Al Jazeera playing fullscreen with an added logo - took about 5 minuets to do. You would have to consider what to do in the event of a stream crashing or changing URL. You could always put a capture card into the PC and then use VLC to play the capture stream with a logo overlay. That would give you BBC easily (probably illegally, you will need to look into the licensing needs yourself). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pete10uk Posted October 30, 2012 Author Share Posted October 30, 2012 What's your actual budget for this? when you say "live news feed" what do you mean? Live TV (freeview / freesat)? Live Webstream? BBC? Sky? Al Jazeera? It's quite possible to play some web streams with a logo overlay using nothing but VLC, you probably won't get BBC news like this (as they are restrictive with webstreams in an attempt to prevent viewing other than using iplayer) I just got Al Jazeera playing fullscreen with an added logo - took about 5 minuets to do. You would have to consider what to do in the event of a stream crashing or changing URL. You could always put a capture card into the PC and then use VLC to play the capture stream with a logo overlay. That would give you BBC easily (probably illegally, you will need to look into the licensing needs yourself). We are looking at freeview or freesat. I'm looking for a hardware solution and not trying to manipulate a bodge, something that is designed for the job. Budget wise I can do this exact job for £700 using a digital Signage media player but as these do a whole lot more than is necessary ie scheduling, multi screens, multiple programs etc. they aren’t that easy. I'm looking for something simpler and hopefully costing less than £700. As I mentioned I was under the impression that a screen manufacturer had included this in a commercial screen as standard where by you just popped in a usb stick with a jpg and you could run either an external or an internal free view signal PIP and scaled. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sleepytom Posted October 30, 2012 Share Posted October 30, 2012 You won't find a dedicated product for significantly less than £700 - the product your looking for is called a "logo inserter" - these are the products that TV channels use for branding, and as such they come with broadcast features and prices (HDSDI input / output only, several thousand pounds of price tag) you could actually do it with a TVOne 1t-C2-750 - slightly less than £700 IIRC - Personally I would use the Brightsign XD1230 - this has more features than you need but they are features which might actually be useful in the future. The TVone box on the other hand also has features which you don't need, however its unlikely that you'll ever find a use for them. Samsung do displays with built in media functions, they are very good and would work well, but they are more than £700 dearer than the same screens without the inbuilt media functions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pete10uk Posted October 30, 2012 Author Share Posted October 30, 2012 You won't find a dedicated product for significantly less than £700 - the product your looking for is called a "logo inserter" - these are the products that TV channels use for branding, and as such they come with broadcast features and prices (HDSDI input / output only, several thousand pounds of price tag) you could actually do it with a TVOne 1t-C2-750 - slightly less than £700 IIRC - Personally I would use the Brightsign XD1230 - this has more features than you need but they are features which might actually be useful in the future. The TVone box on the other hand also has features which you don't need, however its unlikely that you'll ever find a use for them. Samsung do displays with built in media functions, they are very good and would work well, but they are more than £700 dearer than the same screens without the inbuilt media functions. The samsung screens are the closest to what I'm imagining but the inbuilt media functions won't allow for the live feed on top of the signage. The budget of £700 is on top of the screen, I'm looking at specifying NEC screens at £1500, as mentioned they make a box which will do exactly what I require which is a pro piece of kit, what I'm trying to find or ascertain is an alternative way of doing things as I don't particularly want to power a £700 piece of kit which can do masses of things when it is quite likely that there is a small low powered piece of kit that is designed to do exactly what is required. I have seen the look that I'm wanting to achieve in environments where a £700 box certainly hasn't been used, I just didn't think to look at how it was done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shez Posted October 30, 2012 Share Posted October 30, 2012 The NEC screens I have here running digital signage have a PIP feature that will work with two different sources. I've never used it as we have inbuilt PCs running the signage software but it might be worth looking at the screen's own functionality - a couple of hundred extra quid to move up to a better model might give you something useful without needing extra hardware. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pete10uk Posted October 30, 2012 Author Share Posted October 30, 2012 The NEC screens I have here running digital signage have a PIP feature that will work with two different sources. I've never used it as we have inbuilt PCs running the signage software but it might be worth looking at the screen's own functionality - a couple of hundred extra quid to move up to a better model might give you something useful without needing extra hardware. You may have hit the nail on the head. The screen has full PIP functions. Low powered SD card media player with VGA output, into screen and overlay the live news feed. Job done. Cheers May even supply a small netbook to allow editable backgrounds. Thanks again, it's the simple things that work Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AHYoung Posted October 30, 2012 Share Posted October 30, 2012 you dont even need that, there are a few displays around that have a basic usb player and will allow you to PIP and also feature a freeview tuner. Try the LG budget commercial range for starters... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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