Multiscreen Video Playback

The new XC5 BrightSign players have multi-headed output features to let you author video wall and multiple screen presentations. This page describes how to create a multiscreen presentation in BrightAuthor:connected for your XC5 player.

Prerequisites

To ensure a successful multiscreen video presentation, check the following before you begin:

1. You should know the screen characteristics, including the number of screens, bezel size, screen size, resolution, and screen orientation. 

2. All screens must have same orientation and resolution.

3. Frame rates must match exactly if you want the screens to be in sync (so, for example, 23.97 is not the same as 24). If you don’t care about the screens being in sync, you can have different frame rates.

4. You should have a plan or diagram of how the screens should be installed.

Setting Up the Presentation

Follow these steps to set up a video presentation with XC5 players in BrightAuthor:connected.

Create the Presentation

1. Select New Presentation in the Dashboard. This will take you to the Basic > Single Zone > Playlist entry in the Presentation tab.

2. Select either the two output XC2055 or the four output XC4055 (each output is 4K), as the Target Device.

3. Enter a presentation Name.

4. Select Start to create the presentation.

Select the Screen Layout and Properties

1. This will take you to the Screens tab. If your player has two outputs, two screen layouts will be displayed. If it has four outputs, four screen layouts will be displayed (see Image 2).

2. Select the layout and resolution by changing the number of layouts in the Screen Count dropdown menu and picking a Screen Resolution. If you chose one output, you can select 8K resolution output, but if you have more than one screen, the output is limited to 4K for each screen. Layout Resolution in the right panel will show you the total resolution.

3. Select a Target Frame Rate or use the default.

4. Check Force Resolution or Enable YCbCr 10-bit Output for those options:

   1. Force Resolution forces the player to output the selected resolution even if the display reports over HDMI^® that it does not support it. If this box is unchecked, the player will attempt to use the selected Screen Resolution,  but will then fall back to the highest resolution supported by the display if it is unsupported. 

   2. Enable YCbCr 10-bit Output outputs a 10-bit color video signal to the connected display. See the video encoding FAQ  for more details on supported 4K color spaces and bit depths.

5. Under Screen Properties:

   1. Enter a Name for your screen

   2. Select a Video Output (HDMI-1, HDMI-2, HDMI-3, HDMI-4).

   3. Enter Bezel Compensation values, including bezel Top, Bottom, Left, and Right, to adjust the display for the space between the screens. Set this for each screen or select Apply to All Screens to apply the settings for one screen to all the screens. Bezels that are selected will be highlighted.

Lay Out the Content

1. Switch to the Layout tab to see the content layout. 

2. Resize the zone by clicking and dragging on the blue tabs in the corner and middle of the zone and/or move it around the layout to place it as you want. You can do this without affecting the screen layout.

   1. Toggle Layout Boundaries lets you see the screen and bezel boundaries are. This feature makes it easy to resize a zone to match the edge of the screen or the edge of the bezel. 

   2. Enable snap to canvas lets you snap to elements quickly and ensure that your zone fills the entire screen.

3. To add more zones, use Add Zone. In the Zone panel, you can change the priority to put the zone on top of or under other zones. 

4. Under Type, you can change the zone type to Audio, Image, Ticker, or Control.

Add the Content

1. Select a zone. Each zone will have its own content assignment.

2. Go to the Content tab, or double-click on the zone to go directly to the Content tab.

3. Drag your content from the Assets tab into the zone, either as a playlist or an interactive playlist.

4. Continue to do this until all the zones have content. Remember, you can use the Zone panel to put some content zones over others if you wish. You can also change screen configuration and the zone information will remain the same though you will probably have to resize the zone to match the new layout. 

5. You can now publish the multiscreen video presentation.

Appendix

Example

In the video below, we demonstrate how to create a four screen video wall running on the XC4055 video player:

XC4055_8K_Videowall.mp4

Decoding Constraints

XC2055 and XC4055 have the following video output constraints:

• Both players support up to 7680x4320 resolution on the HDMI-1 connector

• All other outputs support up to 4K video resolution

• When using more than one HDMI output simultaneously, all outputs are constrained to 4K video

• If you are outputting 8K, make sure to select HDMI cables that support 8K

Supported Video Types

The chart below describes the supported video types. Video sources larger than 3840x2160 resolution must be in HEVC (H.265) or VP9 format. Neither AV1 nor AVC (H.264) will work at 8k video resolution, and all video sources other than HEVC and VP9 are limited to 3840x2160. See this page for more information.

Supported Audio Types

The chart below describes the supported audio types. 

Touchscreens

As of BOS 9.0.22.3, the default configuration for a single and multiple touchscreens is implemented for all players. Touch works on a single portrait touchscreen and for a single touchscreen with other screens attached.

Note that touch only works on the HDMI-1 output on the XC5 (the system maps the touch area to the portion of the screen associated with HDMI-1).