First Impression: Panasonic Kairos IT/IP Centric Live Video Processing Platform
By Adam Noyes
Kairos is a new technology from Panasonic that harnesses pure processing power to create unlimited M/Es, keyers and outputs in multi camera live production. Kairos can handle as many inputs and outputs as the GPU and CPU will allow. Many are calling Kairos the Photoshop of Live Video.
Churchproduction.com recently posted a great article analyzing how Kairos fits in their live production workflow. Check out some highlights from that article, below.
The world of video is changing. In many ways things are becoming simpler, as they become more complicated. If you were to take all the knowledge of video: speeds, frame rates, connectors, resolutions and put it in a blender to make a smoothie, you would have the Panasonic Kairos.
First things first, it’s pronounced Kairos… rhymes with hair-loss. According to Wikipedia “Kairos is an Ancient Greek word meaning the right, critical, or opportune moment. The ancient Greeks had two words for time: chronos and kairos. The former refers to chronological or sequential time, while the latter signifies a proper or opportune time for action.” I’ll say this for Panasonic, they got that one right. In a time when there are more resolutions and inputs types than a person can shake a stick at, Panasonic simply says “None of that matters.”
Panasonic is calling it “Photoshop for live video.”
Normally in a first impression article, this is the area where speeds and feeds would preside. For some, this is the boring part of the article, for others it’s the most important. However, this time there won’t be technical specs here because, simply put, there aren’t any. The architecture is completely open. Panasonic looked at every piece of video gear ever released and realized that the video world was very much in the “if you give a mouse a cookie” mentality. Release a switcher with 3 MEs, video professionals will want 4, and if you give them 4 keyers, they will want 5. To combat this, Panasonic is basically redesigning how video production is done. Rather than limit keyers, MEs, and outputs, Kairos is just pure processing power. So it can handle however many layers, inputs and outputs as the GPU and CPU can take. Split it up however you like, use it however you need. Leaving us to assume, when you need more processing power, you can probably just add it. Panasonic is calling it “Photoshop for live video.”