The Montreal Highland Games — a festival of Scottish music, dance, and athletics — occurs annually in the final months of summer.
Part of the athletic portion of the festival is a caber tossing competition: a traditional Scottish event in which competitors repeatedly toss a large tapered pole called a caber, usually around 20 feet tall and between 90-150 pounds. This year, Jason Baines set a new world record of 161 caber tosses in one hour, an incredible feat.
The Montreal Highland Games, which took place on the grounds of Douglas Hospital, saw Jason Baines set a new world record of 161 caber tosses in one hour
But Baines wasn’t the only one overcoming a challenge.
Behind the scenes, Montreal-based multi-media production company Scratch Takes was tasked with live streaming the event to YouTube from the outdoors, where network connectivity was limited.
Making the live stream go live
When you’re live streaming from a remote location, consistent and reliable Internet is essential — an unstable connection can bring your entire production to a halt. Without a hard-wired Internet connection, and knowing that a portable wireless router reliant on a single network would under-perform due to the constraints of local cellular network congestion, Scratch Takes did not want to leave their production and connectivity vulnerable to a network outage. Instead, they used a Dejero GateWay network aggregation device to create temporary and reliable on-site connectivity, giving them the peace of mind that their live stream would, in fact, go live.
“You really want to make sure your entire event goes live and reaches the audience. If you have any sort of poor connectivity, it’s almost like it’s all for nothing,” said John Castillo, technical director of Scratch Takes.
But relying on solutions that use a single network connection for live streaming is too risky. Unlike consumer LTE cellular hotspots or failover solutions, Dejero provides ultra-reliable wireless broadband connectivity where you normally can’t get it, by aggregating diverse connectivity paths from multiple providers.
Smart Blending Technology to the rescue
Scratch Takes deployed a Dejero GateWay M6E6 network aggregation device featuring Dejero’s Smart Blending Technology for the live streaming of a new world record attempt during the 45th annual Montreal Highland Games
Dejero equipped Scratch Takes with the GateWay M6E6, a network aggregation device built with patented Smart Blending Technology — technology that intelligently blends together multiple wired (broadband, fiber) and wireless (3G/4G/5G, Wi-Fi, satellite) IP connections from multiple providers to form a virtual Dejero ‘network of networks’.
While each connection path has its own characteristics, Dejero dynamically and intelligently manages the fluctuating bandwidth, packet loss, and latency differences of individual connections in real-time, seamlessly redirecting packets and maintaining session persistence if connections degrade, or are lost.
Now able to combine connectivity from three local cellular network providers — Bell, Telus and Rogers — with two SIM cards allocated for each network, the six modem GateWay delivered enhanced reliability, expanded coverage, and greater bandwidth; this ensured an uninterrupted live stream of the record-breaking event to the Montreal Highland Games’ YouTube channel.
“The GateWay was so reliable, it integrated into our portable workflow as if it were a wired connection – it felt as though we were connected to the venue’s fixed network. When working on a live event, there are so many factors happening at the same time; one of the beautiful things about working with Dejero Smart Blending Technology is that it’s one less thing that I have to worry about, essentially the same as a tethered network.”
John Castillo
Technical Director, Scratch Takes
Traditionally, Scratch Takes’ services have been used for musical production, including audio recording and mixing, video recording and editing, and live streaming – usually from fixed venues or studios. But witnessing the robust connectivity Dejero was able to provide at the Highland Games marked the beginning of a new era for the production company, expanding their horizons when it comes to live streaming outdoor events or from venues with limited connectivity. Knowing they can tap into such resilient Internet connectivity means that they now have the confidence to take on contracts they would have had to previously turn down and offer their services to a broader client base.
Dejero opens up a realm of remote connectivity possibilities, providing critical connectivity for limitless creativity.
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