This page covers using the picture of a playout as a source inside a scene. It lets one line show what another line is broadcasting: a picture-in-picture, a monitor wall, a corner inset.
Adding it
In the scene builder, add a source of the type Ultimate Playout, and choose Playout to show.
The source then shows that playout’s picture, live, wherever you place it in the scene.
The sound travels with it
While a scene showing another playout is on air, that playout’s sound is heard on the watching playout as well — and stops the moment that scene is no longer on air. The sound follows the picture.
Include that playout’s sound is a checkbox on the source, on by default. Switch it off for a corner inset you want to see and not hear.
Slides and speaker in one picture
A picture-in-picture: the slides and the person talking, side by side, in one broadcast picture.
It needs two playouts: every slide is a cue — a still, or a step in a stills playlist — and a cue cannot be laid next to a camera in a scene. A whole playout can.
So:
- Playout 1 runs the slides, as stills or a stills playlist. The operator steps through them here.
- Playout 2 gets a scene cue holding two sources: an Ultimate Playout source set to playout 1 (that is the slide picture), and the camera on the speaker. Size and place them however the picture should look — slide large with the speaker in a corner, or half and half.
- Playout 2 goes to the hall and the stream.
Stepping on to the next slide on playout 1 changes the picture inside the frame; playout 2 never switches at all. And the sound of playout 1 — a clip played between the slides, for instance — travels with it, as described above.
Two of these sources in one scene put two playouts beside each other in the same picture.
Want a different layout during the same talk? Make several scene cues on playout 2 — slide large, speaker large, speaker full screen — and switch between them there. Playout 1 keeps running the slides underneath, undisturbed.
The feedback guard
A source showing a playout, inside a scene that the very same playout is using as a cue, would show a picture containing itself, endlessly.
So it stays black in exactly that case. The source keeps working everywhere else.
If you see an unexpected black rectangle where you expected a picture, this is almost always why: the scene it sits in is on air on the playout it is showing.
What to use it for
| Situation | How |
|---|---|
| A small inset of the stream on the hall screen | Scene on playout 2 with playout 1 as a source |
| A monitor wall of two lines side by side | One scene with two of these sources |
| A “coming up” corner during a break | A scene combining a still and a live line |
| Slides and the speaker in one picture | Slides on playout 1, scene with that source plus the camera on playout 2 |
What not to use it for
Not to copy one line to two outputs. If two outputs need the same picture, that is one playout feeding two destinations, not a playout showing itself in a scene.
Not as a preview of another line. Each playout already has its own preview panel, and a source costs rendering that the preview does not.