Arbor’s multi-stream viewing for educational institutions: how it works and why it matters

As you know, solid and reliable educational live streams are incredibly important for both the lecturer and the student. With lecturers needing to start a high-quality stream easily and quickly and students tuning in (or watching back) pretty much anytime and anywhere, digital viewing needs to be as good as the real-life lecture. Thanks to our technology, the digital experience may have just become even better.

This is Picture-in-Picture (PiP)

As we continue to develop our software to meet the needs of the educational staff and students engaging with live and on-demand video, we’ve created Picture-in-Picture (PiP). This powerful feature is designed for dynamic, multi-perspective streaming experiences.

Developed especially for a leading university client and now available for all educational institutions, Arbor’s PiP feature lets viewers watch 2 fully synchronized streams (such as a professor’s lecture and her presentation slides) with intuitive controls for effortless switching between focal streams. And that’s a gamechanger for everyone.

Effortlessly embedded, security-ready synchronised streams

Arbor’s PiP feature offers more than a smooth and stable streaming experience. It delivers:

• Fully synchronised streams
  Rewind, fast forward, or jump back with DVR functionality while both streams stay perfectly in sync, even when controlled individually. This transforms passive viewing into an interactive, contextual experience (and actually keeps students engaged – no easy feat).
• Effortless embedding
  Designed for flexibility, PiP is embeddable via a simple <iframe>, making it a powerful drop-in solution for any digital front end, from educational portals to university intranets.
• SSO and security-ready
  Built with enterprise-grade protection, support for SSO, encryption, and private/public stream configuration, you make sure your content is secure and accessible only to the right users.

…But wait, there’s more

The obvious use case of high-quality streams is clear, but this feature is also incredibly useful in other educational scenarios:

• Digital events
  Let viewers toggle between your speaker and a live demo screen in digital university meetings and welcome week sessions.
• Uni town halls
  Watch the presenter while keeping slides or student chat viewable in sync.
• Training simulations
  View an instructor and a task window simultaneously during virtual training sessions (such as interactive lab or debate training).
• Multilingual and inclusive presentations
  Run your main feed in the original language, while the PiP feed shows sign language or alternate language translations.

Arbor’s PiP feature is a valuable tool in your digital educational toolbox when it comes to streaming lectures and other academic sessions. It makes life easier for your professors and lecturers, and gives your students the best possible study experience. Isn’t that what it’s all about?

For more information about PiP, using Arbor in an educational setting, or how we can support your university or educational institution, please get in touch. We’d love to hear from you. Contact sales@arbor.nl