Patent ID: 8228980

Claim:
A network media gateway comprising: a processor, configured to include: a plurality of decoder channels configured to transport a corresponding plurality of decoded video streams; a plurality of overlay channels configured to transport a corresponding plurality of overlay content; an overlay renderer configured to receive the plurality of overlay content transported by the plurality of overlay channels and outputs a first rendered overlay content that is stored in the processor; a video mixer configured to receive a plurality of decoded video streams transported by the plurality of decoder channels and the first rendered overlay content from the processor, and mixes the plurality of decoded video streams with the first rendered overlay content from the processor, thereby forming and outputting a plurality of encoded mixed streams; a plurality of encoder channels configured to receive the plurality of encoded mixed streams output by the video mixer according to an M×N matrix where each entry for M in M×N matrix identifies one of the plurality of encoder channels and each entry for N in the M×N matrix represents one of the plurality of overlay channels; each entry in the M×N matrix stores an alpha compositing value and a variable indicating whether the encoder channel and the overlay channel corresponding to the entry are interconnected; and the plurality of encoder channels further transports the plurality of encoded mixed streams.