tvbe november 2014 digital edition
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Business, insight and intelligence for the broadcast media industryTRANSCRIPT
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November 2014Business, insight and intelligence for the broadcast media industry
Transcoding forumIndustry celebrates at the TVBAwards
The new grammar of virtual reality
The Art of AcquisitionNew cameras, robotics and lighting
Imagine where you could take your business...if technology didn’t stand in your way.
An all-new blueprint for managing, moving and monetizing video content is here.
an evolutionary path that aligns current investments with the network of the future.
Find out more. imaginecommunications.com© 2014 Imagine Communications
TVBEurope 3November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
It was a night I will remember fondly. If you
were in attendance at the Hilton London
Wembley on 23 October, I hope this is a
sentiment you will share.
There was something unexpectedly
pride-inducing about being the entity giving
out awards that recognise the efforts and
achievements of industry colleagues; the surprise,
the joy, the thrill of receipt. It’s easy to forget all
of this in the throes of organisation, and it made
worthwhile the effort and labour that went into
every detail of the inaugural TVBAwards.
To the victors, the spoils, and my sincere
congratulations go to all of our awards winners
from the night. Yet, the nub of the evening, as
I will eternally review it, was that beyond the
pomp and the ceremony, the occasion was one
of celebration; an opportunity – an excuse, even
– to celebrate all that is great about our industry
in the company of friends and colleagues.
This was a rare occasion to recognise those
pushing the boundaries in their fi elds, and honour
their pursuit of excellence, innovation, and
endeavour; doing so light of heart, and with
a glass in hand.
Thank you to everyone who helped to make
the night a success, including our sponsors:
IBC, Ericsson, and Manor Marketing; everyone
in attendance; and our beloved events team,
upon whom I seem to lavish praise at regular
intervals, and rightly so. You can read our review
of the evening on pages 38 to 39 of this edition.
Our focus this month turns to acquisition, and the
latest from the world of cameras, robotics and
lighting. Elsewhere, our Forum delves into the
complexities of transcoding, the vital technical
component of the modern broadcast and
production chain, while our Workfl ow section
covers a diverse range of topics – from Riedel’s
involvement in Formula One, to virtual reality,
to recording sound on Mount Everest.
This is an issue I’m looking forward to sitting
down with to read again (minus a red pen).
I sincerely hope you enjoy it, too.
James McKeownExecutive Editor
A night to remember at the fi rst ever TVBAwards
WelcomeEDITORIALExecutive Editor - James [email protected] - Melanie [email protected] Writer - Holly [email protected] Media, 1st Floor, Suncourt House, 18-26 Essex Road, London N1 8LN, England +44 207 354 6002Contributors Mike Clark, Chris Forrester, David Fox, Mark Hill, Dick Hobbs, John Ive, George Jarrett, Heather McLean, Adrian Pennington, Philip Stevens, Reinhard E WagnerHead of Digital - Tim FrostHuman Resources & Offi ce Manager - Lianne DaveyHead of Design & Production - Adam ButlerEditorial Production Manager - Dawn Boultwood
Senior Production Executive - Alistair TaylorPublisher - Steve [email protected]+44 207 354 6000Sales Manager - Ben [email protected]+44 207 354 6000Sales Executive - Richard [email protected]+44 207 354 6000Managing Director - Mark BurtonUS Sales - Michael MitchellBroadcast Media International, PO Box 44, Greenlawn, New York, NY [email protected]+1 (631) 673 0072Japan and Korea Sales - Sho HariharaSales & Project, Yukari Media [email protected]+81 6 4790 2222 Fax: +81 6 4793 0800CirculationNewBay Media, Sovereign Park, Lathkill Street, Market Harborough, LE16 9EF, UK
Free [email protected] Tel +44 1580 883848
TVBEurope is published 12 times a year by NewBay Media, 1st Floor, Suncourt House, 18-26 Essex Road, London, N1 8LN, England
NewBay Media is a member of the Periodical Publishers Association
© NewBay Media 2014. No part of this publication may be reproduced in any form or by any means without the prior permission of the copyright owners. TVBEurope is mailed to qualifi ed persons residing on the European continent. Subscription is free.
Allow 8 weeks for new subscriptions and change of address delivery. Send subscription inquiries to: Subscription Dept, NewBay Media, Sovereign Park, Lathkill Street, Market Harborough LE16 7BR, England. ISSN 1461-4197
Printing by Pensord Press, Tram Road, Pontllanfraith, Blackwood NP12 2YA
A celebration of excellence, innovation and endeavour
In this issue4 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
This issue, our acquisition feature focuses on the movers and shakers of the mid-market camera fi eld, looking at the latest releases and technological developments. David Fox provides the lowdown
TVBAwards lights up Wembley28 38
8 Opinion & Analysis
10 Opinion & Analysis
Transcoding is a vital part of today’s broadcast and production chain. Philip Stevens moderates this edition’s Forum that confronts the issues facing this complex technology
40Transcoding Forum
Akamai Technologies has released its Second Quarter, 2014 State of the Internet Report, providing insight into key global statistics such as connection speeds and broadband adoption across fi xed and mobile networks
46-50 Data CentreAcquisition: Lighting
34Higher quality LEDs, particularly in conjunction with Fresnel lenses, and better colour temperature control are the key trends in broadcast lighting. David Fox reports
The fi rst ever TVBAwards took centre stage at the Hilton London Wembley on 23 October, as the industry gathered to recognise those pushing the boundaries in excellence, innovation and endeavour in broadcast media
24Early producers of narrative live action VR are pioneering a visual and audio language that breaks the walls of cinematic convention, writes Adrian Pennington
12-27 Workfl ow
Broadcast camera round up
David Crawford, MD, satellite for Arqiva, explores the future of satellite TV in a hybrid connected world, and how to keep up with OTT and IP-delivered content
Steve Ballinger, head of broadcast at Carat, believes convergence is changing the way that people consume TV
Opinion & Analysis6 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
More than 46 million households
worldwide will subscribe to a 4K UHD
pay-TV service by 2018, according
to new research from Parks Associates. Pay-TV
providers will deploy this service as a differentiator,
especially among younger consumers who are
more likely to use new pay-TV features, such as TV
Everywhere and cloud DVR, but also have slightly
lower subscription rates for pay-TV services. In the
US, 82 per cent of consumers between the ages of
18 and 22 have a pay-TV subscription, compared
to 87 per cent among older consumers.
“To enjoy the true benefi ts of 4K, three things need
to be present: the television, the content, and a way
to get the content to the TV,” said Brett Sappington,
director of Research at Parks Associates. “4K can
deliver an enhanced experience to viewers, but
these three factors are not yet aligned. Getting 4K
content to the TV remains a key challenge, as is the
pace of production of 4K content.”
Multitasking while watching TV TiVo’s second Annual TiVo Multitasking and Social
TV Survey has shown a dramatic increase in
multitasking during TV viewing: over half of the 856
survey respondents reported multitasking every
time – or almost every time – they watch TV
(51 per cent); compared to just over one third
(36 per cent) in last year’s survey. Though TV
multitasking may be on the increase, viewers also
report a rise in TV viewing as the primary focus:
47 per cent of respondents’ total TV time is spent
Content Everywhere round up
Melanie Dayasena-Lowe rounds up the latest Content Everywhere news, which looks at the number of 4K UHD homes expected by 2018, how multitasking while watching TV is on the rise, and the growth of the global pay-TV market
with their primary attention on the TV show while
multitasking, versus last year’s 39 per cent. More
than a quarter (26 per cent) of their TV time is spent
multitasking with their main focus on another task,
similar to the 2013 study, and 27 per cent of their TV
time is spent only watching TV (not multitasking),
down from 35 per cent in 2013.
Despite the pronounced increase in TV multitasking,
viewers continue to report that their alternate
activities are only rarely related to the programme
being watched. Only fi ve per cent of respondents
report TV-related multitasking every time (or almost
every time) they watch TV, while 50 per cent report
never or almost never engaging in TV-related
multitasking. Top TV-time activities include browsing
the internet (74 per cent), reading or sending emails
(73 per cent), and text messaging (71 per cent).
“Even given the proliferation of multitasking,
viewers remain primarily focused on the television
shows they are watching,” said TiVo chief research
offi cer, Jonathan Steuer. “To paraphrase the Bard,
‘the programme’s the thing!’”
Global pay-TV market to exceed 920 million subscribers in 2014 The worldwide pay-TV market is expected to surpass
920 million subscribers by the end of 2014, according
to ABI Research. Overall, pay-TV average revenue
per user (ARPU) is expected to drop slightly due
to increasing price competition, but at a lower
rate compared to the ARPU drop in 2013. “The
growing number of HD subscribers, as well as major
sporting events such as the World Cup 2014, have
contributed to improving ARPU. As a result, the total
pay-TV market is expected to generate over $US269
billion by the end of 2014,” explained Jake Saunders,
VP and practice director of Core Forecasting.
“ABI Research anticipates that the worldwide
pay-TV subscriber base will grow to nearly
1.1 billion subscribers generating $US323 billion by
2019,” added Khin Sandi Lynn, industry analyst.
“Getting 4K content to the TV remains a key challenge, as is the pace of
production of 4K content” Brett Sappington, Parks Associates
Opinion & Analysis8 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
Many are left bewildered by the choice,
leaving only the ‘gadget geeks’ able
to stay up to speed. But it is not just
the tech-savvy who are enjoying regular use of
platforms like Netflix and BBC iPlayer. According
to Netflix the average ‘streamer’ watches 46.6
hours of content monthly, and earlier this year BBC
iPlayer announced that in 2013 it had a record
three billion programme requests. These statistics
show the growing appetite for OTT content.
Many would argue that media convergence –
where internet-based services are used seamlessly
in line with traditional linear television viewing
– will actually improve viewer experience and
the longevity of satellite rather than threaten it.
Many people still consider linear television to be
‘real television’, with all other options viewed
as ‘something extra’. Connected devices are
becoming more and more ubiquitous, but there
is no reason why satellite – as a linear broadcast
technology providing a simple and reliable service
– cannot continue to play a major role when there
is little sign of change in viewing habits. While the
convergence of broadcast, IPTV and broadband
delivery through smart TVs and set-top boxes
(HbbTV) is well established across Europe, this sits
alongside the provision of satellite delivered content.
The point is that the end-user experience should not
differentiate between the delivery method.
Viewers have a hunger for live programming,
especially when it comes to news, sports and
reality TV. Despite our increased access to near-
line, off-line and archive programming, socially
we expect to watch certain programming and
genres live. The benefit of this being delivered via
satellite is the agility of SNG vehicles being at the
live event and distributing the content globally,
quickly and efficiently. Missing The X Factor,
the latest breaking news or goals scored in the
Premiership as they happen can leave people
feeling left out, and unable to share and banter
with other viewers. Using the red button to vote
or interact with the show is an enhancement to
linear viewing – not a replacement.
The key to satellite is in its simplicity. While
the television experience is now considered to
be interactive, it is what we wrap around the
viewing experience, rather than the content itself
which makes it interactive. There are massive
changes in the way we consume television
now – such as where we watch it, what device
we watch it on, and who we watch it with –
but does this make it interactive? It’s become
the norm now to tweet, post on Facebook or
use the red button on a remote control while
we watch TV. We want to share our thoughts
on what we view with our friends and other
audiences. But underneath all of this, the content
itself is a sequence of moving images which
are broadcast and watched in the quality and
speed that audiences have come to expect.
A huge benefit of satellite is in its ability to service
large coverage areas, including hard-to-reach
rural regions. In the UK, one satellite transponder’s
coverage ability is as good as that of several
hundred terrestrial hilltop-located transmitter towers.
Rolling out broadband services for on-demand and
catch up TV to land-based locations struggling for
high speed broadband service, is not cost effective
for providers, as well as being incredibly difficult to
implement. Across some regions such as the Middle
East and North Africa, the number of unique TV
channels is expected to almost double from 2,800
now to 4,600 in 2023 (Euroconsult). This is due to be
largely satellite driven.
Satellite is very much alive and has a bright
future. Hunger for live broadcasting is as strong
as ever, and satellite is a cost effective and
efficient way of transmitting these feeds over
large and difficult to reach areas. Connected
devices will play an important part in improving
viewers’ experiences, allowing them to seamlessly
interchange between live broadcast and the
internet on their devices. In the future, it won’t
be about the speed of broadband to homes –
Netflix running UHD needs about 15-18mbps – it
will be about the speed being able to support
simultaneous streams, and more importantly that
the broadband infrastructure (and CDNs) is able
to support large scale delivery of live content
(e.g. sports and The X Factor) to audiences of ten
million plus. We see convergence not as a threat
to satellite, but as the emergence of a hybrid world
which offers real enhancement to consumers’
viewing experiences where available.
TV and convergence does satellite have a future?
More service providers than ever are now entering the broadcast space and the technology landscape for content distribution can be confusing. David Crawford, MD of satellite at Arqiva, asks what this means for the future of satellite TV in a hybrid connected world
Opinion & Analysis10 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
I’d bet that many of you watched the Red
Wedding episode of Game of Thrones through
your fingers with a permanent wince on your
face. After all, it was one of the goriest (and most
memorable) pieces of TV programming ever
created and aired.
However, I’d also bet that 33 per cent of you
had one of those shocked eyes on Twitter or
Facebook (or some other social network) to see
if everyone else was as (insert relevant emotion
here) as you were.
According to our recent research from our
CCS proprietary research tool – a survey of
11,000 UK consumers’ media habits – this is how
many people use social media to talk about the
TV that they are watching during the show.
Our research also found that this sort of
appointment-to-view (ATV) TV was driving 35 per
cent of people to actively plan their evenings
around the TV schedule – a rise of five million
from four years ago.
What this means is that TV shows like Breaking
Bad, Britain’s Got Talent and the aforementioned
Game of Thrones are moving the nation from
the era of TV on-demand to the age of
TV on-command.
This might be a slightly grandiose statement,
but the truth is that there is a shift in people’s
perception of how TV should be viewed, as
social media redefines the whole experience by
reinventing the water cooler moment. People
now want to watch TV as it happens, not three
days later, because they want that instant
realtime water cooler moment. They want to be
part of the conversation with friends and strangers
as heads are being chopped off or Meth dealers
are being blown up in nursing homes.
And then there is the ever growing, and
deadly serious, risk of being the victim of a
spoiler. If you’re planning on watching catch-
up you have to pretty much become a hermit,
in both the real and online worlds, to avoid this
potentially evening-ruining situation.
Active viewersThis means that people are moving from passive
to active viewing. Viewers now have the ability
to play along with the show (Million Pound Drop)
and even be part of the content of the show
(the live social wall on Got To Dance).
This is also affecting viewing figures in realtime.
Our research shows that 20 per cent of people
say friends and family are a huge influence
on their TV viewing (up from five per cent in
2010) and this referral traffic can positively or
negatively affect a show’s progress.
Typically the viewing of a programme will be
high at the start of the transmission and tail off
towards the end. The opposite was true for an
episode of Dynamo Magician Impossible –
which grew its viewing during the show as social
media recommendation created buzz around
the content. More recently, when Luis Suarez was
caught biting at the World Cup, social media
went crazy and viewing figures for the games
increased massively. This obviously also has huge
ramifications for advertisers (hey, we’re a media
agency, we were going to get to it at some
point). It turns their advertising from a monologue
to a dialogue. Using second screen opportunities
such as AdSync or Shazam allows the user to
access more content and means more dwell
time for consumers with the brand, but also helps
to drive convergence and get the consumer
closer to the point of purchase. This is something
that advertisers have been trying for a while with
more traditional advertising methods such as TV.
There have also been apps developed,
such as Beamly (formerly Zeebox), which
encourage sharing with friends in the social
space while watching TV.
So, whether a fan of dancing dogs or
dangerous drug dealers, convergence is
changing the way people consume TV
and we need to redefine how we approach
programming, advertising and even
scheduling to reflect this.
TV on commandSteven Ballinger, head of broadcast at Carat, believes convergence is changing the way people consume TV
20 per cent of people say friends and family influence their TV viewing, up from five per cent in 2010
Workfl ow12 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
Earlier this year, ITV Cymru Wales moved
into a new 1,050sqm broadcast facility
in Assembly Square, Cardiff Bay – a
relocation that involved around 100 staff from
the previous base at Culverhouse Cross
on the outskirts of the Welsh capital.
“The new base puts ITV Wales journalists
and programme makers at the centre of the
thriving cultural and business communities
in Cardiff Bay and right next to the National
Assembly of Wales,” explains Phil Henfrey,
head of news and programmes at
ITV Cymru Wales.
“The move represents a multi-million
pound investment, combining the latest HD
technologies, studio and editing facilities.”
The relocation also offered the chance to
install direct fi bre connections to the National
Assembly of Wales building.
He continued, “We’ve upgraded our facilities
in the National Assembly for Wales building as an
additional production and editorial base for our
politics team and we’ve upgraded our
North Wales bureau in Colwyn Bay to HD.”
A time for expansion and upgrades
Philip Stevens follows news operations located in two UK capital cities as they move into new facilities to progress upgrades, conversions and expansions
The news team in the new Assembly Square facility
TVBEurope 13November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Workflow
At the same time, ITV Cymru Wales has
replaced its two satellite trucks with
state-of-the-art HD vehicles.
Mixed outputFive-and-a-half hours of news and programmes
are generated each week from the new facility,
including the flagship ITV News Wales at 6pm,
weekday lunchtime, and late bulletins and
weekend bulletins, plus Wales news injects for
Good Morning Britain. There is also a weekly
news review titled Newsweek Wales on Sunday
mornings. Complementing the news output is
one and half hours of current affairs, factual,
sport and political programming each week.
“We also have a commercial relationship
with the Welsh language broadcaster S4C to
produce up to 30 hours a year of their current
affairs and factual programming so we needed
a fully integrated HD system that would work
for different teams and different types of
programming,” says Henfrey.
Overseeing the technical aspects of the move
was systems integrator, TSL. “We wanted to
work with a team who would complement our
holistic approach to design and be innovative
and responsive to our needs. This was our third
iteration of a regional news facility and the
second with an HD infrastructure,” explains
Paul Stevenson, director of technology and
technical operations, ITV News. He says that TSL
was selected because there was an existing
relationship from earlier work and the company
had satisfied the requirement for innovation
at a competitive cost. Stevenson adds that
the ability to deliver on time and to budget
was paramount.
The projectKeith Warrender, the TSL project manager for ITV,
takes up the story. “Work started on the project
in November 2013 and was completed in June
2014. We were asked to equip the news studio
with production and sound control rooms, four
edit suites, two voice booths, one audio dubbing
room and a traffic desk in the open plan
newsroom. The studio, which measures around
87sqm, includes a green screen area for a stand-
up weather position.”
Four Sony HSC100RT cameras with Canon
K17ex7.7 lenses and mounted on Vinten Osprey
pedestals are employed in the studio. The
cameras are controlled by Ross Furio robotics.
Sony was also selected to provide the vision
mixer – in this case a MVS3000. When it came to
audio mixing, the ITV preference was an SSL C10
Compact Broadcast Console.
James McLoughlin, audio specialist for TSL,
explains, “With the audio system being entirely
MADI-centric, we needed a console that could
process the vast amount of MADI I/O within
the system. The C10 with redundant Blackrock
processor enabled us to not only manage
the required MADI signals, but also create a
backup path for every connection. Using a fibre
infrastructure, we were able to strategically position
several stageboxes throughout the building to
minimise cabling and create a wider system feel.”
Clear communicationsCommunications are provided by a Clear-Com
Eclipse HX-Delta/32 matrix with one E-MADI64-
HX card, one IVC-32-HX IP card and 17 V-Series
rotary keypanels (1RU, 2RU and Desktop panels).
The Eclipse HX matrix is connected to keypanels
in the gallery, news floor and edit suites.
There are also two remote panels over IP,
one to the Assembly of Wales building and the
other to Colwyn Bay. The 64 channel MADI card
provides connection to the main audio router.
“The use of a single 64 channel MADI card
connected to the core router allows for greater
flexibility in setups, without the need for extra
4-wire patch bays or 4-wire ports on the comms
matrix,” explains Stephen Sandford, product
manager of Clear-Com.
The new facility in Cardiff Bay that houses the ITV Cymru Wales production centre
“It also means that signals to and from the Eclipse
HX matrix can be easily monitored.”
The addition of the IVC-32 IP card makes the
connection to remote sites easy to implement. As
IP connectivity is native and standard across all
V-Series panels, they were deployed at remote
locations like the parliament building and other
ITV Wales sites without hardwire connections.
Sandford goes on, “The system was designed
with expansion in mind. Half the 4-wire ports are
free, and there are also free MADI and IP ports on
the matrix. Further 4-wire ports can also be freed
up by moving non-gallery panels from analogue
connections to IP connections, without the need
for extra hardware as the V-Series panels come
with a native IP port enabled as standard.”
Warrender reports that the X-Edit graphics
playout that was in use at the previous
Culverhouse Cross facility was relocated for use
in the new set-up. “ITV also brought across the
Avid iNews NRCS which is linked to the graphics
system. Although the capability exists for ingesting
legacy tape formats, the new facility is essentially
tapeless with Avid handling live or file-based
ingest, central storage and networked (shared)
editing. In common with many of today’s
newsrooms, there is a mixture of journalists who
carry out their own editing and craft editors for
the more complex projects.”
He concludes, “Both TSL and ITV are keen
to use the knowledge gained from the ITV Cymru
Wales installation for future upgrades across
the ITV regions.”
RT takes a view on LondonStaying in the UK but moving from Wales to
London, it’s the turn of Russian news channel RT,
which is expanding its London operation.
Views from the Millbank Tower on the north bank
of the River Thames are stunning. And those vistas
are available to production staff as backdrops at
the London headquarters of Russian 24 hour news
channel, RT (formerly Russia Today).
In order to better serve its viewers in the UK,
RT is expanding its London operation. As well as
increasing the number of journalists, two new
studios have been created to inject UK related
news bulletins and other programmes into the
main output from Moscow.
“Viewers are very discerning,” maintains Chris
Wood, CEO of RT-UK. “They like to see reports
about the United Kingdom from staff who are
locally based. What’s more, they can often
determine when the production is being directed
at a specific audience. RT has long had a
presence in London, but now it is time to step
up local production.”
Two studiosThe RT facility is based around two production
studios: the main Studio A measures about
55sqm, while studio B is around 25sqm.
Solutions provider CVP was retained in February
2013 to equip the facility. “Our brief was to bring
together the most appropriate equipment within
the budget,” states Philip Hatch, CVP’s head of
systems integration.
That equipment includes a number of items
from Sony. For example, Studio A is home to
three HXC-100 cameras mounted on Vinten
pedestals, while a fourth can be found in Studio
B. Where necessary, the cameras can be moved
between studios – or into parts of the RT facility –
as required.
“We decided to use manually operated
cameras in the main studio to provide us with
the versatility of angles,” says Wood. “A number
of different programmes will be produced in a
relatively small space, and to achieve different
looks it will be necessary to position the cameras
to suit production considerations. We also use a
Steadicam for even more flexibility.”
Studio B includes a rack-mounted TBU and
Soundcraft audio mixer. Where this studio is
used for pre-recorded content, the output is fed
to the Dalet Brio servers located in the adjoining
‘media hub’. This studio can also go ‘live’
independently from Studio A and provide
‘Up The Lines’ to Moscow and, indeed, any
other news providers via the production
lines to BT Tower.
Autoscript has provided the prompting
equipment mounted on each camera, including
the Steadicam. The main gallery is equipped with
a Sony MVS-6520 vision mixer.
“We opted for the Sony mid-range mixer
because it offers us all the features RT needed,
without going to the top of the range solution.
Again, it’s a case of using the budget to the very
best advantage,” declares Hatch.
The Sony MVS-6520 produces 2x16 way
multi-viewers internally, the output of which
are shown on Samsung 55-inch LCD displays. In
addition, transmission and preview outputs are
displayed on JVC screens.
Sony has also supplied three BRC-H900 robotic
cameras which deliver HD images via three
half-inch Exmor CMOS sensors.
Workflow14 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
Chris Wood: “Viewers are very discerning”
TVBEurope 15November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Workflow
Multi-image displayThese images, together with pictures or images from
other sources, can be displayed on the Barco 3x3
video wall, the four Samsung 90-inch and one 65-
inch LED screens located at various points around
Studio A. Behind these displays and occupying three
walls of the studio are 69 (60cmx60cm) LED screens.
Multi-image integration and manipulation for
the various displays is handled through a Spyder
X20 video processor and presentation switcher.
“We will change the defused images and colours
on this LED screen according to the programme
which is in production,” reveals Wood. “This
enables us to create a different feel in the most
economical way.”
He goes on, “I was not in favour of having a
massive video wall that covers the whole studio
area. I think having images on a screen to which
presenters can point is preferable to an impressive,
but maybe not so practical, large area display.”
LED lighting comprises a mix of Desisti, Gekko
Karesslite and ETC Source 4 lights. These are
controlled by an ETC Smartfade 2496 in Studio A,
and ETC Smartfade 1296 in Studio B.
“We are able to light the shows in a dynamic
way – something that is difficult to achieve within
a typical office building and low ceilings and
challenging construction,” states Hatch.
On the audio side, four Sony UWP-X7s
wireless microphone kits with ECM-77B Lavalier
microphones are used in conjunction with a
Soundcraft Si Expression 3 console. This mixer
provides 32 recallable microphone pre amps plus
four line inputs, four internal stereo FX returns, AES
in, and a 64x64 expansion slot.
Sennheiser EW 300 G3 In-Ear Monitors are
provided for presenters, while radio Talkback
comes from JVC/Kenwood NX-320E3 hybrid
handsets. “And reception coverage is vastly
improved as a result of the digital air interface. The
associated base station is assembled by Raycom
and I am particularly impressed at the quality and
features of this system compared to what you
would typically find in a studio environment.”
Comms comes from RTS ZeusIII with a
selection of desktop and rackmount panels,
and numerous 4-wire ports. Graphics are
produced by a VizRT system comprising Viz Artist,
Graphics Hub, Viz Gateway for Newsroom
integration along with Viz Content Pilot and
a dual channel rendering Engine.
Newsroom integrationIt was specified that the Dalet newsroom system
already in use in Moscow (and RT’s Washington
bureau) was to be mirrored in London. The Dalet
Enterprise Media Asset Management system
allows both newsroom and media supervision
features to be combined into a single application.
“Since we first started the London operation, our
content has been sent to Moscow for archiving
on the Dalet system,” explains Wood. “Having the
same set-up in London means that we can readily
access that earlier material if needed.”
Once incoming materials have been ingested
and processed, these resources are available
to anyone on sites both within the facility and
remotely via a web browser to bureaux in other
areas of the world.
Playout to the gallery and other destinations is
provided by two 6-channel Dalet Brio servers.
Editing is carried out using Adobe Premiere Plus.
Expanding scheduleThe current schedule calls for RT UK to produce
four 30-minute bulletins a day anchored by Bill
Dod who has recently returned from working
with the network in Moscow. The studio will also
generate the channel’s three times weekly
Going Underground investigation programme.
“With the new studio commitments, we are
increasing the number of journalists we employ,
and our UK-based ENG crews will rise from three
to five,” reveals Wood. “We are still in the midst of
an expansion programme that will see this local
operation contributing more to the channel and
adding that more local UK-based feel that will
benefit our increasing number of viewers.”
“Both TSL and ITV are keen to use the knowledge gained from the ITV Cymru Wales installation for future upgrades
across the ITV regions”Keith Warrender, TSL
Formula One represents the cutting
edge of Riedel’s technology and while
radios are only the start, over the years
it has developed several other services in
communications and media backbone that
make it integral to team command, race control
and even broadcasting of the Grand Prix circus.
Founder and CEO Thomas Riedel chanced by
the opportunity to get involved in F1 around 20
years ago. “I was heard on local radio giving an
interview about our work at Lillehammer (Winter
Olympics 1994) and quite by chance someone
involved in Formula One passing by on the
autobahn heard it, had never heard about us,
and was intrigued enough to put us in touch with
the German Grand Prix,” he explains.
From that coincidental connection, his fl edgling
company began supplying radios and headsets
for marshalls and race control at the German
GP, then the European GP (held at Germany’s
Nü rburgring) and then the Austrian GP.
“After a few years I spotted our kit being used
by Ferrari’s pit crew for Michael Schumacher,” he
recalls. “It had been sold by a dealer but this was
the fi rst I knew of it. I was really proud and excited
so I went with a pile of business cards around the
paddock and introduced myself.” The F1 business
accelerated. First McLaren, then motorsport trade
body FIA and even Bernie Eccelstone’s Formula
One Management (FOM) and soon every team
called on Riedel for race comms.
Among the company’s innovations was
something as obvious as making it possible for
a team member to communicate on the same
radio channel but at a different frequency so
that multiple team conversations could occur.
Before Riedel’s involvement, the driver was
able to listen and talk but there was a limitation
because only one person could talk on a radio
channel at a time. Riedel’s intuition was to
solve this with an intercom system together with
changing the confi guration of the radios.
Riedel also developed a method for cutting out
the noise of the car when the driver is speaking to
the pit over the radio with a device that subtracts
the noise of the car from the voice in realtime.
Riedel supplies all 11 teams with an intercom
system, typically incorporating two to four Artist
nodes, which are connected over a redundant
fi bre ring to form a single non-blocking matrix. A
specially developed intercom interface, which is
geared to work even under the extreme F1 racing
conditions, allows for wireless comms between
each driver and team or among the team.
One Artist node is placed in a weatherproof
rack in each pit with at least one panel
connected to each node.
Beyond intercom, Riedel has also established
secure WAN MPLS data services, providing
point-to-point connections for the team from
the circuit to the team’s base offi ce. All of this
is based on 8km to 12km of fi bre cable which is
removed, shipped and re-installed at each of
the 19 circuits, each year.
Dedicated fi breSurely a permanent installation makes more
sense? After all, each circuit is already ringed
with its own dedicated fi bre. “Having our
own dedicated fi bre means that we are
solely responsible for it; we install it, we test it
and should anything go wrong they know
who to blame,” says operations manager
Richard Serschen.
Signals are routed to a radio base station with
three antennas (two receivers, one transmitter).
Usually this is placed on the highest part of the
circuit which is the race control tower but Monza’s
race control is uniquely the same height as the
surrounding paddock and grandstand buildings
so Riedel places the antenna on a cherry picker.
Nine of the teams are also equipped with
Motorola TETRA radio intercom units. Some 1,500
are used during every race although this pales
besides the 25,000 units used during the London
Olympics. Fortunately, Riedel owns the largest
radio rental fl eet in the world with 40,000 devices.
As if catering to all these high-profi le
clients were not enough, Riedel also services
broadcasters with RiLink which provides
bidirectional links between RF cameras race side
and the broadcast station. Its longest standing
broadcast client, RTL, transfers the international
programme video signal and additional signals
from its electronic news-gathering teams on
location at each of the race venues to its
playout centre in Cologne. During off-peak hours
when there is no signal transmission, RTL uses
the additional capacity for other purposes
such as fi le transfers to its archive in Cologne,
which can be carried out automatically in
managed workfl ows.
FIA team rules this year permit only 60 crew
on-site but up to 250 might be at the factory at
home and even split over three continents at
certain races. This is not only about cost though
there are considerable savings in not sending
200 additional crew to Australia by business class.
“Team strategists feel more relaxed and are
better able to perform and make judgements
within seconds, than they were when crowded
around the pit lane and far from home,” says
Dario Rossi, Riedel head of motorsport. “What’s
more, via RiLink teams can respond instantly.”
The delay is 300 milliseconds from overseas, just
ten milliseconds (tenth of second) in Europe.
Workfl ow16 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
Zero tolerance comms in F1
Adrian Pennington visits the Italian Grand Prix in Monza to walk the pit lane with Riedel
TVBEurope 17November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Workflow
All weatherThe fibre, the radios, and the Artist panels have
to withstand the rigours of constant packing
and shipping but also climates with often severe
weather conditions ranging from rain in Europe,
to extreme heat and sand in Bahrain, to heat
and humidity in Asia. Newer ruggedised and
lightweight versions of the kit is being introduced
from next season.
Riedel’s other key services and products for the
FOM and FIA include wireless HD on-board camera
solutions for the race cars, CCTV recordings of
parc ferme as well as a Race Incident Detection
and Review System to enable race control to view
controversial situations from different camera angles.
A Riedel-built flyaway command centre takes
in all of these feeds and time-stamps them on
arrival. The car information excludes sensitive
engine data but includes braking, gear change,
pit lane limiters and other information which the
race steward might use in the event of a yellow
flag incident. Since this needs to be decided
in race time, when an incident occurs a Riedel
operator can take a snapshot of the relevant
information and hand it over to the FIA.
Naturally for all of these to work, all of the time,
the many communications channels need to be
strictly encoded and segmented because much
of the data and comms is closely guarded to
prevent knowledge of it giving a competitor the
edge in a sport where success is often decided
by fine margins. “The room for failure is zero
tolerance,” says Serschen. “There has never been
a breakdown in this security yet.”
Toward IT and SkypeThe company is also introducing its customers,
step by step, into the world of IT-based media
infrastructures. At IBC it released a new
Smartpanel designed to serve as a powerful
multifunctional user interface with multitouch
colour displays, a multilingual character set
and is sunlight readable. Another release,
Tango TNG-200 is the company’s first fully
networked platform based on the AES67 and
AVB standards.
“It’s all about flexible connectivity beyond any
hardware limitations,” said founder
Thomas Riedel at IBC. “There is no need for
discussions about the right connectivity solution
for audio and video signals in broadcast
whether layer 1, layer 2 (such as AVB), or
layer 3 (such as AES67 for audio or SMPTE 2022
for video). All of these standards have their
raison d’etre and we are convinced that
there are very good reasons for all three
approaches and that they can perfectly
coexist. By supporting layer 1, 2, and 3
interfaces, we will integrate all three transport
layers into one solution to maintain maximum
flexibility and to achieve compatibility at the
same time.” He added that these developments
marked the start of a new era for platform-based
products at Riedel. “We are moving away from
being a purely hardware driven company, to
becoming a software solutions player.”
Eye-catching news at the show was a
partnership with Microsoft to bring a professional
version of Skype into play. The STX-200 broadcast-
grade interface brings any Skype user worldwide
into the broadcast environment. It meets
broadcasters’ increasing need for a reliable
single-box solution that enables them to engage
both reporters and viewers in live programming.
Microsoft, which is looking to monetise its $8.5
billion 2011 acquisition, approached Riedel and
asked if it wanted to tender for the development
of a version of Skype specifically for the needs of
the broadcast industry.
The result, the STX-200, is licensed by Microsoft
which integrates Skype into Riedel’s intercom
solutions. The unit offers HD-SDI, balanced XLR
audio I/Os, remote management and
monitoring of Skype calls.
“By enabling the use of a tremendous volume
of new content, the STX-200 will change the way
broadcasters interact and engage with their
viewers,” said Thomas Riedel.
“Broadcasters now have live access to
quality video from the more than 300 million
regular Skype users around the world, and the
STX-200 equips them to take the best of this
content to engage the imaginations and minds
of their audiences.”
“After a few years I spotted our kit being used by Ferrari’s pit crew for Michael
Schumacher” Thomas Riedel
Everest was possibly one of the most
technically challenging commissions that I
have ever worked on as a production sound
mixer in the 30 years I have been working in the
game. The main thing I was looking for regarding
radio mics was range. I already knew the
technical parameters of Lectrosonics equipment
as far as the delivery of full range audio recording
and transmission, but it was the range I was
interested in, for I was about to be recording
12 A-list celebrity artistes on a mountainside with
a fi lm unit based half a mile away.
I decided to get involved with Lectrosonics
about two to three years ago. I was an avid
fan of Audio Ltd radio mics from the late 80s
when I fi rst went freelance and I stuck with them
from that period. But when Lectrosonics made
their product line available in Europe they soon
proved that their products were absolutely far
superior to anything else on the market. This was
especially true of the quality of the build and
the range of equipment on offer for working in a
more portable style or rack mount set up.
Lectrosonics has a team of people who are
absolutely passionate about the design and build
of their products. I needed to know that when I or
one of my assistants puts a radio mic transmitter
on an A-list celebrity on a fi lm location that it
wouldn’t be the weak link in my equipment chain,
especially for the demanding locations of Everest,
and this gear has never let me down so far in any
of the projects I have worked on, whether for
major feature fi lms or television productions.
For the initial part of the shoot we were fi lming
in Katmandu with maybe six or eight radio mics.
We fi lmed on a bus and around the streets, and
there is very little RF activity in Katmandu so we
were lucky. We also fi lmed at the airport where
there was a lot of other RF around and the
Lectrosonics proved very good at eliminating
some of the unwanted RF in that vicinity.
Open airOne of the more remote areas where we
wanted the greatest range was close to base
camp on Everest. Quite a few of the actors were
wearing radio mics in thick down snowsuits. Our
job was to get the Lectrosonics transmitters as
close to the open air as possible to get the best
transmission from the aerials. Fortunately, up near
base camp the RF spectrum was very clear and
open, we had very few interference issues and
some of the range we got from the radio mics
using the LP650 receiver antennas was brilliant.
It was some of the best reception I have ever
experienced using any kind of radio mics.
Because a lot of the actors were wearing the
transmitters, some of the warmth from their bodies
was helping to extend the battery life of the
transmitters and there was defi nitely a trade off
between having the transmitter outside the body
or having it in a warm protected pouch within the
down snowsuit. We used Lithium batteries for this
project as a standard measure because of the life
expectancy of Lithium technology and because
we were working with fairly sensitive artistes who
didn’t like having the batteries changed too often
– it may well have been a half-mile trek to get to
these actors who were in fairly precarious positions
“One of the most important things for me as a production sound mixer is having
a support network of engineers and supply companies”
Workfl ow18 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
Recording EverestAward winning sound recordist Adrian Bell explains the challenges he faced while recording Everest, a feature fi lm in which a climbing expedition on Mount Everest is devastated by a severe snow storm
on the side of a mountain. Quite often they were
secured by safety climbers, safety ropes and
wearing crampons which our sound team may
not have been wearing, making it hard to get
to them on that rock slope. We had to plan the
situations where we had to re-battery these artists
for whatever scene they were about to shoot.
Director Baltasar Kormakur sometimes changed his
mind as to which scene he was about to shoot, so
we had to be ahead of the game as far as which
scene we were prepared for, and which artistes
were involved in which scene during the course of
the filming.
I generally have two sets of receivers in my
sound kit. I have one set in a flight case or bag
and another set in a rack on my sound cart. I
don’t like swapping gear around from one to the
other in the course of a day. I have no problem
having two sets. One acts as a back-up to the
other and I like to ensure that they are both
maximised in terms of specification.
One of the most challenging aspects of
Everest was filming in the old studio complex of
Rome, where the RF is not controlled and not
licensed and certainly, for a European-wide
spectrum, really didn’t seem to fit into any rules or
regulations. We unfortunately ended up having
to hire in some local frequencies and local
bands of RF which were clear and marked out
by local hire companies. There was no other way
of finding out that information apart from being
there and getting the local guys down to check
exactly which bands and frequencies were clear.
This in no way affected the way the Lectrosonics
gear performed, it was simply down to the
logistical set up of RF planning which is becoming
more common especially in and around cities.
In London and busy studio complexes you need
to do a very specific plan of where your radio
mics will be operating and what pitfalls you might
encounter during filming.
The Lectrosonics app LectroRM and Frequency
Finder is an invaluable tool for frequency
management and planning as far as I’m
concerned. The app is very good at pinpointing
what frequencies might be available in the area,
and might also be useful to plan out frequencies
that you have not got a licence for.
Lending supportOne of the most important things for me as a
production sound mixer is having a support network
of engineers and supply companies. This is only
coming to fruition now in the UK. 2013 was a good
year for Lectrosonics to finally have a small network
of suppliers that can supply kit at a good rate and,
more importantly, a source of technical support.
Lectrosonics has made great inroads into the UK and
European market as far as their specification supply
and technical support over that last year or two.
There is still some development potential I feel
with Lectro gear. Ideally that would be eight
receivers in a 1U rack mount unit. Anyone who
can do that will do very well. We are always trying
to minimise the footprint of our equipment on set.
The transmitters have possibly reached a point
where they cannot be any smaller – they are very
small, very lightweight, with very good battery life
and are very robust. From an engineering point
of view I think it would be very hard to beat
Lectro transmitters.
What I have found over the past few years
is that there are some very loyal supporters
of various types of radio mic equipment but
Lectrosonics has definitely shaken the industry
recently in the UK and as long as they keep
producing the standard of products they do it
will keep them at the forefront of the market for
radio mic technology.
TVBEurope 19
Workflow
“Everest was possibly one of the most technically challenging commissions that I have ever worked on”
November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Workflow20 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
The two new all-digital HD studios used for
Italy’s state broadcaster RAI’s channel
1 flagship news programme TG1 were
presented during the summer at RAI’s Saxa
Rubra complex with the participation of general
manager Luigi Gubitosi.
As well as the technical aspects, the
programme also has a new sound, thanks to the
opening and closing music by Academy Award
winning composer Nicola Piovani (Life is Beautiful)
The new look, on the other hand, came courtesy
of a set incorporating the high visual impact of
Lightbeam LED walls by Monza-headquartered
Leading Technologies.
The main studio, from which the various editions of
the news programme are transmitted throughout the
day, features 3mm pitch LED panels forming three
displays, measuring respectively 3.7sqm (5x5 panels),
8.8sqm (10x6 panels), and 13.2sqm (18x5 panels), all
controlled by means of a NovaStar set-up.
A new digital home for TG1
Mike Clarke reports on the features of the new digital HD studios, the base for Italian RAI’s TG1 news programme
The main studio, from which the various editions of the news programme are transmitted throughout the day, features 3mm pitch LED panels forming three displays
TVBEurope 21November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Workflow
The slim SL 03 BK I (384x384 mm) panels feature
SMD 2020 Epistar Black LED technology and, thanks
to their compact dimensions, lightweight (10kg)
and simple fast mounting system, are suited to any
type of permanent or mobile installation. They are
able to display images, text, graphics and video in
2D/3D in the majority of video formats (AVI, MOV,
MPG, VOB, etc), have a 120°/120° viewing angle,
1300 cd/m2 luminance, 1400Hz refresh rate, 100,000
hour life cycle and IP31 rating front and rear.
The main screen in the studio used for special
TG1 reports is made up of 3mm pitch panels, is
also curved and measures 8.5x2.3m (22x6 panels).
There are three LED ‘banners’, one high and two
low, formed by Lightbeam FD12WH 12mm pitch
flexible LED panels and measuring 0.76x19.2m
(the large top one) and 0.38x6.14m (the
smaller lower ones). The 160x160mm 12mm
pitch panels have SMD 3528 LED, a 110°/110°
viewing angle, >1300 cd/m2 luminance, 1000Hz
refresh rate, 50,000 hour life cycle and are also
rated to IP20 (front and rear). The installation was
carried out by specialist Rome firm TVI Srl. Leading
Technologies’ technical department (in the
person of engineer Alessandro Gianelli) provided
TVI with design and commissioning support for
the prestigious project. Gianelli explains, “Due to
the importance of the installation, each screen was
designed and installed with total redundancy, as
far as both cabling and number of sending cards
“We had an excellent and profitable working relationship right from the drawing board stage with RAI’s set design department, and scenographer Carlo Canè and his collaborators
Alessandra D’Ettore and Cecilia Guzzo” Alessandro Gianelli, Leading Technologies
Workflow22 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
were concerned. The number of sending cards
in the NovaStar control systems used with all the
3mm screens varies according to the size of each
screen. The key feature of this set-up is the complete
redundancy of the control system; each screen has
twice the necessary number of cards in a Master/
Slave-type format: if any element of the master
group has a breakdown, the system automatically
switches over to the slave card, ensuring signal
continuity without the video blacking out.”
The NovaStar MCTRL300 controllers’ features
include: a DVI video input; an audio input; two
Ethernet output ports; an USB interface (which
can be daisy-chained for uniform control),
sending card supporting resolutions of 1280×1024,
1024×1200, 1600×848, 1920×712 or 2048×668; a
light sensor interface, an independent power
supply and two serial ports (UART OUT\UART IN).
The 12 mm pitch banner screens are controlled by
an LINSN system, using the same modus operandi.
Vital parametersGianelli continues, “If necessary, technicians can
intervene on each single panel, carrying out
‘hot swap’ procedure and, when switched
on again, the panel automatically carries out
configuration procedure, without any additional
work being required on the control set-up.
The NovaStar system also constantly monitors
all the screens’ ‘vital’ parameters.”
The 3mm panels measure 384x384mm;
so having to follow the curve of the set, it is
inevitable that putting one alongside each
other they approximate the curve by means
of a series of straight lines. However, thanks to
a special metal support framework designed
by Leading Technologies, TVI was able to
position the panels in such a way as to make
their edges mate perfectly, achieving excellent
results. Gianelli concludes, “Our interface at
RAI from a technical point of view was Fabrizio
Pizzingrilli and I was technically responsible on
behalf of Leading Technologies. We had an
excellent and profitable working relationship
right from the drawing board stage with RAI’s
set design department, and scenographer
Carlo Canè and his collaborators Alessandra
D’Ettore and Cecilia Guzzo. It is always a pleasure
to work with extremely experienced people
who are willing to cooperate to find solutions
to any unforeseen events that can crop up
on installations of this calibre, and seamlessly
integrate all the various technical requirements
into their designs.”
LED technology is also integrated in the main
studio’s lighting, and the rig now includes 40
Rush PAR 2 RGBW Zoom LED fixtures by Martin
Professional, one of the many audio, video
and lighting brands distributed by Leading
Technologies in Italy. These single-lens units feature
fully premixed colour via 12 RGBW LEDs, 10° to 60°
zoom, electronic dimming and strobe effect.
Workfl ow24 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
The rise of Virtual Reality (VR) would only be
extraordinary if stereo 3D hadn’t emerged
before it. In less than a year VR has taken
on much of the hyperbole used to describe
digital 3D – as a new medium for immersive
entertainment beyond gaming.
Likely to become a household name on its
commercial release, Facebook’s Oculus Rift (OR)
faces competition from Sony Morpheus and a range
of companies offering ‘cinematic VR in your pocket’
including Google Cardboard for Android, Samsung
Gear for Galaxy Note 4 and the Durovis Dive.
None of this hardware will fl y off the shelves
without content to watch, play or ‘use’ with it.
Hence the wooing of TV and fi lm producers by OR
which demonstrated Crescent Bay, its new lighter
headset with motion tracking and integrated
headphones, to Hollywood execs in September.
3DTV pioneer Atlantic Productions has
produced three ten-minute VR pilots (a drama,
a documentary and a CG fi lm) for OR and
Samsung and is now fi elding interest from large
international content providers. “VR is becoming
a business model,” says CEO Anthony Geffen.
Twentieth Century Fox has announced VR
projects based on features The Maze Runner and
Wild, and another for its Night at the Museum
franchise. Gravity’s post house Framestore opened
an immersive content studio on the back of a VR
simulation it created for HBO’s Game of Thrones.
“When VR gets out into public hands we will
see a social media of VR content explode along
similar lines to the growth of YouTube,” says
Henry Cowling, creative director at production
company UNIT9. “Members of the public,
brands and semi-professionals will use VR to
deliver immersive experiences online. Users will
access content from mobile devices. Games
companies, movie studios and shortform viral
ideas will take VR mainstream.”
“The [VR] fi lming experience is akin to the
bastard progeny of experimental theatre-in-the
The BBC experiments with VR
The new grammar of Virtual Reality
Early producers of narrative live action VR are pioneering a visual and audio language that breaks the walls of cinematic convention, writes Adrian Pennington
Live streamed VR installation by Inition for Topshop
round and video game production,” wrote Neal
Ungerleider for Fastcolabs.com on the set of
horror short Black Mass, one of the first attempts
by Hollywood of a straight to Oculus Rift
production. Coincidentally, digital media
company Amplified Robot is creating six VR
experimental projects one of which is of a portion
of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night shot against
green screen where actors will be ‘placed’ into
a stately home.
“To an extent, directors will lose complete
command over the experience,” says
Phil Harper, creative director at Atlantic’s
division Alchemy VR.
Audio clues3D positional sound is coming to consumer
electronics in binaural and object-based methods.
Vendors like Dolby may release an SDK for Atmos
allowing producers to create soundscapes that
can aid in directing audience attention.
“You can’t control where the audience look
but one of the things we’re learning is that, for
example, when we walk along a street in real life
we don’t spend all our time looking to the left
or right or behind us,” adds Geffen. “Most vision
is within 180° and that learnt behaviour follows
through into VR.”
There’s no rule which says a VR experience has
to be 360°. A 180° fixed position best seat in the
house IMAX-style film viewing is an application
already advanced by Oculus Rift. Masking crew
and equipment, which will be visible in rushes
from a 360° shoot, can be achieved readily if the
production is shot against green screen.
“For live events or documentaries why not
reveal the crew?” asks Harper. “Immersion in
an incredible landscape or scenario is more
important than masking the artifice of how
you got there.”
Breaking the frameLive action VR production is still in its infancy.
The rule book has not been written. “You’ve
got to think of the project from the ground up
since your location or studio, the cameraman,
equipment and crew – everything will be in
shot,” advises Andy Millns, co-founder, Inition.
“You don’t need to be as frenetic in camera
movements, you can slow the pace down and
not refresh the angle as much (as 2D),” Millns
explains. The vertiginous effect of swooping
camera movements will induce sickness in the
viewer especially if they don’t expect it. “If
the camera is not gyroscopically level to the
horizon you instantly feel it in your stomach. Very
predictable movements are okay.”
Much the same lesson is given by UNIT9, which
has launched a VR division off the back of VR
campaigns for O2 and 5Gum. Any sudden
movement, change of direction or cut will
be even more pronounced than stereo 3D
because of the familiar problems of having the
brain resolve depth and the eyes refocus to
avoid discomfort. “We want to train directors
who are focussed just on VR experiences
because we do see it as a different film
language,” explains Cowling.
“You have to have very long transitions and
ideally make as few cuts as possible. Basically
360-VR is a way more fundamental paradigm
shift than 2D to 3D.”
Because the user is immersed in a scene they
naturally feel more in control of, so some form
of interaction is desired. “In 2D, the director
offers the viewer a very limited POV and we use
choreography and framing to give the viewer
precise details,” says Cowling. “In VR, that
language doesn’t apply to the same degree.
The real question is how you position the user,”
he poses. “Do they take the part of a
character or assume a floating POV, or do
other layers in the scene interact with you?”
Live streaming VRVR opens up space within a film, for the viewer’s
imagination and awareness to complement the
TVBEurope 25November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Workflow
Interior mapping using the structure device from structure.io
Workflow26 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
experience and narrative. A remarkably simple
piece by visual artists Félix Lajeunesse and
Paul Raphael is regarded as one of the best
examples to date for the Oculus Rift. Titled
Strangers – A Moment with Patrick Watson, the
360-camera is static but places the viewer in the
musician’s studio, flawless in its stitching
and composition.
Another possibility is live streaming into a VR
world, although image quality and realtime
image stitching needs development. This was
explored by Inition in February when it worked
with retailer Topshop to launch a new menswear
collection. Live video of a catwalk at the Tate
Turbine hall was filmed using wide angle 4K
broadcast cameras in 180° and streamed to the
headgear of five competition winners watching
in a Topshop store several miles away.
BSkyB must have an eye on live streaming
sports to VR headsets having taken a stake, with
Google, in VR developers Jaunt. Even the BBC has
dabbled. It recorded a news bulletin in 360-video
which enabled viewers to look around the entire
BBC News studio and production gallery.
“VR is not a fad,”
comments Ben
Fender, founder
of agency Drive
Worldwide.
“We’re trying to
create photoreal
experiences.
VR breaks the
fourth wall and
encompasses all
of your senses...
manipulates your
reality.”
Much the
same could
be heard from
Steven Spielberg
speaking at
the USC School
of Cinematic Arts in July 2013: “We’re never
going to be totally immersive as long as we’re
looking at a square, whether it’s a movie screen
or a computer screen. We’ve got to get rid of
that and we’ve got to put the player inside
the experience, where no matter where you
look you’re surrounded by a three-dimensional
experience. That’s the future.”
“VR is trying to satisfy the desire for an
interactive immersive experience which is much
more controlled from the user’s point of view,”
said Douglas Trumbull, genius behind the VFX
for Bladerunner and high frame rate cinema
exhibition systems.
“It’s a ‘one person at a time’ experience in
some kind of virtual world that could possibly
be the same as in a movie. There’s no reason
why you can’t have a movie called Avatar and
a VR world called Pandora. The experiences
are different but they might share the same
intellectual property.”
At the recent OR developer’s conference in
LA, Lucasfilm’s new media creative director
John Gaeta said he is looking at virtual reality
as a potential opportunity for the Star Wars
franchise. Could immersive world narratives
for Star Wars or Avatar deliver the first breakout
hit? A potential drawback to VR is that the user
UNIT9 is developing rigs which combine cameras and 3D scanning techniques
TVBEurope 27November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Workflow
is required to block out the world by strapping a
large piece of plastic to their face. Facebook may
overcome this by incorporating avatars of friends
into a social VR experience, but there’s another
interesting hybrid approach which mashes-up VR
with augmented reality.
Technical Illusions, the outfit behind kickstarter-
funded CastAR, uses micro-projectors that project
a holographic-style 3D image onto a reflective
surface several feet in front of the person wearing
special glasses – allowing users to see and interact
with an immersive scene in front of them.
Amplified Robot (AR) is researching the idea
of putting photorealistic 3D people and objects
within a natural environment. It is working with
Structure Sensor from structure.io, a device which
attaches to a mobile phone or tablet to capture
3D models of rooms.
AR CEO Steve Dann hopes to create
augmented reality experiences where the real
world is the game world.
Immersive journalismFormer Newsweek correspondent Nonny de
la Peña is pioneering immersive journalism
using VR to recreate events and bring them
closer to audiences.
Immersive journalism, as described by de
la Peña on her blog, allows the participant to
enter a virtually recreated scenario representing
the news story. The participant will be typically
represented in the form of a digital avatar.
In Project Syria, she used VR to try to tell the
plight of children in Aleppo. Using audio, video
and stills taken on scene, she recreated in CG
and the Unity game engine, a viewer experience
of a street corner in Aleppo, a rocket attack
and the aftermath in a refugee camp.
However, the experience has been criticised
for its lack of subjectivity and even of trivialising
the reporting of such a volatile subject.
“Filming is the easy part to crack,” says
Geffen. “Post is of another order of
magnitude.” It’s why Atlantic chose to
work though all the problems inherent in
VR by melding the talents of its in-house
post outfit Zoo with its production side to
form Alchemy.
UNIT9 is developing rigs which combine
cameras and 3D scanning techniques,
like a Kinect, to gather depth-map
information which will be projected over
the live action in post.
“The major challenge with live action VR is
to deliver 3D when matching pairs of eight (or
so) cameras,” says Cowling. “Stereoscopy
works from one particular POV but as the
user turns their head in VR the stereo no
longer makes sense.”
Atlantic finds that GoPro-style rigs are
more practical for the form of shooting it does
although lenses can only be synched to a
reasonable degree of accuracy.
There are no shortage of systems for
capturing 360° video. Most are fully integrated
systems, meaning that they feature one battery,
one memory card, a common optical axis,
shutter sync and a means of exporting and
stitching the overlapping feeds together.
Figure Digital’s Panopticam is a ball-like
device featuring 36 HD cameras mounted
into a 3D printed spherical case that stands
on a tripod.
Jaunt has rigged together up to 14 GoPros.
Data from sets of three cameras is used to
triangulate image depth to create a final 3D
stereo image pair for stitching.
Geonaute’s 320 360° sports camera is loaded
with three 8-megapixel wide-angle lenses with
single shot, burst and time-lapse modes.
The smartphone-like 240 Ricoh Theta
includes two opposed hemispherical lenses to
capture 360° stills, and weighs just 95g.
Kickstarter-funded Giroptic’s 360cam has
a unique, egg-shaped design, incorporating
three 185° fish-eye lenses synchronised to
capture and stitch images in realtime inside
the camera.
The palm-sized, spherical Bublcam houses
four 190° 1.6 megapixel lenses and is capable
of recording video at 30fps at 720p or 15fps at
1080p exporting as an MP4.
360Heros offers a 790 mount composed of
Aircraft Flexible Nylon for up to 14 GoPros and
software for stitching them in pairs to form 3D
360. It also has an underwater mounts for 360°
sub-aqua capture.
VideoStich Live from Paris’ VideoStitch
has a range of rigs around 500 housing six to
ten GoPros (it can work with other cameras)
including the Freedom 360 Explorer for
underwater shots.
NextVR has a rig outfitted with six Red
Dragons and claims to be able to support live
streaming of UHD VR content at 60fps.
iSTAR, designed and manufactured by
NCTech for mobile mapping, houses four
sensors delivering a 50-megapixel spherical
image with up to 27 fstops.
France’s Kolor offers a range of image
stitching and 360° virtual tour solutions
branded Autopanor and Panortour and
includes a free video player.
360o video systems
This year has seen a huge number of new
cameras introduced. Besides all of the
4K and high-end systems discussed in last
month’s TVBEurope, there have been a lot of
changes in the low-end and middle market,
including more affordable studio cameras, a
huge choice of compact and miniature cameras,
and greater flexibility for high-speed models.
Studio and system camerasThe sleek HD Blackmagic Studio Camera sells for as
little as £1,125, while the Ultra HD model is £1,740. They
use micro four-thirds camera sensors (the HD version
is slightly smaller than the 4K), and can take add-on
B4 or other lens mounts. Besides the large (ten-inch
1920x1200) viewfinder and the lens, they take up
little space. They include talkback, tally lights and
bi-directional optical fibre connections, plus a three
(4K) or four (HD) hour battery allowing independent
operation via a single optical fibre cable.
The SK-1300 is Hitachi’s first CMOS studio
camera and “takes us to new levels of
performance,” said Paddy Roache, director and
general manager, Hitachi UK.
The 3G-SDI 1080p camera “offers higher
sensitivity than our CCD versions,” added Richard
Harvey, technical director. However, Hitachi was
“reluctant to leap into CMOS before we were
confident of reliability,” explained Roache.
The camera offers sensitivity of F11 at 1080/50p,
signal-to-noise of 62dB, realtime lens aberration
correction, quick focus and focus assist.
Ikegami’s new HC-HD300 is a compact and
“aggressively-priced” HD shoulder mountable
camera with three 1/3-inch CMOS sensors,
and outputs 1920x1080 50i/59.94i, 1280x720
50p/59.94p, plus NTSC and PAL. It offers 58dB S/N
and sensitivity of F11 for 1080/50i.
Also new is the HDK-790X, a studio version of
the portable 79GX, with additional, and more
easily accessible, facilities, such as variable
viewfinder markers and easy access to functions,
such as a button for focus assist.
Ikegami also has two new ultra-low light cameras:
the HDL-4500 box camera has a minimum sensitivity
of just 0.001 lux (or F22 at 2000 lux), with a S/N ratio of
56dB in HD. “It’s amazing. It will be ideal for wildlife
and natural history,” said Mark Capstick, general
manager, Ikegami Electronics UK. It uses three 2/3-inch CMOS sensors. Although it can be fitted with
a viewfinder, shoulder pad and handle, there is also
a new Unicam HD system camera version, the
HDK-5500, which is more easily expandable with
triax, fibre or wireless backs.
Wireless links as standardIP-enabled cameras, which make it simple
to upload video files directly, even for live
streaming, are a key trend among smaller
cameras, particularly for ENG use.
Panasonic’s new AJ-PX800 P2 HD camcorder
will cost €13,400 and offers full networking with
“the ability to stream straight from the camera a
Acquisition — Cameras28 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
Broadcast camera round up
Mid-market movers
Harvey: SK-1300 “offers higher sensitivity than our CCD versions”
David Fox investigates the movers and shakers in the camera market and the latest technology developments
Panasonic’s new AJ-PX800 is being used by ITN in its wireless networking trials
high-quality image with latency of less than one
second, so you can do a two-way interview over
a 4G network,” said Rob Tarrant, Panasonic’s
European product manager.
At 2.8kg, it is also “the lightest three-chip 2/3-inch shoulder-mount camera on the market.”
ITN is using it for a networking trial, allowing users
to upload content in the background over IP, 3G,
4G and Wi-Fi at up to 6Mbps in proxy resolution,
so that editors make their decisions, then send
an EDL back to the camera, uploading only the
full-resolution pictures they need.
ITN is also using Panasonic’s AJ-PX5000 P2 HD
cameras to deliver reports to its London head
office “very, very soon after it’s been shot,” said
ITN CTO, Bevan Gibson. “It allows us to send back
footage
without sat
trucks or other
links, delivering the
content to our non-linear
platforms faster than ever before.”
Panasonic’s new HC-X1000 Ultra HD 4K
camcorder can record UHD 60p/50p on an
SD card. It can also record Cinema 4K.
On formatSony has added the more efficient XAVC recording
format to all of its XDCAM cameras (which still
also record MPEG-2 MXF), either I-frame or 10-bit
Long-GoP – which gives greater quality at 50Mbps
than MPEG-2, “especially in the dark areas,
where there is now very little noise,” said Robbie
Fleming, product marketing manager, entry-level
production, who believes that 35Mbps XAVC is
equal to 50Mbps MPEG-2.
It is adding live streaming in early 2015, with
a maximum of two seconds latency. “We are
developing our own receiver, and also partnering
with Teradek,” said Lucie Wendremaire, Sony’s
European product marketing manager for news
and broadcast production.
The system can work on networks with a very
poor signal-to-noise ratio thanks to a new Quality
of Service (QoS) application on the transmitter.
In demonstrations, the signal broke up constantly
without the app, but was usable with the app.
The QoS app will be a free upgrade in early 2015,
for the CBK-WA100 wireless LAN/modem adapter.
Wendremaire sees the new 22,500 PXW-X500
as “the ultimate broadcast camera from Sony.”
It uses three newly-developed 2/3-inch CCD
sensors. “We truly believe this is best in class
quality, with no rolling shutting, no motion
artefacts, and a wider colour gamut than CMOS.”
It records all the legacy codecs, plus XAVC
Intra and Long GoP, and will be able to have two
optional codecs (ProRes and DNxHD, recording
internally to SxS cards – available April). A further
option records at up to 120fps, “unique for a CCD
sensor. Normally a CCD cannot cope with such
high frame rates. This will make it very suitable for
sport, thanks to the lack of rolling shutter,” she said.
The X500 can be used as a live camera with a
fibre or triax back.
Other new models include: the PXW-X200
(replacing the PMW-200) with three 1/2-inch
TVBEurope 29November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
“[The Panasonic AJ-PX5000 P2 HD cameras] allow us to send back footage
without sat trucks or other links, delivering the content to our non-linear platforms
faster than ever before” Bevan Gibson, ITN
Acquisition — Cameras
www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
Acquisition — Cameras30 TVBEurope
CMOS sensors offering better sensitivity, new
17x lens, and wireless links offering remote
control, FTP and live streaming via a Wi-Fi
dongle or a 3G/4G USB stick.
The PXW-X180 and PXW-X160 have three 1/3-inch sensors and a 25x zoom with three
control rings. “It’s the widest lens we do and has
variable ND filters,” said Flemming. Users can
record different formats on each card (of two)
or relay record.
For very low-light, the 4K-capable A7S
full-frame 35mm DSLR goes up to 409,600
ISO, recording XAVC-S (4:2:0 8-bit) at 50Mbps
internally to SD card, with S-log and Cine modes,
and 4K 4:2:2 output for an external recorder.
The compact 2,313 PXW-X70 uses a single
1-inch 4K sensor (a little larger than Super 16mm
size). It will record 4K (via 500 upgrade early
2015), and records 1080 50/60p HD on two SD
cards in XAVC Long GoP at up to 50Mbps (4:2:2
10-bit), plus AVCHD and DV.
There is also a new MI (Multi-Interface) Shoe
for all of its new XDCAM cameras (except
the PMW-300), including the A7S and FS7. This
intelligent hot shoe allows users to control a light
from the camera, and power it if necessary, and
can also hold a wireless receiver, taking the audio
via the shoe so there is no need to plug it in via
XLR. It is limited to one channel at the moment, but
there could be a dual-channel version in future.
EOS upgradeThe new Canon EOS C100 Mark II is a
comprehensive upgrade of its entry-level
Super35 camera, offering improved image
quality and creative flexibility, easier operation
and wireless sharing.
It is the first Cinema EOS camera to get
integrated Wi-Fi, for file transfer via FTP, and can
record both MP4 and AVCHD (or HD and SD)
simultaneously to the two SD cards (and upload
the low-bitrate version).
Canon’s new XF205 and XF200 each have
a single slightly-bigger-than 1/3-inch CMOS
sensor and come with Wi-Fi and Ethernet LAN
connectivity, for direct or wireless connection
to smartphones, tablets and laptops, including
camera control, remote viewing and the
ability to transfer files via FTP without additional
software. A new CameraAccess function
allows lower-quality proxy files to be streamed
to another device via Wi-Fi, improving the
speed in which content, such as news flashes,
can be shared.
Each camera has a 20x zoom lens (equivalent
to 28.8 to 576mm at 35mm, f1.8), plus ND
filter, records at 50Mbps (MPEG-2) 4:2:2 MXF
on Compact Flash (dual card slots) and can
simultaneously capture 35Mbps 4:2:0 MP4 files
to an SD card, in HD or lower resolutions, for
shooting for both broadcast and web channels,
plus two XLR inputs.
Wendremaire: The new PXW-X500 is “the ultimate broadcast camera from Sony”
TVBEurope 31November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Acquisition — Cameras
B4 and afterThe recently introduced Blackmagic Ursa PL and
EF-mount UHD cameras will soon be joined by
a Broadcast (B4-mount) version using a smaller
13.056mm x 7.344mm sensor than the other Super
35mm models – the sensor and lens mount is a
user-upgradable block.
It has dual CFast 2.0 card recorders for
recording at up to 350MBps, with support for
ProRes and 12-bit CinemaDNG Raw.
Up to speedI-Movix has introduced modular and UHD
versions of its X10 high-speed system, using Vision
Research Phantom cameras.
“There is now almost a bespoke answer for any
set of requirements a customer may have, but
whatever the chosen configuration the solution
will have all the advantages of the market-
leading X10 core technology,” said I-Movix
CEO, Laurent Renard.
Every modular system requires the rack-mount
X10 CCU, and configurations include: X10 USM,
for very high frame-rate sports applications (up to
2,600fps at 1080i, or 5,600fps at 720p); X10 Spine,
which sits below a Phantom camera and supports
the same frame rates but adds operational
flexibility for additional non-broadcast use; X10 SSM,
for use as a conventional HD broadcast camera
with the addition of continuously-recorded super
slo-mo at 300fps (1080i) or 600fps (720p); and the
X10 UHD, which works with the Phantom Flex4K and
can do up to 500/600fps in HD or 100/120fps in 4K
for live use, or can do up to 2,00fps in 1080i/1080p
and up to 1,000fps in 4K for ultra-slow-motion
applications. There are also RF wireless versions
of each module.
For multi-camera production there is the X10
Multi, which can be used with three camera
heads (six channels).
Grass Valley’s new LDX XtremeSpeed (LDX XS) 6x
ultra-slow-motion system comes in both box and
system camera models, delivering 150 or 179.82
3x frame rates and 300 or 359.64 6x frame rates in
1080i and 720p, plus 150 or 179.82 3x frame rates in
1080p, as well as 1x standard speed live output.
There are also two new 3X cameras, the LDX HS
(HiSpeed) and LDX Compact HS, successors to the
LDK 8300, both of which are software upgradable
to the LDX XS and LDX Compact XS, respectively.
The cameras also work in
tandem with Grass Valley’s
K2 Dyno Replay System and
K2 Summit 3G Production
Client, which, using Dyno’s
AnySpeed technology,
allows for smooth playback
at any speed from zero per
cent to 200 per cent.
Heroic effort by miniature camerasThe biggest name in small
cameras is GoPro, which
has just released its latest
range: the Hero4. The
$499 Hero4 Black offers 4K
(and 12MP stills – at 30p),
2.7K (at 50p) and 1080p
at up to120fps, plus a
redesigned audio system
with twice the dynamic
range of previous models,
improved image quality,
better low light performance, highlight tagging,
improved user interface and faster Wi-Fi.
The $399 Hero4 Silver records 2.7K/30p,
1080/60p and 720/120p, and includes a built-in
touch display. There is also an entry-level $129
GoPro Hero, for 1080/30p and 720/60p.
GoPro has also expanded its professional
Protune mode to include colour, sharpness, ISO
limit, and exposure controls.
Camera Corps also has three tiny new cameras:
the Q3 robotic pan/tilt/zoom/focus camera; the
very compact MeerCat; and the third-generation
Stump Cam.
The IP45-rated Q3 comes in the unobtrusive
spherical housing of its Q-Ball predecessor, and
has a 1/3-inch 1920x1080 CMOS imager.
The MeerCat is small enough to be used as a
wearable camera, yet has full control, including
The new Stump Cam can be “completely housed inside a regulation-gauge cricket stump” Paul McNeil, Camera Corps
Canon’s EOS C100 Mark II is the first Cinema EOS camera with integrated Wi-Fi
Hero shot: GoPro’s new Hero4 is the latest in its best-selling line of action cameras
Integrated robotics: Telemetrics’ new Robo Eye HD pan/tilt/zoom camera
Acquisition — Cameras32 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
manual iris. It has a very small footprint, 30x30mm,
and is only 93mm high, to fit very narrow locations.
It can deliver 1080p, 1080i or 720p video at 50,
59.94 or 60Hz, via HD-SDI – or an optical feed using
Camera Corps’ optical fibre interface. The power
supply and interface can be up to 30m from the
camera head, and control signals can be delivered
over a standard audio line, so the interface can be
any distance from the operator. Six MeerCats can
be controlled from one remote panel.
The new Stump Cam can be “completely
housed inside a regulation-gauge cricket stump.
This gives users the freedom to place cameras
in the mid or outer stumps. Each camera can
be configured with a choice of 50°, 100° or 128°
lenses to allow tight, wide or super wide shots,” said
Camera Corps’ projects manager Paul McNeil.
“The Version 3 Cricket Stump Cam system consists
of four cameras: two for each wicket. A classic
arrangement is to position one camera with a
tight-angle lens facing forward to capture images
of the bowler and the oncoming ball. The second
camera, fitted with a super wide lens, is then ideally
placed to televise the wicket keeper. All four feeds
are multiplexed onto single-mode fibre.”
A Robo Eye viewThe new Telemetrics Robo Eye integrated HD PTZ
camera has a Sony Exmor 2.18MP CMOS sensor
and 30x zoom lens, with a S/N ratio of 50dB and
sensitivity of F8 at 2,000 lux.
It offers native 1920x1080 HD-SDI and HDMI
outputs, plus SD composite video signals in NTSC
and PAL. Gain set-up is automatic with a manual
override, and up to 1,000 presets can be stored.
Its servo motors have stop accuracy of 0.005°
and feedback accuracy of 0.000375°, and offer
a pan/tilt velocity of 0.0 - 90° per second.
Open goalBradley Engineering’s elbow-shaped Elkam
was designed to fit in a corner post for rugby
coverage, and is also ideal as an in-goal camera
(it can simply hang in the netting), in corner
pockets for snooker, or on nest boxes for wildlife
productions – “because of its weight distribution,
it just hangs, you don’t have to do any rigging,”
said CEO, David Bradley.
It has a full HD 1/3-inch CMOS sensor, a 100°
wide-angle lens and full remote control. It can
be used with Bradley’s Remote Control Panel
Mk3, which can control all four goalmouth
cameras on the pitch.
Bradley also introduced RD12, probably the
smallest wireless CCU controller capable of
controlling all of the parameters on a broadcast
camera. At just 100g and 88mmx60mmx12.5mm,
it operates with Sony, Ikegami, Panasonic and
Bradley cameras, controlling iris, tally, red gain,
blue gain and pedestal. Goal keeper: Bradley gets up close with his new Elkam camera
TVBEurope 33November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Acquisition — Cameras
Marshall Electronics’ second-generation miniature
2MP HD-SDI camera, the CV500-M2, supports
multiple formats, including 1920x1080 50p and 50i,
and 1280x720 50p. It offers improved versatility,
durability, compatibility, and functionality
compared to its predecessor, with a full size HD-SDI
(BNC) and easily switchable M12 lenses.
“We’ve expanded lens compatibility to a
dozen Marshall HD lenses ranging from 2.5mm to
50mm. Lens options and ease of installation make
this camera possibly the most versatile PoV mini
camera in the broadcast market today,” claimed
Tod Musgrave, product marketing manager,
Marshall Electronics.
The new Flare 2KSDI-ENR is a major upgrade
for IO Industries’ HD/2K mini camera, offering
improved image quality and extra output
formats. Besides outputting full 2K Raw for digital
cinema or 4:2:2 for live broadcast, it now gains
new RGB 4:4:4 output modes in 1080p and 2K.
DSLRs on track for studiosNikon has two interesting new full-frame
DSLRs designed for video use, and has linked up
with Mark Roberts Motion Control to create
an autotracking system for small studios or
sports production.
It can track talent or objects in motion using
automated cameras, MRMC’s AFC-100 heads
and Polycam autotracking to track multiple focus
points. It has tracked cars at over 355kph (220mph),
accelerating through tight corners, demanding
ultra-fast response from the camera heads. A
single operator can automatically control the
synchronous movement of numerous cameras.
“The multiple camera installations are easy to
set up and control from a central location,”
said Assaf Rawner, CEO of Mark Roberts Motion
Control. “In F1, for example, there could be
substantial savings just on freight costs, taking
into account all the peripheral equipment
needed to put an operator safely into the field.
The broadcast unit also has the advantage of
directly controlling and synchronising remote
cameras from one place, all over a standard
Ethernet network.”
Nikon’s €3,200 D810 and smaller D750 (€2,149
inc VAT) both offer full-frame and Super35 format
shooting in full HD at up to 50/60fps, with clean
HDMI out, plus simultaneous capture of full-
resolution footage at up to 42Mbps in H.264 and
on an external recorder.
The D750 “is the first pro camera in the Nikon
range with a flippable [3.2-inch] screen,” said Frank
Zuidweg, co-ordinator Nikon Professional Services.
It is also its first full-frame (24x35.9mm) camera to
have Wi-Fi for remote operation. “We’ve made
it as compact and lightweight as possible [using
carbon fibre and magnesium], without losing any
functionality for professional users,” he added.
Flip-up: Zuidweg demonstrates the new Nikon D750 video-focused DSLR
ARRI, De Sisti, Videssence and Zylight are
all combining the single shadow beam
of the traditional Fresnel lens with the
lower power needs of LEDs.
The latest in ARRI’s L-Series of LED Fresnels, is
the 115W L5, which offers the same features
as the L7, at half the weight and size. It is
tuneable from 2,800K-10,000K, has green/
magenta correction, hue selection, saturation
control and DMX control.
There are L5-C (Colour), L5-TT (Tungsten
Tuneable, 2,600K-3,600K) and L5-DT (Daylight
Tuneable, 5,000K-6,500K) models. The L5-C is the
most tuneable, but the L5-TT and L5-DT are 25 per
cent brighter. New features of the L5 include a
PowerCON power connector and battery input
for portability. De Sisti has four new LED Fresnels,
offering up to 56 per cent greater output in full
fl ood than previous models, with a Television
Lighting Consistency Index of 90 for tungsten and
92 for daylight versions.
The compact 55W LED Magis has a 120mm
Fresnel lens, the 110W LED Leonardo 6 and
Leonardo Piccolo 6 have 150mm lenses, while
the 150W LED Leonardo 10 has a 250mm lens.
Users of existing De Sisti 1kW or 2 kW tungsten
Fresnels can retrofi t a 110W LED in the 1kW or
a 150W LED in the 2kW. Zylight has upgraded
its collapsible 100W F8 LED Fresnel. It delivers
close to the output of a traditional 1kW Fresnel
and collapses to less than 10cm thick for easy
transport. Its yoke mount has now been angled
for greater positioning range and is able to
accommodate 90° stand mounting.
Acquisition — Lighting34 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
Taking a shine to LEDsHigher quality LEDs, particularly in conjunction with Fresnel lenses, and better colour temperature control are the key trends in broadcast lighting. David Fox reports
Space man: Polaczek with the new Sumo100, surrounded by the Sumolight LED Spacelight
Plus, all locking and adjustment is
done with a single knob.
On the light: the self-locking focus
now automatically holds focus
position; it has improved bellows
design for smoother operation;
self-terminating DMX input; better
protection from the elements; and
a new heat sink orientation that
allows 20 per cent better cooling.
“We went back to the drawing
board to make the F8 even better,
without changing the features that
make it the most exciting lighting
instrument on the market” said Joe
Arnao, president of Zylight.
Available in daylight (5600K)
or tungsten (3200K), it is fully
dimmable with an adjustable beam
spread (16-70°), using a patented
focusing system for spot and flood
operations. It can be powered from
standard 14.4v camera batteries
or AC adapter, and is water
resistant (IP54).
Face to FaceliteThe lightweight new Videssence
Facelite 010 is a compact, high
colour rendering LED 10W niche light
that is easy to handle or mount in
tight quarters. It is designed to boost
the vertical light levels on a subject’s
face and features, to separate them
from the ambient lighting. A smooth,
even wash of light is produced with
the frosted spread lens gel that
comes as standard. The Osram/
Sylvania HF2 Narrow Stick LED 3000K
lamp (optional 4000K) should last
50,000 hours. Videssence also has
three new Fresnel LED lights: the
Vidnel 050 50W LED Fresnel; and
two mini LED lights. All are rated at
96+ CRI for tungsten – there are also
daylight versions.
The Little VID LV050 (with stationary
beam and permanent barn doors)
and the Little VID-Focusable,
LV050-F, mini LED lights have
lightweight, compact (165mm x
152.4mm) housings. Passive cooling
delivers quiet operation, and power
is shut off to the driver and LED
when dimmed to zero with DMX so
no external relay or power cut off
is required. The 5.4kg Vidnel 050
joins the Vidnel VN100 100W
fixture introduced last year, and is
designed for key or back lighting.
It has a manual, lockable slide
bar, and spot focus delivers more
than 1077 lux at 3.6m. There is DMX
control and onboard dimming. It
takes standard four-inch Gel Frame
and Barn Door accessories.
Look softPhoton Beard’s new PhotonBeam
80 LED floodlight uses remote
TVBEurope 35November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Acquisition — Lighting
The Rotolight Neo has dual knobs for brightness and colour temperature
Altogether cooler: Improvements to the F8 include better cooling and smoother operation
“We went back to the drawing board to make the F8 even better, without changing the features that make it the most exciting
lighting instrument on the market”Joe Arnao, Zylight
Acquisition — Lighting36 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
phosphor technology that has been adapted to
enable it to provide near full spectrum, high CRI
lighting. It is available in daylight 5600K
or tungsten 3000K versions. Power can be
supplied from 90-260v AC mains or via standard
V- or Gold-mount 11-17v DC camera batteries.
De Sisti’s new LED softlights, the twin-array Soft-
LED 2 and triple-array Soft-LED 3 lights, also use
remote phosphors. They offer a controlled beam
white source (daylight or tungsten) that produce
soft shadows with even distribution and no pixel
effect from the LED. Kino Flo’s Celeb 400Q DMX
softlight joins its Celeb range, which is claimed
to offer “the only stable, colour-variable
LED to ride the spectral sensitivity curves of
digital cinema cameras.”
The LED lights have been designed to offer
peak lumen output without sacrificing Kino
Flo’s signature True Match colour and soft light
aesthetic. Special thermal dynamics (no metal
fins or fans) are claimed to ensure the colour
temperature will remain stable for 50,000 hours
and output won’t fade.
The 65x65cm DMX Celeb 400Q is tuneable
from 2700K to 5500K (saveable as five presets)
without affecting light output, while dimming
(100 to zero per cent) won’t change the colour
temperature settings.
Squaring offLitepanels’ new Astra 1x1 Bi-Color panel is up to
four times as bright as its traditional 1x1 Bi-Color
and offers a high CRI. The daylight-to-tungsten
tuneable colour light is the first in a new range.
It offers higher intensity, a longer throw, and a
wider effective beam spread than the original.
It has both passive (silent) and active cooling
(using an ultra-quiet fan module, for double light
output). An optional communications module
allows brightness, colour temperature and cooling
mode to be controlled via DMX512. Additional
wired and wireless communication modules are
The straight and narrow: The Videssence Facelite
010 is good in tight spaces
TVBEurope 37November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Acquisition — Lighting
in development. Rosco’s new Braq
Cube packs 100W of LED output
into a 12.5cm cube. The Braq Cube
WNC offers 7,000 lumens of white
light tuneable from 2800K to 6500K,
and is powerful enough to hang
from the grid, yet small enough to
be mounted inside scenic elements.
The Braq Cube 4C uses RGBW
quad-chip technology that
eliminates multi-coloured shadows
and can create a fully blended
palette of saturated, mid-tone and
pale tint colours. It also produces
a white light that is particularly
flattering to skin tones.
The smaller (10cm) Miro Cube
LED wash light outputs 3,000+
lumens and is available either as
a full colour mixing fixture (Miro
4C) or a tuneable (Miro WNC).
The slim, soft Rosco LitePad LED
light has been upgraded, and
is now fully customisable and
available in tuneable White and
RGB configurations. It comes in
two models: LitePad Axiom, in a
protective metal housing, and
LitePad HO+, the raw LED light
engine just 8mm thick.
Neo dynamicsThe Rotolight Neo is claimed to be
the world’s first on-camera light
with accurate electronic colour
temperature display, for tuneable
colour (3150K to 6300K in 10K steps).
The bi-colour LED delivers 957 lux
at 90cm, and uses 120 LEDs for full
spectrum colour reproduction with
an overall CRI of 95 (and a skin tone
rating of more than 98). Neo can be
powered by six AA batteries for up
to five hours (or three hours at 100
per cent), or via an AC adapter or
D-Tap, drawing just 9W at full power.
Space raceSpacelights can consume a lot of
power, and require a huge amount
of cable with large dimmer racks.
“There have been a number of
different LED-based approaches
to this problem over the past few
years, but so far it doesn’t seem that
any of them have really caught on,”
said Sumolight CEO Ralf Polaczek.
Generally the result has been heavy
lights (weighing about 20 to 25kg)
with fixed colour temperature, and
sometimes even fans. “Basically the
lights in this category just haven’t
been very exciting.”
He hopes to change this with the
new Sumolight LED Spacelight,
which is fully dimmable and
flicker free at any frame rate, and
comes in a bi-colour, daylight
and tungsten versions. Its output
equals a traditional 6kW tungsten
spacelight with a skirt but uses less
than 500W and is fully passively
cooled. With 30° optics (quickly
swappable) it gives more than
550fc at 3m. It weighs about 5kg,
including ballast, and has a
DMX-RDM interface.
The new Sumo100 LED light can
do some things many other lights
can’t, such as run off 12v from a car,
at high output. It boasts very high
colour accuracy (TLCI 99 and CRI
95+) for daylight and tungsten. It
outputs 1200 lux at 3m, is tuneable
from 3000K-5700K, with zero to100
per cent dimming, weighs 2kg, and
offers interchangeable optics for
30°, 60° and 120° beam angles.
Plasma buzzOne of the few non-LED debuts is
Hive Lighting’s new Wasp Plasma
Par with tuneable Daylight Dial
that ranges from 4800K to 7000K.
The 276W Wasp is flicker free up to
225 million fps and has a powerful
10° beam that can do the work of
smaller HMIs on set. When combined
into arrays (called Killers) the Wasp
is claimed to be the brightest fixture
that can be plugged into a wall.
The six-light Killer is the equivalent
of a 4kW HMI running off of a single
120v wall socket, while 240v allows
as many as 12 to be plugged in at
once. The Wasp can be fitted with
lenses and soft-boxes, or even the
barrel of an ETC source 4, to create
a daylight spot.
The Daylight Dial is calibrated
to prevent green/magenta
shift and can transition all
the way to deep blue
moonlight, with little or no
dimming. It is now available
across all of Hive’s lights.
“There have been a number of different LED-based approaches to this problem over the past few years, but so far it doesn’t seem that
any of them have really caught on” Ralf Polaczek
Hang ten: The 150W LED Leonardo 10 is the largest of De Sisti’s new LED Fresnels
T he grand ballroom at Hilton London
Wembley was the setting for a truly grand
night in which deserving award winners
were recognised, and talent throughout the
industry celebrated. TVBEurope executive editor
James McKeown welcomed awards nominees,
broadcast professionals, PR companies and
TVBEurope figures past and present, who packed
out the venue. “Beyond the pomp and the
ceremony, tonight we are coming together to
celebrate all that is great about our industry,
in the company of friends and colleagues,”
opened McKeown. “We will be recognising
those pushing the boundaries in their fields;
honouring the pursuit of excellence,
innovation, and endeavour.”
The awards were divided into four categories,
with the aim of encompassing a broad range
of talent and expertise in the broadcast media
field. Presentations began with the Workflow
category and first up on stage to collect the
Achievement in Sound award was NUGEN Audio,
for its work on Later…with Jools Holland. This was
followed by Achievement in Systems Integration,
which went to Cambridge Imaging Systems. “The
award is for our work in UK education, providing
a catch-up TV service across 60 universities,” the
company explained. “The BBC and the British
Universities Film and Video Council enabled us
to capture TV and broadcast from the entire
UK spectrum and also from foreign language
channels and to produce those for catch-up,
learning and research.” Finally, dock10 was
awarded Achievement in Post Production
for work on hit TV drama series Happy Valley,
broadcast on BBC One.
The World Cup was a major TV event this
year, so it’s perhaps of little surprise that the
sporting highlight cropped up twice in the
Delivery category. Elemental Technologies was
awarded the Achievement in Fast Turnaround
Broadcast for its successful delivery of a 4K
UHD TV broadcast of the World Cup over an IP
network using Elemental Live encoding, while EVS
walked away with Achievement in Multiplatform
Content for its delivery of the showpiece
tournament. The partnership between EVS and
specialist production company HBS provided the
live and multimedia production and distribution
workflow, including nearly 200 servers and
related connectivity. “With the trust of HBS and
FIFA we’ve been able to accomplish many things
and the multiplatform delivery and multiscreen
delivery technology that we’ve put forward is
something we’re very proud of,” said EVS on
receipt of its award. Achievement in Legacy
Content went to RR Media, for the British Pathe
historic archive for YouTube.
Within the Capture category, Beyond HD
Achievement for Excellence in Image Capture
TVBAwards38 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
Broadcast talent is rewardedat inaugural TVBAwards
Holly Ashford reports on the resounding success of our first ever TVBAwards event on Thursday 23 October, where the broadcast media industry gathered to celebrate a year of achievement and progress, in the shadow of Wembley Stadium
TVBEurope executive editor James McKeown welcomes guests to the TVBAwards
Members of the BAFTA Albert Consortium collect the Sustainability Award for Albert+
The team from Milk VFX receive their TVBAward for Natural History Museum Alive
TVBEurope 39November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
TVBAwards
was created to celebrate a
company or in-house team
responsible for outstanding use
of new and innovative image
capture technologies in a live or
recorded TV programme. TV2 ASA,
Norway was the deserving winner
of the honour, for its work on the
spectacular Fly med oss. “We set off
in May 2014 with a helicopter and a
Cineflex camera and a 360-camera
mounted on the helicopter. We
flew for three weeks and got
some amazing pictures, both of
mountains and people, all over
Norway,” explained the winners,
who didn’t forget to thank the stars
of the documentary: “This award
is actually also to the Norwegian
people who went out on the top
of the mountains and took their
clothes off and waved to us!”
The Achievement in Sports
Broadcast award was picked up
by Presteigne Broadcast Hire, for
its work, in association with CTV,
on The Boat Race – the annual
shootout on the Thames between
the universities of Oxford and
Cambridge. Receiving the award,
the company described the
project as “a technically complex
programme both sides, which saw
lots of innovation, and the first use
of IP and RF mesh-based acquisition
systems, which is reflected in this
award.” Achievement in VFX went
to Milk VFX for the magical Natural
History Museum Alive, broadcast on
New Year’s Day.
The awards ceremony
concluded with the presentation
of four Special Awards, the first
of which went to Karmarama/
Red Bee Media for the WW1 on
the BBC campaign. To mark the
centenary of the start of the First
World War, the BBC commissioned
programmes about the conflict to
run over four years and released
a film showcasing the content.
Karmarama created the TV spot,
which shows the war from various
perspectives, tied together with
the wartime song Pack Up Your
Troubles In Your Old Kit-Bag, which
is sung or spoken by different
characters and BBC presenters.
“We’re very proud not only of
representing the BBC, but also
representing everybody who
gave their lives through what was
an incredibly tough campaign
in the First World War,” commented
Karmarama.
The Sustainability Award went to
BAFTA Albert Consortium for
its Albert +, an industry project
promoting sustainability in the
production process.
Channel 4 was the winner of the
award for Outstanding Broadcast,
in one of the most eagerly
anticipated moments of the night.
The broadcaster demonstrated the
largest-ever UK TV commitment
to the Winter Paralympic Games
in Sochi, delivering 50 hours of
coverage, with two further digital
streams providing 100 hours of
additional content. “A lot of
people have worked very hard on
Channel 4’s behalf to deliver the
best possible coverage and to tell
the great stories of the Paralympics
we’ve been working with,” said
the broadcaster.
The evening wrapped up with
Dr David Wood, former deputy
technical director of the EBU
and current chair of the World
Broadcasting Union’s Technical
Committee, taking to the stage.
Wood had previously been
announced as the recipient of the
Lifetime Achievement award
and shared with attendees a
reflection of fond memories of his
career and experiences in the
broadcast industry.
Simon Fell, technology and
innovation director at the EBU
described Wood as “a unique
talent well respected in the
industry. His humour and all round
enthusiasm for all things involving
media technologies have given him
international respect.”
TVBEurope would like to thank
our TVBAwards sponsors, Manor
Marketing, Ericsson and IBC, as well
as all of our guests. For those who
were unable to make it, we hope to
see you in 2015.
Lifetime Achievement winner Dr David Wood accepts his award from James McKeown
Attendees enjoyed dinner at the Hilton before the Awards presentations got underway
40 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
Devlin: As we start to deploy transcoding
into the cloud the biggest challenge remains
interoperability between systems. Gone are
the days when a transcode was just a case
of fl ipping a codec from .mp2 to .mp4. The
current transcode paradigm is much more like
manufacturing on demand, with a different
feature set between contribution transcoding,
and transcoding for web. Smart transcoding
involves great deinterlacing, frame rate
conversion, audio handling, captions and
subtitles and metadata handling with a minimum
of fuss for the end user – something Dalet
AmberFin has been pushing for the last six years.
This complexity results in a legacy of years of fi les
being made in the wild that contain subtle and
expensive-to-correct issues in them. These issues
can lie there until an upgrade of playout servers,
transcode farm and/or editing equipment takes
place when the errors need to be addressed.
Eksten: The biggest single infl uence as we think
about transcoding and encoding and all the
ramifi cations are the next generation formats
and their resolutions. The challenge is that chip
set manufacturers are reticent to leap into the
game. On the software side, we’ve crossed
the line. We know that software can do most of
what we would describe as being part of the
broadcast infrastructure in realtime. As you
move to software, there are discussions about
how you are going to manage or monitor the
systems and I think that is something the industry
is a little bit behind in.
Turner: Whilst our business is to take fi les from
one format and turn them into another, the
proliferation of those formats is a constant
Delivering a coded message
Transcoding is a vital part of today’s broadcast and production chain. Philip Stevens moderates this month’s Forum which tackles some of the issues facing this complex technology
Different video and audio workfl ow environments mean that there is always a need for fi le transfers to take place. So what are the challenges for transcoding equipment makers? Does the use of second screens add complications? And has the ‘cloud’ made an impact on the transcoding scene?
To discuss these and related issues, we’ve brought together (in alphabetical order) Bruce Devlin, chief media scientist, Dalet; Brick Eksten, VP product development, Imagine Communications; Simone Sassoli, VP marketing and business development at RGB Networks; Paul Turner, VP enterprise product management at Telestream; Owen Walker, head of product management, root6 Technology; Keith Wymbs, chief marketing offi cer for Elemental.
Transcoding Forum
“The current transcode paradigm is much more like manufacturing on demand, with a different feature set between contribution
transcoding, and transcoding for web”Bruce Devlin, Dalet
What are the biggest challenges facing makers of transcoding equipment and services?
TVBEurope 41November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Transcoding Forum
issue. It has been made worse recently with
the introduction of new cameras, both in the
professional arena and in smartphones. The world
of newsgathering has been hit with this last issue
as UGC becomes more and more of a source for
final outputs. This is likely to continue as we move
forward. The challenge is not so much in the
decoding of the video and audio, but in ensuring
that metadata survives the transcoding process.
More and more of our customers’ workflows rely
on manipulation of metadata, so preservation
throughout the transcoding process is of great
importance. Unfortunately, there are no real
standards being enforced in this regard.
Walker: Transcoding is not a creative task, it
needs to be fast, reliable and automated. It also
needs to be part of an overall solution, it cannot
be an island. Products which enable transcoding
need to be workhorses which can scale to meet
these demands and provide the formats and
tools which clients require. The never-ending
emergence of new standards requires root6
to deploy resources to stay relevant in a very
dynamic, rapidly changing industry as the move
to complete file-based workflows becomes the
norm. Interoperability with third-party devices
as part of a wider workflow, such as file-based
QC, takes time in development, but can offer
rich rewards, rather than having to develop
every function in-house. Building tools which not
only provide the required transcoding needs,
but can also manage the workflow is key. Our
ContentAgent product provides encoding,
media management and metadata tracking
with a complete toolset for automating the
transcoding, management and distribution of
digital media files. Its user interface has been
designed to be operated by non-technical
users using a graphical node-based workflow
tool – to allow them to build their own workflows
and apply automated decision processes, and
provides a highly efficient encoding engine.
Wymbs: The key challenges are keeping
pace with rapid changes in streaming formats
and video resolutions, increased emphasis on
virtualisation, and helping customers maintain
a balance between adding new value-
added services, such as 4K, while controlling
costs. Elemental software-defined video
frees video providers from the constraints of
dedicated equipment by allowing for the best
architecture and processor combination to
be used for a particular application – even if
that application changes over time. Another
challenge is supporting customers contending
with increased demand for value add time-
shifted services, adapting those for multiscreen
“Transcoding is not a creative task, it needs to be fast, reliable and automated”
Owen Walker, root6 Technology
42 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
Transcoding Forum
viewing, monetising live services with targeted
advertising, and managing multiple content
delivery networks and network topologies. This
necessitates a new class of video infrastructure.
At IBC, Elemental introduced the Elemental
Delta video delivery platform that helps content
owners and distributors add new time-shifted
services, reduce distribution costs and more
precisely manage content in multiscreen
delivery deployments.
Devlin: This depends on the defi nition of second
screen. A presentation at Broadcast Asia from
Twitter confi dently stated that the only second
screen app of signifi cance was Twitter. Other
defi nitions of second screen include dedicated
apps and multi-view experiences for the
consumer. Many of these contain different media
to the fi rst screen and so have undoubtedly
increased the volume of transcoders required.
It has also added a new dimension in the
complexity of transcoding to be delivered. More
versions of more content packaged to more
deliverables with more automation and more
metadata more cheaply.
Sassoli: Advertising remains the primary revenue
source for the TV industry – representing 57.6 per
cent of total global ad spend in the latter half of
2013. Fortunately, the unicast nature of multiscreen
adaptive bitrate delivery of content provides
operators with a wealth of new opportunities to
create a more personalised ad engagement
experience in the multiscreen environment that, in
turn, drives revenue. RGB’s AIM is a leading alternate
content monetisation platform that enables relevant
advertising in realtime, across all video stream types,
on subscribers’ preferred viewing devices.
Bruce Devlin, Dalet Simone Sassoli, RGB Networks
Has the growing use of second screens made any impact when it comes to transcoding equipment and standards?
TVBEurope 43November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Transcoding Forum
Turner: It has certainly driven the demand for
high speed, parallel encoding at multiple bit
rates. We have specifi cally targeted a transcode
product at this area, focussing on high fan-out
encoding from a single input encode.
Walker: The explosion of media consumption
equals more platforms, equals more material,
equals more transcoding needs. The requirement
to transcode media in an effi cient and timely
manner requires the transcoding product to be
able to manage and scale to meet the ever-
growing demand for content in different formats
for different platforms. Keeping track of ever-
increasing versions of fi le-based material requires
a product which not only transcodes, but also
manages the overall workfl ow keeping track of all
media assets. The key to enabling new workfl ow
paradigms is to have a toolset which will allow the
end user to build and design their own workfl ows –
which will then automate multi-platform delivery.
Wymbs: Absolutely. Two cases in point include
the high-effi ciency video coding – HEVC/H.265
– compression approach and software-defi ned
video processing. HEVC is expected to become
the video standard of choice for the next decade.
It will fi nd widespread adoption in streaming,
broadcast, satellite, cable, IPTV, surveillance,
corporate video and gaming applications before
the end of the decade. As with each generation
of video compression technology before it, HEVC
promises to reduce the overall cost of delivering
and storing video assets while maintaining or
increasing the quality of experience for the viewer.
Without sacrifi cing video quality, HEVC can
reduce the size of a video fi le or bit stream by as
much as 50 per cent compared to AVC/H.264
or as much as 75 per cent compared to MPEG-2
standards. This results in reduced video storage
and transmission costs and also paves the way
for higher defi nition content to be delivered for
high-quality-of-experience consumer consumption
for new value-add multiscreen and 4K services.
When it comes to Software-Defi ned Video
Processing, keeping pace with rapid changes in
technology and consumer demand is a signifi cant
challenge to video providers as they try to address
a plethora of internet-connected devices. Relying
on traditional video processing infrastructure is
becoming increasingly diffi cult and costly, yet
video distributors simply do not have the option of
ignoring demand for multiscreen video services as
they risk permanent loss of customers to internet-
based OTT alternatives. Software-defi ned video
solutions offer a way around the tradeoff between
the need for long-term investments in technology
for video delivery and the expectation of short-
term return on investment. Software-defi ned
video is an infrastructure agnostic approach
to implementing fl exible, scalable and easily
upgradable video architectures.
Devlin: On the human front, the increasing
number of engineers who truly understand
storage and networking issues has made the
transcoding vendor’s life less diffi cult. Virtualisation
and network licensing solutions have made life
easier and more fl exible for the operational life
of the transcode customer. The mass roll-out of
contribution grade HD IP-streaming directly into
live transcoders is, however, still some years off
and remains an exotic solution today. I personally
wonder if the real, long-term solution will end up
using the cloud for this type of application.
Eksten: This is where all the excitement exists
today. The broad perspective at looking at IP
or IT, whatever term you use, is that there’s an
opportunity to benefi t from the economy of scale.
As the computers get faster, as the networks get
faster, as the prices come down, there’s the thought
that we are going to see cost savings and a fl exibility
for our infrastructure we never had previously. But
there’s a reality that is attached to that, which is
that these systems were not really designed for the
type of work that we do. If you look at IP, it is a ‘best
effort’ network. It is designed to robustly deliver
your emails, it is not designed to deliver every single
frame or frame boundaries. And especially if you
start talking about UHD, it becomes really scary. So
we fi nd ourselves at this crossroads, where we have
Brick Eksten, Imagine Communications
Keith Wymbs, Elemental
Does the increasing use of IP technology make any diff erence to transcoding practices?
44 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
Transcoding Forum
customers integrating islands of IT or IP into their
systems – where it makes sense – then trying to plan
a roadmap of how they are going to transition to
everything. I think it is incredibly exciting because it
creates opportunities for new product categories,
new technologies.
Wymbs: Absolutely. A good example of the
opportunity and challenge of IP video and the vital
role played by software-defi ned video processing
is found in the pay-TV market. Consumers of
video have the power today. By and large,
they decide when, where, and how they watch
their videos. Pay-TV providers are accelerating
their IP-based video services to compete more
effectively with rapidly emerging OTT providers.
But there’s an Achilles’ heel in many operators’ TV
Everywhere game plans – few or no live channels.
To keep a competitive edge, pay-TV operators
need an offensive strategy that enables them to
easily ready their technology infrastructures for
live linear streaming at the lowest possible total
cost of ownership. Hardware-based approaches
lack the agility and elasticity to get the job done.
Pay-TV providers enriching their current services
with premium live-linear streaming services can
strengthen their competitive position and speed up
time to market by deploying SDVP architectures as
the core of their next-generation infrastructures.
Devlin: There are two angles – technical impact
and business impact. A well-designed transcode
platform should offer the fault tolerant, fl exible
performance required to scale independently
of where it is actually running. Dalet AmberFin
has worked hard to achieve a resilient platform
that can scale from a small laptop to hundreds
of nodes in a facility or in a cloud. This technical
versatility makes the main impact of cloud a
business decision on resource allocation rather
than a technical one of making it work. Many
companies still prefer the owner-operator
model where all of their content stays within
the physical boundaries of their facility during
a transcode. Others are experimenting with
cloud to discover the techno-commercial
benefi ts. There isn’t a one-shoe-fi ts-all way to get
a win-win for every transcoder vendor and all
transcoder users.
Eksten: Yes, it has. Part of that change started
four or fi ve years ago when we began thinking
‘what is the value to the customer?’ When you
think about the systems we are trying to use in a
cloud environment, they don’t exactly meet our
requirements in broadcast. In an IP environment,
it’s all designed around ‘best effort’. When you
take that into the cloud, it gets that much more
challenging and so what we fi nd ourselves
having to do is look at the opportunities.
Spending more time encoding a feature
because we can do it in the cloud means we
can do it more easily. And if we are managing
all of our queues, and our pipeline from end to
end, then we know when we can squeeze it
into the overall workfl ow.
Sassoli: The IPTV industry has fi nally embraced
the cloud. And, at RGB Networks, we recognise
how open source projects like this can help
promote the use of standard APIs which
make it much easier for vendor-to-vendor
integration and for video service providers
to migrate to a cloud-based video delivery
model. We have just announced that we
are developing an open source version of
our popular TransAct Transcoder. Called
‘RipCode Transcoder’, the new, cloud-enabled
software transcoder will provide RGB Networks’
customers with greater control, integration
and fl exibility in their video delivery workfl ows.
In a pioneering move, and harnessing the
industry momentum toward developing
cloud-based solutions, RGB Networks is actively
welcoming operators and vendors to be part
of a community of contributors to the open
source project.
Turner: Customers are showing great interest in
the idea of transcoding in the cloud. It certainly
makes sense for many of them, but we feel
that in most cases, this technology will be used
for peak throughput management and
quarantined deployments. Peak management
in the sense that customers will continue to
have suffi cient capacity on premise to handle
their typical workload, but will cope with
peak demand by spinning up transcode farms
in the cloud. Others will use the cloud to allow
them to quickly bring new services online in a
secure, siloed fashion – quarantining the new
service from their run-rate operations until
such time as they feel they want to pull that
work on-premise. The cloud is not a cure-all,
though. Customers should carefully consider
the time and cost of transferring assets up to
the cloud service, and to download the
output fi les back to their own facilities. The costs
can be quite high, and the transfer times
can be quite long.
Walker: Cloud transcoding is the natural
evolution to enable vast server farms to scale
the encoding of fi les quickly and effi ciently.
However, there are some challenges at this
present time. Getting large media fi les to
and from the cloud storage is a challenge,
fast internet access is an absolute requirement,
and fi le delivery WAN acceleration tools must
be deployed. The cloud storage itself needs
to be able to support the bandwidth to
encode large media fi les and the servers
themselves need to be high-end machines to
enable fast processing. As network bandwidth
increases, cloud transcoding will become
more obtainable for many media companies.
One of the most interesting aspects of cloud
processing is the ability to subscribe to
Owen Walker, root6 Technology Paul Turner, Telestream
“To keep a competitive edge, pay-TV operators need an offensive strategy
that enables them to easily ready their technology infrastructures for live linear
streaming at the lowest possible total cost of ownership”
Keith Wymbs, Elemental
What impact has ‘the cloud’ had on transcoding practices?
TVBEurope 45November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Transcoding Forum
a cloud service on an ‘as needed’ basis:
a‘Software as a Service’ model rather than
using capital expenditure.
Wymbs: Video processing in the cloud provides
the scalability required to seamlessly add
capacity in order to keep pace with growth,
while also providing the elasticity to quickly
adjust capacity as demand fl uctuates. And
while costs can sometimes be higher for cloud-
based solutions on a per-asset basis, overall
costs can be optimised to accommodate
spikes in the demand. This improves business
planning, eliminates fi nancial risk and replaces
capital investments with operational expenses,
which often align expenses with revenues more
tightly. With a cloud video processing service,
such as the Elemental Cloud Platform as a
Service, users have more control than ever.
Businesses can experiment with offerings
before fully committing to large capital
investments and they can manage fl uctuations
in demand with ease rather than over-buying
processing capacity as a risk-mitigation
measure for the business.
Devlin: Increasing use of the smart toolbox such
as (AT)3 from Dalet AmberFin. As transcoding
becomes ‘manufacture on demand’, the role of
a smart transcoder will be to match the available
resources to each job’s requirements. (AT)3
shows how a toolbox can be created that gives
different performance depending on the source
material and the execution environment – CPU/
GPU/cloud. Ultimately, it’s a business decision to
match the best resources to the money-making
content. A modern transcode farm underpinned
by great IPR allows this to happen.
Eksten: On the hardware side, I think we will
continue to see solutions driving density and
quality, and, therefore, cost. You are going
to see much more dense platforms that are
going to be more easily traded off between
the number of streams and the quality of
those streams. So a little bit of that software
style of fl exibility, but in very dense and lower
powered hardware packages. On the software
side, we are going to see continued drive for
optimisation. We are still learning about visual
acuity – how people perceive content – and I
think there have been some real breakthroughs
over the last 12 months or so that are allowing us
to drive even greater compression.
Turner: We see transcoding as much more
than just converting media from one format to
another. We’re already producing products that
work in conjunction with Vantage’s transcoding
capabilities to reduce the repetitive operations
required of many creative personnel in various
workfl ows, and I think you’ll see an expansion of
that role continuing as we move forward.
Walker: As fi le-based delivery becomes
the norm, having comprehensive delivery
specifi cations will be paramount. At root6, we
have implemented a complete DPP workfl ow
solution with our ContentAgent product. From
creating the AVC-I essence to metadata
insertion tools to visual and fi le-based QC,
we have got it covered.
What is the next innovation we can expect relating to transcoding?
46 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
“The number of firsts we’re seeing in
the Second Quarter, 2014 State of the
Internet Report make this a particularly
interesting quarter,” commented David Belson,
editor of the report. “We’ve experienced our first
quarterly decrease in global unique IP address
counts, the global average connection speed has
risen above the 4Mbps broadband threshold, and
Akamai’s customers experienced a reduction in
the likelihood of repeat DDoS attacks.”
The global average connection speed
increased 21 per cent from the first to second
quarter of the year and, at 4.6Mbps, exceeded
the 4Mbps ‘broadband’ threshold for the first time.
For the second consecutive quarter, Switzerland
topped the European country listing, just ahead
of the Netherlands, with an average connection
speed of 14.9Mbps. Sustained quarter-over-
quarter growth was observed in all European
countries; France had the lowest growth rate at
7.4 per cent, while Romania achieved the biggest
increase at 27 per cent. Impressive year-over-year
gains were observed in all European countries,
ranging from a low of 22 per cent in Austria and
Italy to a high of 58 per cent in Ireland.
Average peak connection speeds in all
European countries surveyed also saw significant
quarter-over-quarter growth. Romania came out
top, with an average peak connection speed
in excess of 60Mbps, while significant quarter-
over-quarter increases pushed the Netherlands,
Switzerland and Belgium above 50Mbps.
The global high broadband (>10Mbps)
adoption rate continued to see strong growth
in the second quarter of 2014, reaching 23 per
cent thanks to a 12 per cent increase during the
quarter. In Europe, Switzerland, the Netherlands
and Romania recorded rates of 50 per cent or
more and, with the exception of Italy, all countries
in the region achieved high broadband adoption
rates above ten per cent. Positive quarter-
over-quarter changes were observed across all
surveyed countries. Finland was the only country
to see its high broadband adoption rate increase
by less than ten per cent, growing just five per
cent from the first quarter, while the highest growth
rate was seen in Portugal (up 92 per cent).
The global broadband (>4Mbps) adoption rate
grew by 5.6 per cent quarter-over-quarter to reach
59 per cent. In Europe, Romania, Denmark and the
Netherlands joined Switzerland to become the only
surveyed countries in the region with a broadband
adoption rate of 90 per cent or more. Once again
all European countries had broadband adoption
rates above 50 per cent. A review of the quarter-
over-quarter changes reveal that these were
positive but limited, with only Norway and Italy
growing by more than ten per cent. The smallest
quarterly increases (less than one per cent) were
seen in the United Kingdom and France.
4K readinessFollowing the introduction of the ‘4K readiness’
metric in the First Quarter, 2014 State of the
Internet Report, Akamai has again identified
countries that are most likely to sustain connection
State of the internetAkamai Technologies has released its Second Quarter, 2014 State of the Internet Report. The report provides insight into key global statistics such as connection speeds and broadband adoption across fixed and mobile networks, overall attack traffic, global 4K readiness, IPv4 exhaustion and IPv6 implementation, and traffic patterns across leading web properties and digital media providers
Data Centre
The global average connection speed increased 21 per cent from the first to second quarter of the year
TVBEurope 47November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Data Centre
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speeds above 15Mbps, as Ultra HD adaptive
bitrate streams typically require bandwidth
between ten and 20Mbps. The fi ndings do not
account for other ‘readiness’ factors, such as the
availability of 4K-encoded content or 4K-capable
televisions and media players.
This quarter the majority of European countries
had more than ten per cent of their connections
to Akamai at speeds above 15Mbps, with the
top three countries (Switzerland, the Netherlands
and Sweden) seeing more than a quarter of their
connections at those speeds. Switzerland’s 33
per cent 4K readiness rate was the highest seen
in the region. Both Portugal and Romania saw 4K
readiness rates more than double quarter-over-
quarter, while the smallest increase was seen in
Finland (14 per cent).
Under attackAkamai maintains a distributed set of
unadvertised agents deployed across the internet
to log connection attempts that the company
classifi es as attack traffi c. Based on the data
collected by these agents, Akamai is able to
identify the top countries from which attack traffi c
originates, as well as the top ports targeted by
these attacks. It is important to note, however,
that the originating country as identifi ed by the
source IP address may not represent the nation in
which an attacker resides.
The European region experienced a modest
quarter-over-quarter decline of 14 per cent, with 49
reported attacks in the second quarter, down from
57 reported attacks in the fi rst quarter.
IPv6 adoptionIn the second quarter of 2014, more than 788
million IPv4 addresses from more than 238 unique
countries/regions connected to the Akamai
Intelligent Platform. For the fi rst time in the history of
the State of the Internet Report, the global unique IP
address count declined quarter-over-quarter, by a
nominal 0.9 per cent.
“Though even a minimal quarter-to-quarter
decline is unusual in the history of this report,
we see no reason for concern,” said Belson. “It
may be due to providers working to conserve
limited IPv4 address space, or likely was a result
of increased IPv6 connectivity and adoption
among leading network providers. That said,
globally, 69 per cent of countries and regions still
showed year-over-year increases in unique IPv4
address counts.”
European countries continued to dominate
the IPv6 adoption list, holding seven of the top
10 positions. IPv6 traffi c volumes more than
doubled from the previous quarter in the Czech
Republic and were up by more than a third
in Belgium. Romania and Germany however,
saw IPv6 adoption levels decline quarter-over-
quarter, with Germany dropping 25 per cent.
This, however, is due to the IPv4 request count
growing more aggressively than the IPv6 request
count, resulting in a decline in the calculated
percentage of IPv6 traffi c.
“ 69 per cent of countries and regions still showed year-over-year increases in
unique IPv4 address counts” David Belson, Akamai
48 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
The European TV industry is one of the most
vibrant environments in the world, offering
signifi cant, untapped potential. Across the
region, viewers are eager for quality content and
are prepared to pay for the privilege. This makes
Europe an immensely valuable region for the TV
industry, worth in excess of $130 billion* a year.
With 750 million people, 53 countries, 28
currencies and billions of IP devices, connecting
European subscribers to content is complex,
and competition is fi erce. Several streaming
services expanded their footprint on the
continent this year: Germany’s Sky Deutschland
has launched Snap; Italy’s Mediaset is standing
behind its Infi nity offering; and France’s Canal+
has launched CanalPlay. And as Netfl ix picks
up the pace of its signifi cant European roll-out,
TV operators across Europe are preparing a
counter-attack to respond to the demands of
an increasingly connected and media-savvy
audience. But it is too little, too late?
There are signifi cant hurdles to overcome for
TV executives looking to expand their breadth
of reach across Europe, not least because
launching in new markets also comes with a
price tag. From the cost per hour of production
to content agreements and legal restrictions,
there are many regional variations that must
be factored into the go-to-market plan. When
crossing borders, content expenditures are
considerable, and acquiring rights must be
carried out on a territory-by-territory basis.
To understand how companies are adapting
to the challenges and potential offered by the
region, Clearleap commissioned some exclusive,
high-level research and interviewed over 30
European TV operators to understand how
they are approaching the demands of content
without borders.
The headline fi nding was that OTT and TV-over-
IP services are already well established, at least
in a 1.0 version. Forty-eight per cent of operators
surveyed stated they had already launched an
OTT service in some form, while a further 45 per
cent had launched a SVOD/TVE service.
For TV executives, OTT clearly presents a
tremendous opportunity to reduce churn, increase
subscribers, and generate new revenue streams.
Content without bordersMonetising the European pay-TV revolution
Data Centre
Braxton Jarratt, CEO of Clearleap, discusses his company’s recent study which outlines the changing face of service delivery among European pay-TV providers
“As Netfl ix picks up the pace of its signifi cant European roll-out, TV
operators across Europe are preparing a counter-attack to respond to the demands
of an increasingly connected and media-savvy audience”
With 750 million people, 53 countries, 28 currencies and billions of IP devices, connecting European subscribers to content is complex, and competition is fi erce
TVBEurope 49November 2014 www.tvbeurope.com
Data Centre
When asked to describe how they currently
manage their business processes to offer TV
services to subscribers, the majority (65 per cent)
said they used a partner. When asked about their
future plans, the overwhelming consensus
(87 per cent) were considering increasing
the use of partner providers.
Today’s TV executives are relying on partners
to pick up the technology heavy-lifting so
they can focus on their core content and
services business while also delivering slick
streaming solutions across a growing number
of devices and platforms. When tied together
correctly, multiscreen video logistics can help
TV operators ramp up to a 2.0 OTT/TVE
monetisation model.
For pioneers able to combine great content
and effective delivery within a viable business
model, the rewards are signifi cant. For those that
don’t meet consumer demands, it’s clear that
others will. In an era where content lives without
borders, now is the time to bring innovative new
services to an eager market.
* iDate: http://www.idate.org/en/Research-store/
Current TV services being offered
50 TVBEurope www.tvbeurope.com November 2014
When it comes to planning the evolution
and development strategy of any
organisation, a clear vision of the future
is necessary. However, without a crystal
ball how can we know precisely what the
future will hold? As an organisation, Marquis
Media Partners helps organisations shape
their future through strategic technology
planning, change management and
deployment for organisations working in
media and broadcast. With this in mind,
we wanted to fi nd out where the industry
was on their future thinking and therefore
commissioned two separate surveys of
broadcast executives in 2014.
We completed our fi rst survey earlier
this year and ‘changes in consumer
viewing habits’ was shown to be the
greatest business challenge, while ‘content
management and distribution across
multiple platforms’ led in terms of the
greatest operational and technology
challenges faced by the industry today.
However, in our most recent survey,
completed in August, we wanted to delve
deeper and fi nd out why such issues were
infl uencing business strategy. We questioned
over 100 senior executives in the sector
about their businesses’ most pressing issues.
Respondents were at director level or CTOs
from broadcasters from the UK, Europe and
the rest of the world.
Some of the results were unsurprising with
many respondents citing uncertainty about the
future as a challenge. Forty per cent stated that
there was uncertainty about what technology to
invest in to satisfy customer needs and more than
half (53 per cent) said that ‘keeping up with the
pace of change’ is an issue.
Changing viewing habitsMany view change positively. Most (55 per cent)
see changes in viewing habits as an opportunity.
However, 37 per cent agreed with the statement:
‘we are unsure how to drive our technology
strategy to remain fl exible for whatever
emerges.’ When it comes to making a profi t 41
per cent of respondents were unsure how to
monetise the new opportunities.
Yet, although what the future will bring is unclear,
the good news is that many organisations are
taking steps to address this pressing issue. More
than half (58 per cent) of fi rms either have a
team dedicated to addressing this challenge
or have already started working with partner
organisations to fi ll the knowledge/resource
gap. However, 11 per cent are concerned their
organisation is doing nothing or changes in
viewing habits have not been addressed yet and
this does raise concerns. “The company I work
for is stubbornly trying to ignore the signs,” stated
one respondent. For those organisations who are
not yet embracing the need to change, the fear
is that they will simply be left behind.
Resources do seem to be one of the key
challenges with 41 per cent stating ‘to meet
our vision we need more resources’.
Similarly, 28 per cent said: ‘it is diffi cult with the
expertise and experience we have to identify
the way forward.” One respondent commented:
“[I am] concerned that we do not have enough
staff or budget to shift the business.”
However, for most, the challenge is mainly
about uncertainty: ‘It is diffi cult to keep up with
what the next big thing in viewing habits will be’
(53 per cent). In addition, the pace of change
is certainly on people’s minds: “The industry is
changing too fast for large companies to keep
pace,” one respondent commented.
What we do know is that the industry is
developing and there is good news that the
majority of organisations are adapting and
attempting to move forward by anticipating
the new nature of future viewing habits even
if they are not yet sure precisely what these
will look like. As one respondent said: “I
intend to be one of the survivors.” It seems
that whatever the future holds, change will
be the only certainty.
Change is the only certainty
By Andrew Ioannou, partner, Marquis Media Partners
Data Centre
53 per cent said that ‘keeping up with the pace of change’ is an issue