In Broadcast - November 2015 - 70

www.inbroadcast.com | Vol: 5 - Issue 11 | November 2015

InForm

Report Finds 'Broadcast Quality'
Is Determined By Viewers
At the upcoming SMPTE conference in LA, Co-founder & CMO of Archimedia Technology,
Josef Marc, will present a paper that challenges current perception of 'broadcast quality'...

ccording to Archimedia CMO Josef
Marc, 'Broadcast quality' is now
being determined by the viewer, not
broadcasters. Broadcast quality, which
has traditionally been a standard that
television engineers have strived to
achieve, is being superseded by the
choices of consumers in their devices.
In his presentation at the conference
Marc will recall the mostly-forgotten
origins
of
'broadcast
quality'.
According to Marc, in the early days of
television the advertising community
needed a standard for 'broadcast
quality' so they could be sure their
commercials were seen in the best
possible light.

Altered Model
Standards bodies like SMPTE and
NTSC helped define what the viewers
would see. Marc says: "After a TV
commercial ran, broadcasters had to
send advertisers a record of when an
ad ran, as well as TV technical specs
that were achieved. If the specs were
not 'broadcast quality,' the advertiser
might not pay."
But as Marc looks to the present, that
model no longer applies: "Consumers
don't care if it's right, they care how
it makes them feel. Advertisers and
subscription services will compete to
satisfy them. Today smart television
sets have powerful controls over what

Archimedia Iris
File-based
workflow
requires
more coordination because file
components are worked on in
parallel. But because file work is also
done in many geographic locations
and needs to support hundreds of file
variations, new tools are needed.
"People who are involved with
file-based workflow recognize these
areas immediately," said Mark Gray,
CEO of Archimedia. "They are places
in file-based workflow that are
fundamentally different than linear
workflow, and where unprecedented
challenges slow things down."
Archimedia engineers examined
file-based video production from all
angles, built applications, and tested
them at 14 beta sites. The result is
Iris, a suite of applications designed

to change six key areas of delay
into areas where workflow can be
accelerated.
The six workflow points of delay
identified include:
* Coordinating Multiple Locations;
* Coordinating Parallel
Component Work;
* Speeding the Approval Process;
* Juggling Video File Formats;
* Resolving Video File
QC Problems;
* Resolving Mistakes and Disputes.
Iris provides a suite of integrated
applications that give content
production and distribution teams
the tools they need to turn these
points of delay into points of
workflow acceleration.

the consumer sees, so 'broadcast
quality' is now more in the hands of
the consumers than broadcasters."
The driver of this change is the
growing sophistication of today's
smart TV sets which offer a wide
variety of 'modes' to shape the
viewers' experience. From the
technical view, these modes are
complex
algorithms
combining
a variety of visual and aural
characteristics, including contrast,
brightness,
edge
enhancements,
colour range, audio processing, motion
blur repair, and even upscaling normal
High Definition to Ultra High Definition
and High Dynamic Range. Once a
consumer engages a mode, a wide
variety of technical adjustments takes
place that shapes what the consumer
experiences.
Marc says: "When looked at from this
point of view, the viewer experience is
no longer shaped by a standard that is
adhered to at the point of broadcast,
but by the powerful digital processing
within today's smart TV sets, smart
phones, smart tablets, and smart
personal computers.
Quality Plus
At the end of Marc's paper he will
look into the future: "We've reached
a point where basic quality is a given,
and as we look to the near future,
viewers will also be able to opt in for

expanded audio and visual experiences
including High Dynamic Range (HDR),
UHD and 4K, expanding the colour
gamut, and even a 'Director's Look' to
complement a Director's Cut version of
a movie. Perhaps we'll choose to watch
a 1980's science fiction classic in its
original look, but with sound processed
by the TV to match next year's latest
object-oriented theatrical type sound
system, just because we can."
Modes and enhanced viewing
experiences will become more and
more important. The term 'broadcast
quality' has moved from the hands of
the broadcaster to the hands of the
consumer.
Archimedia
(Archimediatech.com)
was started by television industry
veterans Mark Gray, Josef Marc, and
Chi-Long Tsang whose collaboration
at other companies brought many
technical innovations to the television
market.
Archimedia's first product was Atlas,
a reference file player that can play
almost any file and make it look right.
Today, Atlas is in use all over the world
at major broadcast facilities. Building
on that success, Archimedia released
Iris, a software suite of applications
that speeds file-based workflow by
enabling file workers, anywhere in the
world, working on almost any file type,
to collaborate in a frame accurate
environment.

http://www.inbroadcast.com http://www.Archimediatech.com https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9GSLq0CopU

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