November 2013 www.tvbeurope.com


The forecast for usefulness of the cloud come IBC2014-time remains, well... cloudy


TVBEurope 15 IBC Wrap-Up AVB to the rescue


Set to ease the transition from broadcast-specific to IT-generic is AVB, or Audio Video Bridging, an IEEE standards initiative providing for time-critical, uncompressed baseband sound and/or vision to be carried over standard IP networks. AVB is applicable to wireless and wired communications, using copper or fibre infrastructure, so the media can be flexed to suit what needs to be carried. A number of broadcast industry names (Avid, Axon, Barco, Calrec, Cisco,


With the fire-sale on 3D TV over, the


shelves at the Amsterdam RAI had been swiftly restocked with 4K TV


Quality Control IBC saw the launch of the EBU ‘periodic table’ of QC criteria for file-based AV content. Circa 160 tests have been scoped, with 50 or so defined in detail. Identified tests fall into four categories — Regulatory, Absolute (against a particular standard), Objective (quantifiable, but not necessarily having an applicable standard) and Subjective (may require human eyes and ears) and exist in one, or more, layers — Baseband, Bitstream, Wrapper, Cross-check (that values in the other three layers are in agreement). Ten vendors are actively participating in the surrounding project and the results are expected to dovetail into the next part of the Framework for Interoperability of Media Services (FIMS) initiative and become part of UK Digital Production


Partnership (DPP) AS-11 standard for programme delivery. Ongoing arguments about how


much longer movie images will be captured on film media and whether cinema audiences should continue to be served the ‘film look’ aside, 4K/UHD-1 brings with it the best opportunity yet for convergence of master image capture between movies and TV. Movie content forms an obvious and ongoing source of potential content for UHD-1 broadcasters. The source most often suggested at IBC, however, was live sports. The exchange of signals at baseband has always been a staple of live sports production. Equipment interfaces are ubiquitous and content moves, predictably, in realtime. One of the great hopes for file-


based working has always been that it would be somehow faster than baseband (and tapes), faster


than realtime. In practice, with the large file sizes associated with high definition content, this hope is not always realised. The cumulative latencies in processes of nonlinear editing, transcoding, file-packaging, staging, QC, network transfers, more staging, anti-virus checking, even more staging, can be considerable. Where significant collaborative working between production partners and service providers is involved, this matter is already a concern with HD pictures. Expect it to become a real issue with UHD.


Simple things take time For most broadcasters, the replacement of VTR-based technology with video servers for short-form replay has long since happened and was accomplished relatively swiftly. In 2013, delivery


of short-form content as files is the norm, however much trafficking/delivery of long-form content remains on videotape. So what news of the work-a-day replacement for these transmission-ready videotapes, with their attached record reports? One notable success in this


regard is that of the UK Digital Production Partnership (DPP) in its drawing together of major UK broadcasters around a common set of technical requirements for file-based programme delivery. Key to the success of the DPP AS-11 standard, as it is known, is its simplicity and recognition of the crucial part that metadata has to play in the modern, broadcast ecosystem. Boiling down the ‘standards soup’ into only two base format choices and utilising the combined experience of practitioner participants has delivered an accessible and very practicable result.


While on the subject of DPP


at IBC, it also recently released the last in the trilogy of its ‘Revolution’ series of reports, this time aimed at shining the spotlight on another piece of Amsterdam fluff — the cloud. Where once we used to debate


what was meant by Media Asset Management (MAM), we now do the same for the cloud. Should the cloud be characterised as something technical — storage, networks, software applications, or something more editorially- friendly? Either way, the vibe from visitors on the show floor and the conclusions of the report were in general agreement. The forecast for usefulness of the cloud come IBC2014-time remains, well... cloudy.


Bio:


Mark Hill is an industry consultant at Ixedia Ltd, www.ixedia.co.uk


Dolby, to name a few) have come together in the ‘AVnu Alliance’ to lend practical support to the project. What future then for baseband audio and video routers, that have been getting larger and ever more dense over the years? If AVB becomes mainstream, router and mixer manufacturers (and by association, manufacturers of cameras, servers, and graphics on the source side and encoders and monitoring on the destination side) will have some serious re-engineering to do. – Mark Hill


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