HDTV progress abroad

[infocus]

Some recent surfing revealed some interesting facts about changing TV technology elsewhere in the world, especially connected with progress towards HDTV transmissions elsewhere, and it surprised me it hasn't been more generally reported.

In particular, I note the BBC reported on the 1st Dec 2003 that "Japanese viewers get digital TV" - ( http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/tv_and_radio/3252992.stm ) and quoted that "The UK, US, Sweden, Australia and South Korea already have the technology."

Errr, not quite, BBC. Go directly to NHK ( http://www.nhk.or.jp/digital/en/ ) and one can see that what the Japanese have got on DTT is true High Definition broadcasting, and it appears that the plan is to turn off their analogue network by 2011 - when it seems Japan will be an HDTV country!

I know that the main Australian networks have also been simulcasting HDTV for some months now on DTT, and understand that they have also done successful trials with mobile SDTV reception, which the 2k carrier system used in the UK is not suited for.

Perhaps the BBC report should have said that the UK "already has an early, inferior version of the Japanese technology"!? I've further read about the blue laser DVD replacement formats being developed specifically for HDTV movies, and HD camcorders for the consumer - JVC already having product on sale.

It all makes me wonder why so little is normally heard of this in the UK. (Perhaps it could form a Computer Video article!?) Do the broadcasters here have any plans to move to HD, or will they be forced to anyway when "Eastenders" etc look poor alongside the latest feature film on Blu-Ray!? Any Australian readers have any comment on whats happening over there?

If it's a question of bandwidth, I would happily trade the majority of Freeview channels to get the major ones in HD!

[Z Cheema]

Unfortunately the word digital & quality seem to come out in the same breath, whereas this is not the case, digital processing is just an encoding process and if done well will represent the signal faithfully. As we have come to see, we don't have the same old problems of generation loss, we now have new ones of data loss, quantization errors.

The new digital transmissions help make better use of the existing radio spectrum and of course help make more money, there is room in the spec to allow for better HD transmission, but it takes up more room, so instead of up to six TV channels in one group you can get one HD. Also bear in mind it will be all change on the equipment front and so more cost for us, and then what next ?

[Z Cheema]

A bit more on the BBC site http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3403493.stm

I would take the technical details with a bit of salt as anyone who writes

"Traditional analogue TV is made up of magnetic waves that are sent through the air, and it is a far from perfect technology."

yeah like the signals from Voyager, Sky, mobile phones, & Wi-Fi transmissions use the same method called Electromagnetic waves and they manage OK.

[infocus]

Taken with my example, you would hope that the BBC would be more accurate technically - especially when writing about broadcasting issues!

The article does reinforce the point though - the manufacturers aren't spending all this money on development for the fun of it. They anticipate that within 5-10 years big money will be being spent, and must assume that content will be available. Apart from pre-recorded disc, Japan, Australia and the US have HDTV transmission plans, and maybe the increased availability of hardware will sway currently uncommitted countries when they come to decide.

So - to return to my original post - where does this leave the UK? Have we closed the stable door in favour of a load of extra (largely unwatched) channels? Will we produce programmes in HD in future for foreign sales, whilst we have to put up with viewing them in an inferior form?

Incidentally, in your original reply you said "bear in mind it will be all change on the equipment front and so more cost for us". My understanding from the Australian sites is that an HDTV RECEIVER (ie set top box) is not neccessarily any more expensive than one for SD, and will give an SD output. Hence on an analogue switch off, viewers are no worse off than they would be in the UK, and, of course, can buy an HD display as and when they choose. Just because a signal is broadcast in HD doesn't mean it HAS to be displayed on an expensive display.

[Z Cheema]

"Just because a signal is broadcast in HD doesn't mean it HAS to be displayed on an expensive display."

Well..... in fact it does Infocus, otherwise what is the point. Remember our sets are 625 lines and a vertical resulution of an average TV of about 400 lines (VHS -240) nowhere near the 700 at TX end. So PAL viewed on good equipment at the head end would look incredible.
Lets look at film, that's High Def and yet when you get it on your TV you can see the difference, but you will never get the whole experience as the TV just cannot resolve it, even if you had a TV projector it would be no better. Apart from the resolution ,also the dynamic range of video s no where near film.

High Def in japan was I think 1250 lines so a visible difference, add to that more dynamic range and you can see why the whole TX chain needs to be changed including your home TV.

The leading company in the UK, who gave us Colour, Teletext, Nicam is the BBC who normally lead in this type of progress, but I believe the engineering dept is a former shadow of itself.

[infocus]

Sorry, I should have been clearer - that sentence referred to when the analogue switch off happened.

You're quite right in that displaying the signal on an old tv wouldn't yield much benefit BUT would mean that people who couldn't afford a new set wouldn't be forced to buy one, whilst people who could afford an expensive display would reap the benefits. With the current situation UK viewers don't have the option of choosing an expensive/high quality option if they wish.

What I'm really trying to say is that a HD signal may be displayed to full effect on the main TV in a house, but can also be seen on cheap tv's in kitchens, bedrooms etc. A bit like being able to listen to CD's on a range of players. If you can afford expensive CD decks, fine, if not, you can still listen, albeit in lower fidelity.

[Z Cheema]

The BBC did at one time consider Fractal TV, that way no matter what set you watched on, the signal would only decode to your resolution, and allowing up to very high res.
(http://www.fortunecity.com/emachines/e11/86/pracfrac.html)

Maybe we will see HD as technology progresses, but as it is of no commercial benefit to the TV companies they will not be in a hurry to move in that direction if no financial benefit is to be had. There is still the question of spec's

high quality radio is now available via DAB (another BBC lead), but not many commercial stations on it at the moment due to the limited amount of RX's out there, no doubt to change very soon as prices fall.

I went on one of the BBC test's listening to DAB on a coach , it was just like listening to your CD/Walkman player with a pair of headphones firmly attached, while the FM option you could hear the station fuzzing in and out to due multi path's and the stereo pilot hiss.

finger crossed for you, i to would like to see HD, perhaps we will get progressive TV first and then move on.


[This message has been edited by Z Cheema (edited 18 January 2004).]

[Alan Roberts at work]

Don't get me started on fractals and Peano scanning.....

Japan has been broadcasting HDTV since the mid 1980s, in analogue until about a year ago when they adopted the ATSC system devised in and for the US. Korea isn't yet fully launched but has been doing test broadcasts fior about a year. Australia launched a year ago, using the European DVB model. The US has been doing HDTV in digits for a few years, and now has a significant proportion of its transmitters doing it. the main networks have been the slowest to take it up, because of the cost of changinging theirn infrastructures. the leaders were small stations who could set up a minimla system with a vtr, a switcher, a coder and transmitter.

Europe has no plans for HDTV transmission at present. There is no way it can be done terrestrially until analogue is switched off, there's not enough bandwidth available. There is a European HD transmitter, called Euro-1080, started this year but it carries only one demo channel and one programme channel. It's available to broadcasters to use as a demo/test system and is run by Alphacam who have a significant fleet of HD OB vehicles and a sizeable studio base. There are several other companies with HDTV facilities on te road, and most of the London production houses have HD facilities.

There's a lot of HD production going on, far more than you'd imagine, much of it is for drama where co-producers want an HD output. The domestic viewer gets a better picture because it starts off with better cameras, better set up.

HD in Europe can't get much further until transmission standards are agreed, and that's a problem because we have lots of countries. There's universal rejection of the US system for two reasons; the coding (ATSC) is not as good as DVB for mobile (i.e. portable) reception; it's founded on NTSC frame rates. Europe will go to 50Hz like Australia and China when HD happens. But it doesn't stop there, the US is mostly working at 1920x1080 pixels (59.94Hz interlaced or 29.97 progressive)(2-megapixel frames) transmitted at about 19.3Mb/s MPEG. Some European countries would go to 1920x1080 at 50 (or 25p), sopme want to go to 1280x720 at 50p (with no interlace ever), some want to go to 720x576 at 50p (the US also has 1280x720 at 60 and 720x483 at 59.94p). So there's a way to go before we can get some form of agreement.

My money's on 1920x1080 at 50 or 60 progressive, with interlace completely dropped. That's for transmission, sigbnal sources could be anything, with appropriate conversions. The displays are already at all sorts of standards, few of the US displays actually run at 1920x1080 apart from the crt based ones.

I can drone on like this for ever, but I have work to do. If it's of interest to anyone, please post here again and I'll happily keep it going, oherwise I'll nod off again.......

[Z Cheema]

Most interesting and informative, nice to catch up on some details that have passed me by.

What news do you have on the fractal front, I had some software from a company called iterated i think, that allowed images to be fractelised.

[Alan Roberts at work]

Fractal scanning is a way of compressing files. I tried one for home use, but the files were only slightly smaller than LZW TIFF so I threw it out (because the files are not universally decodable, you need the fractal decompressor) and hard drive sizes continue to grow, so file size is much less important (to me anyway).

LZW (at least when used in ZIP) is a one-dimensional compressor, it works on the bitstream, whereas processes designed for images work in 2-d and are able to compress a bit harder. It is totally lossless, you get out exactly what you put in. For software and algorithm transmission that's what you want, but for images you can often accept quite a lot of lossy compression because of the curious ways the eye works. JPEG depends on that, and works quite well at lowish compression rates. It's when we get greedy that it all goes wrong, and MPEG does it in 3-d to hit it much harder. There are newer algorithms that do much better, WM9 is remarkable for how small the files are, and how good they look.

[infocus]

I, for one, would be very interested to hear more from you, Alan Roberts! Whilst I understand the principles, and the difference between progressive and interlaced, one thing has puzzled me. It appears that "progressive" seems to be a "good thing", so why are all HDTV standards not this way?

To be specific, there seem to be two favourite standards (in 50 HZ territories) - 720p (25Hz) and 1080i (50Hz) - so why not 1080p (25Hz), which I would assume to have the same data rate as 1080i (50Hz)? Also, can you point us towards any good technical, but not TOO technical, explanatory websites?

I have heard that one future pressure on European broadcasters will be next generation disc delivery, they won't be able to hold back for long when viewers get a much better product off disc than off air. You quote "there is no way it can be done terrestrially until analogue is switched off, there's not enough bandwidth available" - which raises two questions in my mind. Firstly, how therefore are the Americans, the Australians and the Japanese able to do it, and can we live in hope for once the analogue switch off does happen?!! My initial post was largely prompted by finding out how advanced the situation was in the leading countries, and I was also struck by what came across as the high level of viewer satisfaction in the US - seemingly far higher than that in the UK for DTT transmissions.

If you have any influence Alan, can I urge you to ask those responsible to at least start including a "would you want HDTV" question within general surveys. I suspect that one reason it is perceived in this country that "there is no general interest in HD" is because the public are never asked!

[Alan Roberts at work]

The US and Australia can do it because they are very big countries with only one language (effectively). Europe is a tightly connected set of displarate countries, our terrestrial transmissions have to mesh with each other to avoid disruption. Plus, American and Japan are doing HDTV mostly by satellite, so is Korea but they intend to have a terrestrial srevice as well for mobile use.

The problems with standards is that of bit-rates. At 1080 image is about 2Mpixels, and 720 image is about 1Mpixels, so you can run 720 at twice the franme rate of 1080 for the same transmission bit-rate. Proscan is good for film, and for thjose programme genres that want a film look (i.e. jerky motion). Interlace is good for all else, until the displays get really big, and the you want proscan but at much faster than 25Hz. 720 hasn't really taken off in the US because their HD displays are all rather big, and they like the idea of more than 1000 lines, but 720 has its uses for sport and wildlife, where running it at 60 frames/sec gives really good motion portrayal albeit at lower resolution. Don't forget that in the US, they also call 480p HDTV.

720 really comes into its own as a capture format, because the top720p camera is the Panasonic Varicam which, although using heavy compression and spectrum folding, can delivery a reasonably facsimily of super16 film. The variable nature of the camera allows you to shoot at any frame rate between 4 and 60/sec, playing back at 25 or 24, so you can do much of the speed change tricks that wildlife shooting needs without going back to film.

We can't do HD inEurope until one of two things happen:

1 turn off analoguie channels to free spectrum space on analogue transmitters.
2 allocate new spectrum space for satellite broadcast.

In practice, there's quite a lot of channels available on sattelite already, but we'd need lots of it in Europe because of the multiplicity of countries and languages, it's a lot harder than in continent-wide countries like the US, Australia, and Japan, where "near neighbours" are a long way away; Eurpoean "near neighbours" can be next door. This is a big problem, not just for the number of channels needed, but because briadcasters negotiate transmission rights for programmes into specific audiences; if a broadcaster has the rights for a propgramme in, say, England only, then he has to avoid it being recieved in Wales, Scotland etc, not just France, Germany etc. That problem won't go away, ever.

[infocus]

That's very interesting, Alan - I'm beginning to get the idea, though would need to see comparisons to fully understand! Do I interpret you correctly by saying that up to really big displays the definition of 720 is good enough, and using the bandwidth to reduce motion effects is of most importance. When you do get to really big displays, you need the resolution of 1080, but without the "jerkiness" of 25p - hence 1080i(50) if the bandwidth for 50p is just not available? I assume we're not just simply talking about "flicker", since presumably with 25p each frame can be repeated more than once - as in a cinema projector?

The day after I posted "....one future pressure on European broadcasters will be next generation disc delivery, they won't be able to hold back for long when viewers get a much better product off disc than off air" then lo and behold - "Computer Video" pops through my letterbox with the main title "Hi-Res revolution" and a review of the GR-PD1!! So will consumers really be content in future with not only watching HD off discs, but in their home movies as well, whilst broadcast offerings are still SD!?

Talking of that review, I wasn't quite sure what to make of the Hi-Res mode being quoted as 1280x659 pixels - 1280x720 seems a lot more likely, and is 16x9 with square pixels. Was it a misprint? I wasn't too sure about what was said about single v three CCD's either. My understanding was that the main reason for 3 CCD's and a splitter was for increased sensitivity for a given size of chip - as opposed to colour fidelity. Colour fidelity doesn't seem to be a problem for top end digital SLR's - who get round the sensitivity problem by having much larger CCD's than in consumer video cameras. But that's a digression - I suspect it won't be very long at all before other consumer HD models come along.

Regarding your last paragraph, what about cable? It's passed my road for the last 7years - HD would finally make a subscriber of me.

I started this post by saying that I just hadn't appreciated how big the subject had become in other parts of the world (especially the USA!) - some interesting links which well illustrate the point are at : http://www.ilovehdtv.com/hdtvmagazine/news.html

Typical of them are at http://www.knoxnews.com/kns/tech/article/0,1406,KNS_8976_2586683,00.html and at http://www.nypost.com/entertainment/15355.htm the New York Post comments how HDTV is at "tipping point". They talk of 5 million sales in the US this year - an interesting contrast to Digital take up in the UK!

[Jim Bird]

Hi,

It’s difficult to think in terms of Hi-def TV when we are still having major problems moving from old fashioned analogue terrestrial TV to Lo-def digital TV in this country?

I can understand the need for capturing our footage in Hi-def for use in Hi-def TVs at a later date, but as for Hi-def broadcasting over here that seems to me to be a long way off.

Jim Bird.

[infocus]

Hi Jim,

In a way, that's exactly my point, and until a week or so ago I've have said "I can't see it catching on."

What surprised me though (and caused me to post!) was how positive most of the public reaction abroad to HDTV seems to be - just look at the first of the three links above. I was flicking down that list of headlines and saw just one that seemed negative - "Public ambivalent on digital TV, says report" - then realised it was one of the few that referred to Freeview in the UK!

I do agree with what you say about the major problems with the transition to digital in the UK, but feel your point should be the opposite way round - if HD was part of the landscape it could add a big incentive to the takeup, as seems to be the US experience. Personally, I sometimes watch News24, the children sometimes watch CBBC, but I've yet to meet anybody who watches such as the shopping channels etc. Everybody I know who is really keen on the idea of multichannel TV (normally for sport) has bypassed Freeview and got Sky - most of them in analogue days. In the States big sporting occasions seem to be quite a catalyst for HD display sales.

[Ian at LynxDV.com]

It's closer than you think http://www.dvdoctor.net/cgi-bin/ubb/smile.gif
http://www.euro1080.tv/
Started broadcasting on the 1st Jan from one of the Astra Satellites, havn't really done anything about watching it myself but friends say the quality on the PC monitor is amazing.

[Alan Roberts at work]

Yep, Infocus' comments are right about rates/sizes/quality. HD won't make a lot of sense in Europe until the displays get so big that 625 looks awful, in the way that big screens in the US show how bad NTSC is.

Euro-1080 is a demo channel (or strictly a pair of demo channels) that the industry will use for presentations/events. It isn't really intended as a direct-to-home system. When I first saw it in action (at a Prom concert last year, I was in one of the HD trucks there), there was only one decoder in existence. Production of them is now getting under way but don't expect them to be consumer items, Euro-1080 isn't into that market.

[infocus]

An interesting link to NHK's December 2003 report is at http://www.nhk.or.jp/pr/update/new/update68.pdf - under "Digital Update" they refer to their researchers investigating "super high resolution widescreen, with 4,000 scanning lines"! When can we expect that from the BBC, Alan? :) (Just think of Eastenders!)

I also finally found out more about the GR-PD1 at http://www.jvc-australia.com/!ProductFeatures/pics/GR-PD1_PDF.pdf and have posted a new topic within the CV forum. I do, however, believe that it does not record to tape anything higher than 576p - the figures quoted in the CV review refer to sensor pixels used to form the image - NOT recorded resolution. The above link also has some interesting data about the single CCD it uses, and the way it works, and I now begin to see how it may challenge a 3 CCD camera for sensitivity. Any comments, anyone?

[Alan Roberts]

NHK's 4000 line camera is a lab prototype, immense, huge, gargantuan. It uses IMAX film lenses. There's no tape format that can cope with it, recording is to hard drive only. Since NHK started analogue HDTV in the 1980s, 20 years ago, you should expect them to be thinking about what happens next.

As far as HD in Europe's concerned though, it won't be broadcast until Europe-wide planning is agreed allowing all the 30-odd countries to do there own things. It took ages to get agreement for 625, HD will have to follow the same route, and the water's being muddied by the disparate wants of the countries (e.g. the existing HD countries are all doing 1080i and p, with a stated aim of ending up with only p at 50 or 60Hz, but Finland wants 576p at 50Hz, Sweden wants 720p at 50Hz, most others are not sufficiently interested to make decisions yet).

[Alan McKeown]

Evidence that HDTV in Europe is slowly beginning?

http://www.areadvd.de/news/2004/200401/230120040003.shtml

Which being translated (sort of) doth say:

News from the DVD world

Premiere transfer NFL Superbowl into HDTV

23.01.2004 (ks)


As the first German TV sender premiere transfers the NFL
Superbowl on 1 February 2004 into HDTV. Michael Jachan of premiere enterprise communication indicated that premiere would take over the HDTV feed of the NFL. The HDTV transfer is to take place parallel to the normal DVB transfer on premiere sport. For this a further branch RA satellite transponder will presumably be used at short notice. In the discussion the transponder is 103 on the Sat position 19,2 degrees of east premiere the Superbowl with high security unencrypted into HDTV will for this at present transfer, since there are so far still no HDTV Sat hDTV-Sat Receiver with premiere certifying on the market.
The used transfer format will be presumably 1080i (1920 x of 1080 pixels). Whether in 50 cycles per second or 60 cycles per second one transmits, is not certain yet exactly. Premiere transfers simply the original NFL HDTV feed to English, since its own production of the premiere presentation is at present not yet in HDTV possible. The HDTV transfer will take presumably approximately four hours and against 00:40 o'clock on 1 February will begin. Premiere regards the HDTV transfer first of all as technique demonstration, which is supported also by the satellite operator Astra. A HDTV transfer of further sport events is quite conceivable. At the moment a general HDTV transfer of
premiere program contents is however still no topic. For this would have to be clarified in particular with the features still right and Lizenfragen with Hollywood hollywood-Studios, are called it by premiere. Potentially also interest exists to be able to transfer
possibly the football WM 2006 into HDTV with premiere. Since the
rights are however not yet assigned here, the topic is for the moment still pure speculation. The Superbowl transfer takes place in the USA at CBS and by Sony is gesponsert. In the USA the Superbowl belongs regularly to the TV Events of the yearly, with which the TV senders can obtain the highest advertising prices per Spot.


Alan

[This message has been edited by Alan McKeown (edited 26 January 2004).]

[Ian at LynxDV.com]

<BLOCKQUOTE>quote:</font><HR>Originally posted by Alan Roberts at work:
Euro-1080 is a demo channel (or strictly a pair of demo channels) that the industry will use for presentations/events. It isn't really intended as a direct-to-home system. When I first saw it in action (at a Prom concert last year, I was in one of the HD trucks there), there was only one decoder in existence. Production of them is now getting under way but don't expect them to be consumer items, Euro-1080 isn't into that market.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

According to what I've been told, you don't need a dedicated decoder to pick it up, just a dish, a £50 SkyStar 2 PCI card and a P4 system.

[infocus]

Two bits of interesting news now at http://www.definitionmagazine.com/ - the EU seems to be thinking again about HD, and do I detect hints that multi channel hasn't quite lived up to all it's early promise....?

Secondly, interesting news from Pinnacle, and since I understand Sony were one of the promoters of HDV, I'd be surprised if they didn't bring a product out. Be interesting to see what it will be, though!

[Alan Roberts at work]

Ian, you could be right; I don't know, it's all too new.

[Alan McKeown]

For those of you interested in High Definition Television (HDTV) in Europe in general and the UK in particular.

The Quali-TV HDTV “set-top-box” for the reception of Euro 1080 transmissions (QS 1080 IR) is scheduled to be available from late May 2004 from Parabolic Communications (with which I have no connection other than as a customer).

You will of course require a suitable HDTV-capable display to make full use of this receiver unit.


http://www.parabolic.co.uk/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=199


Alan

[Alan Roberts]

Be warned that Euro-1080 will remain "in-clear" only for as little longer. Many of the producers of HD pictures in Europe are worried about the rfree distribution of pictures for which transmission agreements have been agreed with specific broadcasters (not Euro-1080). For that reason, they're going to encrypt the channel, making it subscription. They PC cards that people have made work on the channel will suddenly stop working. Shame.

[infocus]

I've posted the URL: http://www.digitalvideoediting.com/2004/04_apr/features/psd3js6t.htm as a separate topic ("Sony at NAB") in the A/V hardware forum, but it's of some relevance here. I think it shows how far things have changed in only six months, looking back at the first posts here.

Sony seem to be implying that DVCAM will evolve into HDV, at least for acquisition. (In the medium term - DV for the consumer, HDV for the prosumer with SD output available, and the pro market.) Whilst that may happen more quickly in 60 Hz countries, I suspect it's inevitable in Europe as well. And when that happens, it just adds to the pressure on broadcasters to transmit HD.

If any Australians/Americans are reading this, it would be interesting to hear their views/experiences.

[Alan Roberts]

I don't think that's a correct interpretation. I think that DVCAM will stay for quite a while yet, but HDV will attach to the lower end of HD rather than the upper end of SD, so people will be making more use of HDV to make cheap HD than to make expensive SD. Of course, as users' SD kit wears out and is replaced, the HDV format will be the natural progression. But I can't see that DVCAM will falter as a result of that for several years yet, because the vast majority of tv production is for low-budget cable channels who are unlikely to go to HD unless they are forced to.

[infocus]

The quote I was referring to was "From the perspective of applications, the applications of DVCam that are covered today in the SD world -- from the prosumer to the entry-level broadcaster -- we see perfectly covered by HDV as we start launching prosumer and probably some broadcast gear using HDV."

Perhaps I made a bit too much of it, but as in previous discussion on higher level systems, does any manufacturer want too many product ranges? Therefore phasing out DVCAM in favour of miniDV for the consumer, and HDV for such as "low-budget cable channels" could make perfect sense. Yes indeed, such as the latter "are unlikely to go to HD unless they are forced to" but HDV gives a good SD output. I think it depends on pricing, and if DVCAM gets phased out in favour of comparable HDV kit at comparable prices, I don't think anyone can complain. All this is much more relevant to the US, but such is the market we're likely to get dragged along behind.

[Alan Roberts]

Yes, this is really crystal-ball gazing. I still think that bthe markets big enough to support DVCAM alongside HDV and HDTV, simply because of the amount of programming that's being made, but the writing's on the wall for digibeta as a capture format. It's a personal view, of course, and it's mine smile.gif

[Alan Roberts]

For another view of HD in the UK, take a look at www.vmi.co.uk (http://www.vmi.co.uk) asnd download HDToday. I'm named in one item and was heavily involved in another, no prizes for working it out smile.gif

[plettner]

In Australia, the commercial (free-to-air) stations were told they must transmit digital TV by last year. Before the dealine, no TV station could decide if they wanted if they wanted to transmit HDTV single channel, or multi-channel HDTV. Some wanted extra channels, and therefore transmit in standard definition. Other wanted the higher quality and digital sound. The communications minister at that time said, right, if you guys can't decide I'll decide for you - all station must send both SDTV and HDTV.
So now we have all the stations transmitting both Standard Definition and High Definition TV. The communications minister then quit. Thank goodness. He was an old-fart who wouldn't know the Internet from an episode of Happy Days.

[infocus]

So, just to get this straight, are you saying the Internet and Happy Days are two separate things!?

Seriously though, what I was getting at was what the "early adopter in the Australian street" thinks of HDTV. I don't know how well you know the score in the UK, but Digital Terrestial broadcasting was initially launched here as a subscription service with the appeal of extra channels. As such it was a spectacular failure, and is now in it's third guise as a free to air service with fewer channels. There was (still is) a market for extra channels, but that is much better catered for by Sky satellite and cable - ON Digital and later ITV Digital rather fell between stools. I believe a similar model befell a very similar fate in Spain.

Australia has obviously gone down a different path, and I'm interested to hear what the general perception is and how successful it has been. From what I read, the US has also started HD transmission in a big way, and that seems to have caught the public imagination in a way that Freeview just has not in the UK - in spite of huge promotion from the BBC.

With tongue slightly in cheek, in another topic recently I posted "I understand "Neighbours" originally went to being produced 16:9 because of UK sales, long before 16:9 transmissions started in Australia. Ironic indeed if in the not too distant future "Eastenders" starts to be produced in HD for the Australian market, whilst we in the UK don't see the advantage for years!" Reading Alan Roberts recent vmi link, what do I see but a banner headline of the BBC trialing HD for future production of "Holby City", and remarks about no reason why all drama should not soon be shot on HD. So, plettner, you may indeed get to see every scar on Dirty Den's and Phil Mitchell's faces long before we in the UK do!!
:D

[Alan Roberts]

You might find this link interesting ;)

http://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/pubs/whp/whp085.html

[Unicorn]

Ironic indeed if in the not too distant future "Eastenders" starts to be produced in HD for the Australian market, whilst we in the UK don't see the advantage for years!"I can safely say that the lack of video resolution is _not_ the reason why I never watch 'Eastenders' smile.gif .

And, while that's a joke, I think it does go a long way to explaining why HDTV adoption is likely to be real slow. There's simply very little on TV other than movies, nature shows, some very high-end drama or some sports where improved resolution will improve TV: most of the problems with TV are far more fundamental than that.

Personally there's no way I'll buy an HDTV, but I'll certainly be buying an HD-DVD drive for my PC once they're available.

[Alan Roberts]

And there, in a nutshell, is the reason why European broadcasters are not showing any signs of eagerness to jump back into HDTV. They've tried it once and given up.

[plettner]

Hi Infocus,

Eastenders? Is that still running? I don't think we get that here anymore. We get "The Bill" (of which I'm a bit of a fan), and many other UK shows. Digital TV/HDTV is really only new, so the uptake hasn't been significant. Here, we need to get a decoder box, which you can pick up from K-Mart, Myer, or similar. But you can also choose to get a standard definition box. I think Standard Definition digital will probably pick up steam quikcer than HDTV. When HDTV decoder boxes come down in price, I'll be getting that.

One thing to remember, in Australia, we have 2 government funded stations, ABC and SBS, and then we have the commercial stations, TEN, Seven, Nine. On top of that in Sydney at least, there is a community station.

The government wants to switch off analogue TV in 2007 so one will need to buy a decoder or new TV.

Lastly, free-to-air means free-to-air. I got a shock in Germany when I lived there for a year and they wanted a monthly "Rundfunkgebuehr" (A TV fee). I belive in the UK it's the same.

[plettner]

Oh, in regards to Neighbours. I don't know how far behind the series is there, but Connor (the Irish lad) finds out he is a father to the Asian chick who left a while ago.

Toadfish goes missing. Still no one knows where he is. Stuart is a little suspicious as to Toadie's whereabouts now that he's a copper. He suspects Rocco. :cool:

Lou owes Rocco (the Italian mafia guy) some money and decides to do a runner. He has an accident and is later found. He's OK now.

[Alan McKeown]

HDTV from the BBC???

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/article/ds14311.html

Alan

[Alan Roberts]

That's hardly news, the BBC's been "considering" distributing HDTV since 1987, when we got involved with HDMAC. There's nothing in that article to give any clue on dates or formats, HDTV isn't being taken seriously in Europe yet. What is news is that there's a public statement about it. It shows that it's on the table, but only as a discussion topic. For the past 17 years we worked on HD under a directive from the Board of Governors, that no money should be spent on HDTV if it's benefits could not be seen by the licence-payers, I agree with that and we've made HD programmes fror international sale that looked better to the SD viewer, so everybody wins.

The front-running standard being considered for Europe is currently 720P at 50Hz, more's the pity, not even proper HDTV. And this at a time when Japan's prototyping 1080/60P cameras and onwards up to 4k. The problem's all down to the size of our houses, you'd need to view HDTV at 1080 from about 3 times picture height to get the best from it, 5 times from 720, 0.7 times from 4k. So either you move the furniture or you get a bigger house. That's the scientific view, but personally I'd go for HDTV tomorrow if it was 1080, 720's ok as a capture standard when you need the flexibility of the Panasonic Varicam, but even after I've had days tweaking it, the camera only just matches up to a Sony 750, and even that doesn't do proper justice to 1080, you have to go to a Thomson Viper or Sony 950 for that.

[StevenBagley]

I visited the US at the beginning of 2003 and tried whilst over there to see HD in action. So I went to the HD section of Fry's in Palo Alto expecting to be blown away by the picture quality.

I was.

Lots of huge HDTVs being fed... SD off a DVD player. Via Composite. Looked awful.

I wonder how fast the take up of HD will be when it's not displayed right in the stores.

Still from the UK point of view, I wonder if we'll end up leap frogging the current MPEG2 based HD system and get an MPEG4 (or WMV9 or whatver) based system. Which should allow nicer pictures for the same bitrate. I have a clip from 'Alias' captured from the HD transmission (1280x720 transmission, acquisition is 35mm) and it's breathtaking but the grain in the image does some weird things thanks to inadequate MPEG compression.

Steven

[mooblie]

Originally posted by StevenBagley:
.....I wonder how fast the take up of HD will be when it's not displayed right in the stores.....

Steven This is reminiscent of recent years (and it still goes on now) of widescreen TVs here in UK being displayed in shops with the wrong aspect ratio set, resulting in Joe Public thinking "that's what widescreen TV is supposed to look like." Annoys the hell out of me.

[Alan Roberts]

I can beat that chaps :D

I went to a meeting at a major indie post-prod house a few weeks ago, and they had loads of new plasmas showing off their corporate show-reel. The only problem was that it had been shot wide, eidted and finished as letter-box in 4:3, and then shown anamorphic on the wide plasmas. The result just looked unprofessional and silly. I told them about it smile.gif

HD should be less of a problem for shape than dsigits has been, because there are no 4:3 HD picturedss, it's all wide. So all HD displays have to be wide, or to allow for wide pictures. The on ly problem will be the "compatible" output, the downconversion for showing on SD displays, they'll all have exactly the same problems that they have with digits now.

The interface between the decoder and the display should be simple, DVI is ubiquitous in the US now even though it's only an interim standard (the VGA connector was never designed to handle digits at 1.5Gb/s or more) and the new standard's only just emerging. The downconverted pics should be RGB, and we in Europe can connect them via SCART as RGB. The problem in the US is that SD tv sets have only rf and composite inputs, they never implemented RGB via SCART or anything else, so it's normal to see digital pictures decoded and fed to analoguie tv sets via composite NTSC or even via the aerial. At least we won't be granted that horror.

By the way, I've launched a private investigation to see how accurate the digi-spy story is, my first contacts have no idea who was being quoted, nor have I. Yet. I'll let you know what I find.

[mooblie]

Alan, do you think there a danger that the Yanks will unnecessarily invent some new video connector format that does the job of RGB connection, but isn't SCART, just because they didn't invent it first, or use it already?

I recall you saying once you didn't expect the obvious choice (FireWire) becoming common as a video interconnect, which I find dismaying.

[StevenBagley]

I doubt they'll add RGB connectors to their (standard def) TVs now (they have component inputs anyway, which gives them the same quality -- mroe or less).

And they are better off without SCART, horrible connector, nice idea but they'd have been better off using a 25 pin D socket like computers do.

Remember that putting a firewire socket on a TV is no use for DV, unless the TV has a DV codec chip in it, which is unlikely to be the case.

Steven

[infocus]

A while back Alan, you posted:
Originally posted by Alan Roberts:
......European broadcasters are not showing any signs of eagerness to jump back into HDTV. They've tried it once and given up. Given up, or put into abeyance? And possibly now realising that it's time has come? I saw a very early demo of HDTV with a couple of colleagues, and we came away with "wow, I want THAT!" With hindsight the problem was the timing, it was (is) a product with huge "wow factor", but ten years ago hindsight now tells us that it could never have taken off then for reasons of cost. I want it, I'd pay extra for it, but not the premiums that would have been the case then.

All that's changed now. Enough people are prepared to pay serious money for big plasmas to show that, and the price of origination and display equipment is not so much of a premium as to deter purchasers - the US experience proves that. The problem now in Europe is bandwidth and getting product to the consumer.

Potentially it's a crucial issue for such as the BBC and ITV in the next decade. Sky have made huge inroads into the UK broadcast scene in the last decade, and this issue could accelerate that - bandwidth is less of an problem for them than for terrestial broadcasters. They make a lot of their money from pay per view, and pub etc screenings of major sports events on a big screen - and from what I've seen HD for this market can't come too soon. If they then choose to extend HD into Sky Movies, Sky One etc just at a time when big screens are becoming commonplace, HD-DVD is coming in, video games have HD outputs the implications for the BBC and ITV could be serious. I just don't think sitting back and hoping the whole thing will just go away is an option.

Referring to Alan McKeown's web link, one paragraph stood out at me: “Although it expected the service to become a viable proposition within the next five years, the BBC highlighted several reasons why it may not contribute towards switchover. - "If UK demand for HDTV emerged, it would be most likely to do so from existing digital TV adopters and so, initially, would not drive switchover.””

This gives the impression of a BBC whoose only interest is achieving analogue switchoff by whatever means possible, and b*g%%r what the licence payer wants! Another quote from the report is: "HDTV is not backwards compatible to any of the current digital receivers and so to consumers would represent another new platform". This I believe is in contrast to the Australian situation where SD boxes derive an SD output from the HD transmission. (Plettner: what's the difference in price roughly in Aus between HD and SD boxes at the moment?) In my very first post in this topic, commenting on the BBC's report of digital broadcasting in Japan, I said "Perhaps the BBC report should have said that the UK "already has an early, inferior version of the Japanese technology"!?" I see no reason to change that view now.

[plettner]

An SDTV decoder box is around $300AUD (120 Pounds or so). HDTV decoders cost at least $1200. I think this may be a problem, all the punters will buy SDTV decoders (the quality is still supposed to be better than our analogue UHF and VHF) becuase of the lower cost. The TV stations will then complain that HDTV was a waste of money. This may result in them shutting down HDTV signals and then we'll be stuck with SDTV for the next 30 years.

The other thing to consider is what is currently broadcast at HD. Our news services are, and I guess movies and so forth would be also.

As I mentioned, our broadcasters are requried to broadcast SDTV and HDTV signals on top of the normal UHF/VHF analogue.

Pay TV is a different kettle of fish.

[infocus]

Originally posted by plettner:
An SDTV decoder box is around $300AUD (120 Pounds or so). HDTV decoders cost at least $1200.
Well - that's surpised me! I've got a DTV card within the PC (Nebula DigiTV) which suppots HD where it exists (not here :( ) - cost? Well - just look at an Aus site http://www.digitalnow.com.au/products/dvbt.html fo Aus prices. I can only assume someone is charging a HUGE markup for putting the chips within a fancy box....... any explanations for why the HDTV decoders cost 4x SD ones?

[Unicorn]

I have a clip from 'Alias' captured from the HD transmission (1280x720 transmission, acquisition is 35mm) and it's breathtakingI can't say I find 720 breathtaking: I was impressed the first time I saw such footage, but pretty soon realised that it's not that much better than PAL... after all, you're only talking 50% more lines, though presumably more horizontal resolution too. 1080 is really the minimum I'd want to see to bother with HD footage.

[plettner]

Dick Smith Electronics (http://www.dse.com.au/cgi-bin/dse.storefront/408f02b30fb1c0662740c0a87f9c0750/Product/View/G7653)

Prices for HDTV are coming down. Here is one I found and it's a little less than $1200, but still compartively expensive to the TV Card option.

[infocus]

Originally posted by Alan Roberts:
By the way, I've launched a private investigation to see how accurate the digi-spy story is, my first contacts have no idea who was being quoted, nor have I. Yet. I'll let you know what I find. This http://www.culture.gov.uk/global/publications/archive_2004/bbc_report_on_digital_switchover.htm report, page 5. It's actually a small part of the BBC's submission on the progress towards analogue switchoff

[Alan Roberts]

Aha, now I see wheere it came from, it's a journalists rehash, taken out of context and blown up out of proportion. If you read paragraphs 104 onwards (Part 5), you'll how he got the words, but put it into context and you'll see that it's a piece of navel-gazing. Like I said originally, it isn't news, the BBC's been "considering" HDTV for over a decade, that doesn't mean it'll broadcast it soon, that'll only happen if a business model can be found that fits the currwent UK remit of public servive broadcasting. Don't hold your breath.

720 can be breathtaking, recent footage I've seen shot for NHU is staggeringly good, but then, I would say that wouldn't I? (Who set up the cameras and spent weeks making fine adjustments...). But I still think that 1080's the way to go. The US plan is to end up with 1080P at 60fps while Europe fiddles about with 720P at 50; I reckon we should adopy 1080P as the standard, with switchable frame rates, 25 for film, drama and upconversions, 50 for sport and LE. And not MPEG2 either, maybe MPEG4 or WMV9 or one of the h26* options. After all, any standard we start now ought to last at least 20 years, PAL has lasted 40, NTSC 50, so far.

[infocus]

Well, can one have much faith in the government when one reads from non other than the DTI ( http://www.digitaltelevision.gov.uk/switchover/hdtv.html )that "Analogue HDTV has been implemented in Japan but has not proved a great success."

Errr, you would have thought that if any body within the UK would be aware of what was happening within Japan, especially with regard to HD DTT, it would be them! (See the very first post in this thread, from way back in January.) Their link also gives e-mail contact details, ("Contact Us") - perhaps some people may like to point them in the right direction....

[Alan Roberts]

Ahem, the DTI paper's right. 100%.

Analogue HD was introduced in Japan as an experimental service many years ago but never reached significant sales even after many years of pushing. The HD MUSE analogue coding system was complex (yes, that's right, analogue compression) and very expensive to deal with, the decoder costs were high, so they never became affordable. It was an 1125/60 interlaced system with 1035 active lines, the Sony HDW700 was the last camera made for it, from which the 900, 750, 730 and 950 all derive. It grew very slowly despite major cash input from the Japanese government, the US overtook Japan in the first 6 months of digital transmission, so they switched off analogue HD last year (or was it the year before?, can't be sure) and relaunched in digits using the US ATSC 8-VSB system which immediately took off because decoders were already available in Japanese shops, made in Japan in bluk for the US market.

Analogue HD was doomed from the start, Europe knew that in 1987 when we started working on HDMAC for Europe, but the experience taught us a lot about HD, experience that the US capitalised on to launch digital HD.

[infocus]

Well, the sentence is 100% right technically and in isolation, and I certainly don't dispute anything you say regarding the history, Alan - but 100% irrelevant in the context in which it's used. And 100% out of date. The rest of the DTI link is all about digital broadcasting - the rest of the site for that matter - so why refer to an out of date system, already superseded, and ignore the current situation? A bit like writing a report on TV nowadays, throwing in about the UK having adopted 405 line transmission, and ignoring PAL, DTT, satellite! The page is generally up to date, including mentioning Euro1080's launch in January, so why so behind the times regarding the Japanese situation? And therefore giving a misleading impression?

[Alan Roberts]

Agreed, nothing it says is actually wrong, but there are holes. Perfhaps you'd like to vent some spleen on them by email? You can quote me if you like.

BTW, I can now confirm that the earlier piece is a misquote and has been taken out of context. Everything it says is true, but cannot be held to imply that there is actually any plan to broadcast or emit HD in the near future. The only implication you should take from it is that the BBC, like every other broadcaster, is keeping a weather eye on the rest of the world so that it knows what to do when it needs to. You can also read into that, that it will listen to opinions, so if you have them, make them to the appropriate people (i.e. not me, I've retired, but I can supply some pointers).

[infocus]

Originally posted by Alan Roberts:
Agreed, nothing it says is actually wrong, but there are holes. Perhaps you'd like to vent some spleen on them by email? Done before I originally posted here! Still waiting for a reply. ;)

Rereading the page I linked to, the odder it seems. If they were aware of the current situation, you'd expect "Analogue HDTV WAS implemented" ... rather than "has been". I suspect their information is just very out of date, which is not very impressive really. As regards the comment that it has "not proved a great success", then in numerical terms this may be true due to the costs involved. BUT it may have been a big success in showing the man in the Japanese street what is available, such that when digital HDTV launched at an acceptable price it was taken up with enthusiasm.
Originally posted by Alan Roberts:
......the BBC, like every other broadcaster, is keeping a weather eye on the rest of the world ......it will listen to opinions, so if you have them, make them to the appropriate people (i.e. not me, I've retired, but I can supply some pointers). I suspect the BBC is like many organisations in that odd complaints don't get taken too seriously, a few on the same subject get looked into, and a score or so are seen as a sign of a serious problem! With that in mind, would you like to publish your pointers here, and maybe others may like to use them as well.....

[Alan Roberts]

Indeed, the wording is curious, but the message is correct; HD in the UK won't happen in a hurry even though programme-makers are getting going and selling content to other broadcasters successfully.

Anyway, about contacts, let me think about it, not that I don't want you to do it, but I want to be sure that I get the right route.

[Alan Roberts]

OK chaps, here's the beef.

If you want to contact the BBC officially to talk about it's policy on HDTV, you should email andy.quested@bbc.co.uk. Andy works in Production Modernisation at TV Centre and is the hub for the HD Support Group that advises Production (staff and indies working for the BBC) on the use of HD within the BBC. He's effectively been my direct line manager for the past 18 months and it's been a delight working with him.

It seems we now have a direct conduit into the BBC, so it's up to you to use it. :D

There now, I've been itching to do that for years.

[Alan Roberts]

Andy has read this thread and is happy to respond to emails.

Here's his reply : -

"All interesting.

Alan keeps me up to date with most of this. My view has to be personal
- if it's worth anything - I would rather wait for 1080/50p the images
are stunning. I don't think Europe has missed out, some of us
sometimes forget how good 576/50i actually is on screens up to 42".
Our average screen size hasn't reached 30" yet.

If we wait (but keep producing programmes in HD at no licence fee cost)
we could jump straight to 1080/50p using new codecs and leave the other
HD territories cold in terms of delivered quality.

Andy"

[StevenBagley]

Maybe we'll be using the BBC's own Dirac (http://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/projects/dirac/index.shtml) codec to watch TV.


Steven

[Alan Roberts]

Could be. Wavelet coding results in data groups that can be compressed more heavily than MPEG since they aren't spatially aligned in blocks. The only problem is that the coder is rather more complex than MPEG, which has had far more spent on its development. So, although wavelet coding is an old idea, it still has a way to go before we get a decent commercial product.

Still, I'd like to see it happen; the prototype demos were impressive.

[cstv]

have to agree with Mr Quested i'm afraid. i have no desire to watch HDTV at home yet, at least not broadcast by the BBC.

Using it as a capture medium, now that's a different story not only does it improve quality of SD broadcasts, but it increases BBC funding from overseas buyers.

any thoughts on what will proliferate (is that the right word?) first, HD film distribution (to the home) in a format similar to DVD, or HDTV broadcast. My money would be on a DVD replacement, but that assumes that the practice of physical distribution continues as opposed to a download to some sort of home media system...

mark.

PS- how are we pronouncing Dirac? is it di as in die, or di as in distribution
i'm guessing the first, but you never can be sure... ;)

[Alan Roberts]

Dirac is named after the Fench mathematician so it must be Di-rack (the i pronounced as in king). Hence propounded the impulse function that makes digital filters designable, the "delta-function" that has zero width but an area of unity.

HD capture and production is a no-brainer, it makes money and we get better programmes. My bet for the first actual HD programme release to the licence payer will be an HD DVD, free on the front cover of the Radio Times. Although not yet common even in the US, the HD DVD is hear already, and there's even a recordable HD DVD system (Sony "Blu-Ray") that went on sale at the end of last year. It hasn't swept the market yet, but it looks set to become the standard. It won't sell in Europe until big-screen, HD capable, displays are common in Dixons, and that really means flat panels of 40" diagonal or bigger. We're a few years away from that at present.

[Alan McKeown]

In French, “i” is pronounced as “e” is in English.
So I would think Dirac is pronounced “Dee-rack”.

Alan

[cstv]

but who wants a 40" screen in the corner of the living room??? i certianly don't!

i can see a point to HD for cinema, conference, and even home cinema enthusiasts, but i don't want to watch the 6 o'clock news in HD!

BBC drama docos work well captured on HD, but i don't really want to have to build an extension to my house to fit the screen in. our 28" widescreen is plenty big enough, and gives quite nice results... Alan, what you said above, and the tables in your Rel white paper suggest that running a 1080 image at that size would see little or no visible difference... is that right, or are the larger screen sizes just the optimal? i find it hard to believe that you wouldn't experience a considerably better picture - assuming you don't stick it through NTL's mpeg encoding... ;)

mark

[infocus]

Originally posted by cstv:
but who wants a 40" screen in the corner of the living room??? i certianly don't!
Judging by most branches of Currys, Dixons etc an awful lot of people! ;) And that's with SD displays, normally set up badly in the showroom!Probably me, when the price is right, and with wall mountable flat screens most rooms will be happy with a larger screen than in CRT days. OK, many people won't want 40" displays (yet!), but in the past many viewers were content with a 19" monochrome receiver - would that have been a valid reason for not introducing colour 625 line transmissions? And because most people listen to the radio on small portables, does that mean the introduction of FM shouldn't have been done?

What we are talking about here won't be mainstream for 10 to 20 years, but decisions taken now will be crucial to the future. My first glimpse of HD wasn't on a huge set, but the difference WAS noticeable - viewing distance is obviously important as well as screen size. I'd like to see more HD displays on public view, and when HD DVD's appear, that becomes much easier for retailers. With lower prices, that's when the broadcasters are going to come under public pressure.....

[Alan Roberts]

Rhyme "Dirac" with "Chirac".

The previous 2 posts show exactly what I meant about size, takeup etc. Some will want it early, others will wait until it's cheap, yet others will refuse it until everything else is switched off.

My table of display sizes tells you how close you have to be, or how big the display has to be, for a pixel to be the same size at the eye. That assumes that the tv signal will be as well populated with content as SD is today, i.e. pretty well fully. HD as shown in the US doesn't fully populate the signal because the vast majority has been captured or produced on HDCAM; the equivalent on SD (720/576) would be 540 pixels for luma, 180 each for chroma, our digital SD is 720, 360 each for chroma.

Clearly HD is still at the formative stage, it'll take a while before anyone considers that fully-populated resolution is worth while, at present that would mean capture/production on HD-D5 or HDCAM-SR in 4:2:2 (1920, 960 each), or HDCAM-SR or hard drives in 4:4:4. The latter is the standard format for film post production now, because it makes for good blue/green screen keying.

Incidentally, it's interesting how much film production is posted at 25fps, even when shot at 24 on film or HD, and even when it's going to be printed back to film. It makes sense, because you get the live down-conversion to 625/50 for local viewing. A fair amount of "film" is now shot as HD video at 25fps just because you can get this live monitoring very cheaply on nthe studio foloor, it means you don't have to wait to see the dailies, you can feed lots of monitors very cheaply, and you can stand the studio doiwn as soon as you shout "Cut" rather than keeping everyone on stand-by until the dailies are shown next day.

[Alan McKeown]

Quote:*** ** ** ** * * ** **
“but who wants a 40" screen in the corner of the living room?
i can see a point to HD for... home cinema enthusiasts, but i don't want to watch the 6 o'clock news in HD!”

I have been using a 1.9 m (75”) diagonal 16:9 screen for the past few months and I would certainly not want to go back to a 27” screen. The new screen is fixed to the wall and the projector is miniscule, so compared with the 27” monitor used previously the space taken up is actually less.

Something to be aware of is that such a projected picture is not just a magnified version of that on a conventional TV monitor. The projector, fed from a suitable DVD player, allows a digital feed (DVI) (better horizontal sharpness) and progressive scan (better vertical sharpness). The display of 1280 pixels/line x 720 lines yields a sharper picture with very much less visible structure, allowing comfortable viewing at 3.5 picture heights even from “625 line” DVDs. It is effectively a halfway stage between conventional SD and HDTV (sometimes referred to as extended definition television (EDTV)).

For the news and suchlike we have a 14” portable TV set.
HDTV and even EDTV should be reserved for “special” programmes and DVDs that you really want to watch!

The unwanted coding artefacts of present digital broadcasts are unacceptable with this size of screen whereas a good DVD is very acceptable.

The HDTV “jam tomorrow” prospect of 1080P from the BBC is OK but only if in the meantime the present SD encoding is markedly improved.


Alan

[StevenBagley]

The HDTV “jam tomorrow” prospect of 1080P from the BBC is OK but only if in the meantime the present SD encoding is markedly improved.
Absolutely, if digital TV in the UK was running at its full potential rather than the limp offering we have now then the need for HD wouldn't be so great. As it is, HD appears to be the only way we can get quality TV pictures back again (ignoring programmes like 'Diarmuid's Big Adventure' which look like it was shot with amateurs in full auto mode, certainly an exercise in how not to shoot TV judging by the first episode last week). Looking at BBC2 now the artefacts on the snooker balls are obvious...

But then 1080p really does sound nice...

Steven

[Alan McKeown]

Quoting a “High Definition Magazine” report from the recent NAB convention in Las Vegas:

“Had a chat with BBC Resources' Andy King who was holed up in a room at the back of the South Hall and they announced with much glee their first high definition OB truck. This is quite significant for the BBC and although meant for their overseas market is still a rubber stamping of the format from within the hallowed halls. Their first gig is the Last Night of the Proms in September for NHK. Good news of the BBC less good for Alfacam who had been doing all of the BBC's HD OB work.”



Quoting an EE Times report:

“Columbia TriStar Home Entertainment will launch all its new titles on Blu-ray disks by early 2006 when the format is officially released, said Benjamin Feingold, president of the movie studio that is an affiliate of Sony Corp. Although no other studios have committed to a next-generation disk format, Feingold said it is time to make the shift in part due to a rising tide of high definition pay-per-view content on cable and satellite channels such as HBO and Showtime.

"By the time we launch there could be 25 million high-def displays in the market," said Feingold. "There's a huge pent-up demand for high definition content right now, but the DVD market is so big, most studios can't see it," he added.

Feingold noted that only a handful of studios backed DVD when it was first released in 1997, however it quickly became the fastest growing format in electronics history. "[Blu-ray] will be a mass market from the very beginning," he predicted.”


Alan

[infocus]

One probably for Alan, and I feel I should know the answer! When these Blu-Rays are released, are they likely to be 1080/24p, the player then feeding 60i to the display? It occurs to me that aside from any regional coding, they could be playable anywhere - a European player feeding 50i from the same disc?

I've also heard conflicting things about compatability - will a Blu-Ray player in my living room be able to play back current DVD's?

[Alan Roberts]

In the US, they'll play film at 23.98 with the usual 2:3 pull-down to get output at 59.94 interlaced as PsF with the strange morion jerkiness that many Americans is an essential part of the "film-look". The only Blu-Ray prototype deck I've seen in the UK did that, but there's no reason why a 50Hz version shouldn't play out at 50 without that complication.

I don't know about compatibility play-back, but if Sony want is to buy these things, then this sort of compatibility is essential.

[Alan McKeown]

Quote from the Blu-ray Disc founder’s web site:

“While production cost is extremely important to commercial content providers, of equal importance are compatibility with current DVD media and protection of digital content from piracy. In response to these concerns, while no blue-laser disc will be readable using a red-laser, combined blue/red drives and other devices will be perfectly feasible resulting in a full backwards compatibility with DVD. Several leading drive manufacturers have already proven this feasibility with drives for consumer products such as video recorders that can read and write both DVD and BD discs.”


Alan

[infocus]

Should anybody wish to make their views known directly to government, http://www.culture.gov.uk/global/consultations/2004+current+consultations/bbc_digital_review_consult.htm may be of interest, and not just for HD matters. It's worth reading the terms of reference - whilst the consultation is more to do with content of BBC 3&4, childrens channels etc, future HD broadcasting just about comes under the terms. (A report will be submitted to the Secretary of State "......outlining any views....on how the new digital television services might develop in the future.")

It seems a little strange to me that it's the BBC under such scrutiny - as a viewer they seem to be trying a lot harder to maintain standards than most of their opposition.....? Interestingly, not only have I received no reply to an e-mail to a feedback address at digitaltelevision.gov.uk (see my post of 28 Apr), but that whole site appears to have been down for a while - or is it just me experiencing problems?

[Alan Roberts]

The main problem is that the BBC's an easy target, always has been. It has to tread a tight-rope between the job of monitoring and calling the government to book, and not being so offensive that it loses the franchise. It's a hard job. But HMG's email responsivity doesn't surprise me at all.

[infocus]

Also from “High Definition Magazine” about the recent NAB ( http://www.definitionmagazine.com/ ):
"Had a canteen meet with the the Apple UK guys who were pretty knocked out with their company's announcements and .......so nobody will be able to hide from the HD wave that is coming. This is a great news for the format and will not be missed by the broadcasting powers that make HD decisions. As for broadcasting in HD I heard Marc Valentin of Thomson say that HD in Europe is only five years away, also I met someone who is booked to train France's TF1 staff in HD later this year, so things are gathering pace."

[Alan Roberts]

Five years sound about right, it can't be any sooner. And it's nice to hear that France is taking training seriously, training BBC staff and indies has kept me busy for about 8 years now.

[Alan McKeown]

I have at last got a High Definition Television set top box (STB) installed and working. The HDTV picture quality, from Euro 1080 and also the Astra HD promotional channel, is excellent, with none of the annoying artefacts that plague the present standard-definition broadcast digital transmissions. It proves that when properly implemented, digital television can live up to its original promise.

Equipment employed:

Satellite antenna: Wavefrontier Toroidal 90 Gregorian.
HDTV receiver: Quali-TV QS 1080IR

DVI-D connection (720p 50 Hz) from HDTV receiver to projector via Gefen HDTV DVI-D switcher (to allow switching between DVD player (Yamakawa 365) and HDTV satellite receiver).

Connecting cables: DVI-D Gefen (2 X 2 m) and Lindy (1 X 5 m)

Video projector: Panasonic PT AE500E (1280 X 720 X 3 LCD)
Mains supply to projector is via a UPS.

Screen: Beamax, fixed frame, 16:9 aspect ratio. 1.9 m (diagonal)
Screen gain: 1.2 relative to a Lambertian surface.


Quad 44 / 405 audio amplification
2 X Quad ESL 63 loudspeakers.
(HDTV is specified to have surround sound)


Alan

[StevenBagley]

Now was anyone expecting this...

Sky have announced they'll launch a HD service from 2006 in the UK.

BSkyB announces Free-To-Air and High Definition Television initiatives (http://www.corporate-ir.net/ireye/ir_site.zhtml?ticker=BSY.UK&script=415&layout=0&item_id=580035)

BSkyB will again demonstrate its commitment to lead innovation in digital television with the development of a premium package of channels in the High Definition Television (HDTV) format. Following the successful launch by BSkyB of the UK's first digital television service, first interactive television service and first integrated Digital Video Recorder Sky+, the proposed introduction of HDTV to the digital satellite platform in 2006 will ensure that Sky customers continue to benefit from the most advanced television services available.

HDTV, delivering substantially superior picture quality than standard-definition television, is the preferred format for a growing number of US television productions in genres including sport, drama, entertainment and news. Its introduction to the UK is expected to strengthen further the differentiation between digital satellite and other television platforms and to appeal to the increasing number of consumers who seek to enhance their in-home audiovisual experience with equipment such as wide-screen televisions, plasma screens and home cinema systems.

The premium service will launch in 2006 with both a set of dedicated HD channels and access to selected events produced in HD format. Further details of BSkyB's proposed technology and programming offering in HDTV will be announced in due course. In addition to the package of channels to be offered by Sky, other broadcasters on the digital satellite platform will also be able to take advantage of its HDTV capabilities to provide an enhanced experience to their viewers.

Judging by FOX in the US using 480p as a HD service -- it'll be interesting to see what we get from Sky (576p anyone? tongue.gif ). And more interestingly how the BBC respond.

Lets hope we don't get lumbered with an out of date HD service in the UK and that Sky really innovate (MPEG4 transmission perhaps?) this time.

Steven

[infocus]

On the 27 April, I posted on the subject of HD(with no inside knowledge, honest!)

"Potentially it's a crucial issue for such as the BBC and ITV in the next decade. Sky have made huge inroads into the UK broadcast scene in the last decade, and this issue could accelerate that - bandwidth is less of an problem for them than for terrestial broadcasters. They make a lot of their money from pay per view, and pub etc screenings of major sports events on a big screen - and from what I've seen HD for this market can't come too soon. If they then choose to extend HD into Sky Movies, Sky One etc just at a time when big screens are becoming commonplace, HD-DVD is coming in, video games have HD outputs the implications for the BBC and ITV could be serious. I just don't think sitting back and hoping the whole thing will just go away is an option."

I could not have foreseen just how prophetic that would be, or how quickly events would move. On it's report on the announcement the BBC states that "....Picture quality on the service is better, especially for sports and films, but, so far, the high cost of the new TV sets has deterred people in the US from buying them." Which shows just how out of touch the BBC now is. Everything I've read shows massive exponential growth in HD sales in the US.

[StevenBagley]

I was talking to a friend in Atlanta this evening about this and he laughed at the bit in Sky's press release about HD taking off -- his exact comment was 'As If'. I suspect that it falls somewhere between Sky and BBC's comments.

But I agree that the BBC (and the other broadcasters) will need to react to this somehow. Which would mean making some of their flagship shows available in HD (via whatever platform). Maybe we'll see a BBC HD channel, which transmits a mixture of programs in HD that are also in SD on the main channels.

I imagine Sky's offerings will be (at first) imported US series, Movies and Sporting events. So the BBC could easily react with homegrown drama and documentaries in HD especially as some are already being made in HD eg the Natural History stuff, which would really showcase HD or programmes like 'Holby City' which have already experimented).

Also, as a lot of the BBC film drama is made by producing a physical cut negative, would mean that things like 'Pride and Prejudice' could be retelecined in HD (though whether the film stock used would actually resolve anymore detail than the SD version is another matter entirely).

I can't see the BBC sitting this one on the fence though.

The timing is interesting though -- 2006 would be the next World Cup, which Sky have no rights to show (at least in SD)...

Steven

[infocus]

Well...... from http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/bus/stories/052304dnbushdtv.3d09d.html (you have to register) "Strong end-of-year sales forced the Consumer Electronics Association to increase its DTV sales projection from 4 million to 4.3 million units. It now projects 5.7 million digital television units will be sold this year, increasing to almost 23 million by 2007."

And other reports I've read give the same picture - one the promoters of digital TV in the UK can only envy! Yes, it's still in a minority, but I understand take up has been faster than for DVD at an equivalent stage after it's introduction. The negative view in the BBC article simply is not justified.

Perhaps Alan Roberts could tell us what his ex-colleagues really make of the announcement, and did they see it coming?

[Alan Roberts]

Let's put this situation into context, using a lot of inside information.

HD in the US took off because it had already done so in Japan, the kit was reasonably priced and suited them (it largely runs at 59.94Hz, not 50Hz). While Japan has broadcast analogue HD for several years, it wasn't until the US decided to implement in one act, digital TV, widescreen and HDTV, that it took off there. Until then most US prodiction was analogue, a lot of it SVHS. It was all 4:3, much of it produced already NTSC coded. It looks awful on big screens.

In the meantime, Europe has largely gone digital in production, widescreen in the UK, Eire and some hotbeds of other European countries. We did that because, historically, we hada better system than the US (576 active lines rather than 487, and 5.5MHz bandwidth rather than 4.2) so our pictures always look a lot sharper than theirs. So their motive for HD is a lot greater than ours.

If you look at a map of the world (Snell & Wilcox have done this nicely), you'll see a large block (all the Americas, Japan, Australasia, Korea) have gone directly from analogue 4:3 SD production and broadcasting, straight into 16:9 HD digital broadcasting in one step. China is going to do the same, and I expect India to follow soon after. That leaves Africa, Europe, the Middle East and Russia, all 625-line countires, where the motive for HD is rather less. It's least in the UK because we've already got digits and widescreen running very successfully.

Sky are only promising one channel, by the year after next. They could do it in a fortnight if they wanted to, it isn't hard. the delay is to wait for the share price to rise so that new investors will contribute a cash sum for them to do it. The whole process is cost-neutral to Sky, they aren't a charity. The programming will be big sport and rock concerts for the first year, so ti won't be a continuous channel. That programming already exists, rock concerts are routinely shot in HD, as is a lot of sport.

The BBC is taking delivery of it's first batch of HD studio/OB cameras in a couple of weeks (I'm going to get paid to help them sort this out) and will have a digital HD OB van ready by IBC. BBC Music & Arts is already planning to make all big productions (e.g. Glyndebourne, Proms etc) in HD. Much of BBC Drama is already shot in HD and Natural History is making "Planet Earth" in HD because the co-producers won't pay otherwise.

So there's a lot of HD activity going on, it's just that you don't see it, all you see is programmes in SD that look better than they might (largely because the cameras are set up to my prescription). The BBC can't make programmes in HD unless someone else pays the extra cost that it incurs, it's a charter problem. When there's a broadcaster that can get the stuff out to the licence payers, all that will change. Already, the plans are for all drama to be HD by end 2006, and tape will be phased out at about the same time.

Honest chaps, all this really is going on, you don't see it because the programmes look good, but it's like a swan on a pond, all serene above water but furious paddling going on down below.

[PaulD]

Originally posted by Alan Roberts:
Already, the plans are for all drama to be HD by end 2006, and tape will be phased out at about the same time....Hi
I edited (as an assistant) my first BBC colour footage in the summer of 1967 (Eastman Color negative, which came out streets ahead of Ektchrome Reversal stock in low-light documentary tests at that time). Later that year I worked as a vision mixer with the new but horrible Editec 2" Quad videotape assembly edit system.
I went on record when I stopped vision mixing and returned to the film cutting rooms with the bold statement "film will see me out for my lifetime".
I was wrong. My last documentary film was made in 1988, and I was made redundant from TV in 1993. (And got my first Premiere NLE system).

What I never had the slightest inkling of was that video tape wouldn't last to see my career out - I reach retirement age in 2007.

Not the slightest inkling.... ;)

[Alan Roberts]

I think that tape will stay around as an archive medium, and as a delivery medium (i.e. you post the tape). But for organisations that capture edit and deliver all in-house (e.g. the main broadcasters), tape is well on the way out for editing already. The BBC's first desk-top editing systems using central servers is starting work in Bristol this week, editing can happen on a laptop using proxies from the server, only when the edit is complete does the real footage get loaded into an NLE like Avid for conforming. It never hits tape at all because the final playout is already from a central server, and has been for quite a while. Tape exists only when dealing with indies, or delivering to co-producers. The grand plan is for central servers to be accessible world-wide, so the NHU camera-man in Peru can download his footage via G3 phone, and do his first edit in the field, delivering the EDL the same way. The only need for tape is as a buffer between the camera and his laptop, and the Panasonic P2 and Sony XDCAM already obviate both of those.

[infocus]

Thanks Alan, a good resume, but one could read from it that whilst 5 years ago the UK had one of the best technical systems in the world, in 5 years time it will be inferior to India! (Let alone the US, Japan.......) And have we really got digits running successfully? Digital terrestial has been plagued by reception problems since it's introduction, and we seem saddled with a standard inferior to most other DVB countries - 2k v 8k. Granted the BBC and Freeview have improved matters, but the situations still far from ideal.
Originally posted by Alan Roberts The BBC can't make programmes in HD unless someone else pays the extra cost that it incurs, it's a charter problem. When there's a broadcaster that can get the stuff out to the licence payers, all that will change.I see the first point, but why can't they or another party set up their own transmission channel, for which a higher licence fee may be payable? A comparable situation to the colour licence fee being greater than for monochrome. Or is that our forthcoming surprise for the next few months? Either way, whatever anyone may think of Sky, they've been very astute financially so far, and the significance of their move must be seen as high. I understand what you're saying about a lot happening behind the scenes, but as a viewer I'm only interested in what makes it into my home.
Already, the plans are for all drama to be HD by end 2006, and tape will be phased out at about the same time.All drama, soaps etc and all, or just high end drama? And with a move to HD production with it's higher data rate requirements, what do you envisage tape being phased out in favour of? I'd been expecting HDCAM as the next generation and tapeless the generation after.

[StevenBagley]

And with a move to HD production with it's higher data rate requirements, what do you envisage tape being phased out in favour of? I'd been expecting HDCAM as the next generation and tapeless the generation after.Hard disk presumably -- the technology is already here. A modern Apple Powerbook with a Magma expansion box is powerful enough to capture HD to an external SCSI RAID array in a package that is portable. Modern SATA drives will probably remove the need for a SCSI RAID. 1Tb (4 250Gb drives) would give over 2hrs of footage at 1080 uncompressed. More if you accept compression, with HDCam coming in at 140Mbps (I think), a 120Gb harddrive can hold 160minutes of HD footage for £60, while a 40min HDCam tape is £35 or so...

But this opens up even more interesting possibilities, you could easily downconvert and create a DV compressed version on a firewire drive that could be plugged into the edit suite to do the offline. Production Assistants could be given tablet PCs that use wireless networks to add their notes as metadata directly on the captured files themselves.

It's already happening BBC R&D have their Orbit (http://www.bbc.co.uk/orbit) project looking at various bits and pieces, and software like 'Final Cut Pro' is already challenging the way shows are made, 'Ground Force (http://www.apple.com/uk/pro/video/groundforce/)' is regularly offlined in a cottage in Norfolk and in the US,' Scrubs (http://www.digitalfilmtree.com/images/credits/scrubs.html)' has virtually moved to producing the whole show in FCP. I wonder if we are on the brink of a change in TV production methods that'll do to the rest of TV production what NLE did to editting? I know whilst editing something earlier in the year for a producer who based in London that we were using MPEG4 compressed versions of the current edits that I uploaded to a web server to send rough cuts effectively and quickly to each other. He was then able to use MSN messenger to discuss points as with me as he watched the stream -- not only did this allow quick feedback, but I also had a log of the points he made to refer back to.

Steven

[Alan Roberts]

There's too much here for a detailed response, but...

The BBC's busily trading on reputation for production content and technical quality. That's why it's still selling well in the US. Broadcasting's limited this only as far as the licence payers are concerned, the Sky bill for carrying BBC content was a major cost, and Freeview was a cheaper answer that got signals out to more viewers more quickly. It works, although I'm happy to agree that it's not good enough. I have Freeviw for two reasons, 16:9 and BBC4, otherwise my PAL pictures are significantly better.

As far as setting up new channels is concerned, there's no spectrum space in terrestrial (despite the plethora of crap channels, closing all of mthem would only make space for one decent HD channel) so it would have to be satellite, back to Sky? Or maybe one of the other Astras, like the latest unencrypted BBC transmissions. HD needs a lot of channel, about 19Mb/s, it's not something you can shoe-horn into a corner.

The plan is (at least that's what I was told on Wednesday by someone I trust) for all drama to go HD in 3-4 years time. Probably not soaps because there's no international market for them, but it would cover a lot of kids programming because it's drama. Tape'll last longer in HD than SD because of the numbers problem, but eventually, it'll all go. For capture and production.

HDCAM is 144Mb/s (ok, that's nit-picking), and terrabyte drives are down to 700USD now, so hard drive space is not a problem. It's bound to happen. The problem with hard drive storage is that it has to be removable so that you can reload, there's little worse than having to spend time downloading the camera drive so that you can start again. All the solid state, hard-drive, and optical systems already create lo-def proxy files so that you can do a quick/dirty edit without spending the time to move the big files around. That's been happening nfor about 18 months now, and is set to explode in the next couple of years. Wireless networking is already up and running, central servers holding the clips. Editors can work away doing the grind while the director sits in his office monitoring the output, maybe continents away. All this is already with us as technology, but hasn't supplanted everything yet, that costs money. Just remember that BBC Manchester does all its news editing in BetaSP, not even digits yet.

[Alan McKeown]

In case it hasn’t been mentioned before.
Euro 2004 in Portugal is being covered in HDTV.

Quote from the Alfacam website:

"Alfacam at the European Football Championshi4/6/2004
Alfacam covers all 31 football games for the host broadcaster RTP-EBS in HDTV and in SDI 625 at the same time. To ensure the high quality, seamless broadcasting and coverage of all the games, Alfacam will be present with 8 OB Vans, 4 Assist Trucks and 2 SNG Trucks.”

Alan

[infocus]

Do we know if that is being transmitted anywhere in HD, and what percentage of the games it applies to?

[Alan McKeown]

Unfortunately the matches are not available live on Euro1080 main channel. The Set top boxes with conditional access cards were about a month late being delivered so Euro1080 main channel is not yet encrypted as it would have to be to stand any chance of live transmission of Euro 2004. Hopefully it will be able cover some of the Olympics from Athens.

Euro 2004 may quite possibly be being carried live in HDTV to the US and Japan but I am not sure of this.


Quote from Euro1080:

Euro1080 is proud to announce that we will broadcast most games of the European Championship Football, EURO2004, in cinemas all over Europe. These games will brought to you through the Euro1080 Event Channel.

The live projections will be in High Definition, which means that the matches can be viewed with a superior picture and sound quality.

For reasons of television rights, those matches will not be broadcasted on our Main Channel. In the privacy of your home, you will still have to rely on the traditional TV stations to view EURO2004.

But if you want to participate in a unique experience, very close to actually being at the pitch, you can do so in the comfort of a cinema.

Cities in Europe where you can enjoy EURO2004 in a cinema :

Belgium
Brussels, Mons (Imagix)

Czech Republic
Prague (Slovansky Dum)

Hungary
Budapest (Palace MOMPark)

Latvia
Riga (Baltic Cinema)

Luxemburg
Luxemburg (Utopolis)

Portugal
Lisbon (Cinemas Millenium, Mariott Hotel Lisboa)

Sweden
Aseda (Aseda Folkets Hus)
Idre (Idre Kulturhus)
Örebrö (Conventum)
Oskarshamn (Oskarshamns Folkets Hus)
Sandviken (Folkets Hus Sandviken)
Smedjebacken (Smedjebackens Folketshusförening)
Spanga (Spanga Folkan)
Stockholm (Draken/Offix)

Switzerland
Basel (Walch Kino)

The Netherlands
Zoetermeer (Utopolis), Den Helder (Utopolis)

[Alan McKeown]

Rumour on the Web has it that there is presently a live transmission of Euro 2004 in HDTV from a satellite positioned at 22 degrees West. Unfortunately I am unable to confirm this as my antenna cannot see anything more than about 5 degrees West. There is a mountain blocking its view!

Alan

[infocus]

A fairly basic question, but if these games (or any European material) are originated 1080i/50 and were to be transmitted in the States, would the broadcaster have to convert to 1080i/60? Or could they just be transmitted as originated and HDTV receivers are able to adapt? I understand the receivers can cope with differing line standards (480,720,1080) but are they fixed to 50Hz or 60Hz?

[StevenBagley]

A fairly basic question, but if these games (or any European material) are originated 1080i/50 and were to be transmitted in the States, would the broadcaster have to convert to 1080i/60? Or could they just be transmitted as originated and HDTV receivers are able to adapt? I understand the receivers can cope with differing line standards (480,720,1080) but are they fixed to 50Hz or 60Hz?I think it'd have to be converted to 60Hz, to be compatible with people watching on NTSC TVs (downconverting in the box). Film material is transmitted with 3:2 pulldown at 60i/60p too as I understand it (got to feel sorry for Americans having to put up with that).

What is more of a problem though is that I don't think you can't get motion-estimation based that work in HD so the standards of conversion would be pretty poor compared to an Alchemist conversion. With football if this is the case I imagine you'd get a lot of motion blur.

Steven

[Alan Roberts]

Yep, the US can't broadcast 50Hz, the decoders won't work unless reprogrammed.

By the way, hot news: John Varney (Chief Technical Officer, BBC) has said that all BBC production will be HDTV by the end of the decade. That's not a command or instruction, just an observation.

And Sky really have no idea yet about how to do their recently announced HD channel. It seems Murdoch made a policy statement, rather than a release of details. There'll be a lot of head scratching in the next year before they tell us what they're going to do, but I guess they'll import reprogrammed DirectTV decoders from the US (DirectTV is owned by News Corp). If you look on the web, you'll find adverts for them in the US, a set of 5 decoders (for 5 tvs, displays) installed for $369, that makes them $79 each, so the going rate for them in the UK will be about £150 :(

[Alan Roberts]

[mixed metaphor]
Just been told about this document. It explains the official EBU position on HDTV. But, remember that it was written before Sky's announcement. I reckon the pidgeon loft must be in uproar across Europe at the moment :D I really do hope so, they can't keep their heads stuck in the sand too much longer.
[/mixed mataphor]

http://europa.eu.int/comm/avpolicy/legis/key_doc/legispdffiles/rollout.pdf

[StevenBagley]

I get the feeling reading that they are hoping HD will just go away and leave them alone...

Steven

[Alan Roberts]

Quite :D

[infocus]

Originally posted by Alan Roberts:
Yep, the US can't broadcast 50Hz, the decoders won't work unless reprogrammed.In another thread you posted "Incidentally, the BBC truck's first job is 2 Prom concerts, one a rehearsal for the Last Night, which will be taken live in Japan in HD (at 1080/50i)."

Do we take it Japans system is more advanced?
And can their decoders still give an NTSC output with 1080/50i input?
By the way, hot news: John Varney (Chief Technical Officer, BBC) has said that all BBC production will be HDTV by the end of the decade. That's not a command or instruction, just an observation.
Hmmmm. Which begs the question, when will it become mandatory for new equipment being ordered to to be HD - even if material being shot/edited with it is unlikely ever to be seen HD. We're talking chickens and eggs again, but I'm surprised to hear that BEFORE an announcement of an outlet channel. :confused:

[StevenBagley]

Presumably it's a case that SD kit will be scarce by the end of the decade, with HD kit being the norm from the likes of Sony...

Steven

[Alan Roberts]

Two things:

The US is highly isolationist. Anything they buy has to be right for broadcasting with no other effort. Therefore they will accept only 59.94i or 23.98psf (e.g. film-mode shot at 24psf or 25psf and slowed for replay). Japan is more pragmatic, NHK haver a prototype converter that will convert HD from 50 to 60 for their own use, highly sophisticated, motion adaptive, looks very good. They used it for the Last Night of the Proms last year.

John Varney's comment has to be read in a world where digital kit is multi-functional. Most of the HD kit we're using now is switchable, you can get SD out of the HD cameras and vtrs, all the HD switchers work perfectly happily at SD rates, so does all the distribution network. So his comment really means that before the end of this decade, you won't be able to buy digital production kit that won't do SD and HD. Thus all new installations will automatically be HDTV capable. All the digital OB trucks are being built this way, and HD kit is now coming in at very little more than SD digital kit was three years ago. It would be economic suicide to build a digital production facility that can't be switched to HD. SD kit will still be around, installed, but any new kit will be HD capable. By the way, the first piece of kit to work this way was a plasma panel fitted with a digital input by Richard Stevens some years ago (BBC R&D, shared my office last year), the same input circuit would run at SD or HD without being told what it was, that's why the pix looked so good, no analogue anywhere.

[Alan McKeown]

Quote:*** ** ** ** * * ** **
“Yep, the US can't broadcast 50Hz, the decoders won't work unless reprogrammed.”


Interestingly, there has very recently been a software update for the “Euro1080” set top boxes, to allow them to correctly process 60 Hz transmissions (in addition to 50 Hz).

Rather oddly for a European channel, the Astra High Definition demo. material (from Pioneer) is in “60 Hz”. As such, it plays very jerkily on 50 Hz receivers. With the update, both 50 Hz (from Euro1080) and 60 Hz (from Astra HD) material play correctly.

I assume that if the “political” will was there, this could be achieved with US STBs also. So technically there would seem to be no barrier to the direct exchange of 50 Hz and 60 Hz programmes, always provided that the home display systems can cope.


Alan

[Alan Roberts]

Exactly right, you got it. It's only software.

I've long held the view that broadcasters should not standards-convert maqterial for broadcast, but should just put it out at the shooting rate. My tv sets will all show NTSC correctly, and two out of three VHS decks will replay NTSC as well (OK, they're SVHS and the other's an ancient Philips VHS).

I still hold the view that we no longer need standards in broadcasting, now that we've got digital pipelines. All we need to agree on is the form of compression, so that all decoders will work. Then we could supply the pipeline with any resolution at any frame rate, knowing that the display will not mess it up as happens with standards conversion. It would mean that we could put films out at the rigbht speed (24Hz) instead of 4% fast, and let the display work out what to do with it. There's a similar body of opinion min the US, that wants to get rid of the truly grotesque 2:3 pull-down they do, by displaying it at 72Hz with, effectively a triple-bladed shutter (this is like our 100Hz tv sets, effectively using a 4-blade shutter for film, 2-blade for tv).

WM9 is the nearest we've got to what I want. It works at any resolution and frame rate. The output resolution is no concern of the coder, because it's dynamic, if the picture isn't big enough, you just grab a corner and enlarge it. And it's far more efficient than MPEG2 or MPEG4.

I really hope that we see the comp[lete death of tv standards in the next few years, so that we can produce at any resolution and rate, code it and traqnsmit it, the decoders sorting out how mto handle it. TV will then and only nthen have fully matured.

My 2 pen'orth.

BTW, these views represent those of quite a few BBC people, but not that of the BBC or any other broadcaster. They are only just beginning to understand the full implications of WM9 (and the BBC R&R Dirac codec).

[Alan Roberts]

BTW, I've just heard that ITV are planning to join in the funding/control of Freeview. It's about time they woke up and joined in, Freeview now reaches more homes than all cable delivery systems put together.

[Alan McKeown]

Good news about ITV and Freeview.


More on HDTV in Europe.
Quoted from SES ASTRA:

Betzdorf, June 21st, 2004

*

HDTV SPECIFICATIONS AND TIMETABLE AGREED BY SES ASTRA AND INDUSTRY PARTNERS FROM ALL OVER EUROPE

"HDTV" label for display devices to be launched in collaboration with major industry partners

SES ASTRA, an SES GLOBAL company (Euronext Paris, Luxembourg and Frankfurt Stock Exchanges: SESG), in a concerted effort with more than sixty of its European broadcast customers, hardware manufacturers and other industry partners, at their second European HDTV Forum session held on the 17th of June at SES ASTRA's headquarters in Luxembourg, have agreed on the technical aspects and the timetable for the introduction of HDTV (High Definition Television) services in Europe via the ASTRA Satellite System.

Due to the eye-catching higher resolution compared to standard definition broadcasts, HDTV offers a compelling new viewing experience, notably on state-of-the-art flat screen displays and home cinemas, which are being installed at an increasing rate in European homes.

HDTV is already a reality in countries like the United States and Japan, where more than 6 million households currently receive HDTV broadcasts and all major broadcasters offer full-fledged HDTV services.

SES ASTRA pioneered the transmission of HDTV services in Europe with EURO 1080. Europe's first dedicated HDTV offer has been broadcasting via the ASTRA satellite system at 19.2° East since January 1st, 2004. In the meantime, the interest in HDTV has gained considerable momentum in several European countries under the ASTRA footprint. The latest pan-European HDTV initiative undertaken by ASTRA and renowned industry partners is expected to trigger a rapid deployment of the new technology across various European markets, with additional HDTV channels expected to launch as early as this year on the ASTRA Satellite System.

To ensure a uniform roll-out and avoid a fragmentation of the nascent market in Europe, SES ASTRA and its industry partners have agreed on the minimum technical specifications for HDTV broadcasts, based on e.g. the open MPEG-2 or MPEG-4 AVC standards. These technical specifications include:
- HDTV ready displays need a minimum of 720 lines vertical resolution
- Scan formats of 720P50 and 1080i25 for HDTV
- Standard interfaces for peripheral equipment

SES ASTRA and its industry partners have also agreed on the launch of an "HDTV" label which will be deployed to identify future-proof HDTV displays. The label is intended to ensure consumer confidence when acquiring new display devices and will be used in the upcoming HDTV marketing campaigns of the different manufacturers promoting the pan-European HDTV initiative.

Ferdinand Kayser, President and CEO of SES ASTRA, states: "So far, Europe has been trailing countries like the United States with respect to the introduction of HDTV services. At the same time, sales of flat screen displays have been booming. Independent research institutes actually suggest that in a few years tens of millions of HD enabled TV sets will be deployed in the different European countries. By agreeing on minimal technical specifications and building on open standards, SES ASTRA and its partners from the broadcast and hardware industry intend to ensure that the roll-out of HDTV services in Europe kick-starts as early as this year."

For further information please contact:

Yves Feltes
Press Relations, SES ASTRA
Tel +352 710 725 311
Yves.Feltes@ses-global.com
www.ses-astra.com (http://www.ses-astra.com)

[Alan Roberts]

Yes, that Astra statement is very clear and accurate. It's exactly what I've been saying for ages, HD'll take off only when the displays get big, and into homes, and only then will the broiadcasters wake up and get on with it. Just pray that the 720/50P pushers don't get their own way, what we need to end up with is 1080/50P or 1080/60P, and the best way to get there is via interlace first. Launching a 720/50P service could be a major disaster in my opinion.

[StevenBagley]

Launching a 720/50P service could be a major disaster in my opinion.Why do some people think it would be a good idea -- just short sightedness (ie it looks as good now and uses less bandwidth) or something more fundamental?

Steven

[Alan Roberts]

It's because they can do it now, very shortsighted in my opinion.

[infocus]

Launching a 720/50P service could be a major disaster in my opinion. I think I remember you saying that Sony don't support 720 - only 1080. Does that not make 1080 a more likely bet? ;)

I've just been looking back over the first few posts in this topic, and even though I was one of the most bullish, I'm still astonished at the speed with which announcements have been made. I shall be very surprised if the BBC sit on the fence for much longer now. When organisations such as Astra are this committed and quote statistics like "Independent research institutes actually suggest that in a few years tens of millions of HD enabled TV sets will be deployed in the different European countries" the subject has to be seen very seriously.

Regarding the comments about ITV and Freeview, I seem to recall stories (before my time!) of an earlier ITV wanting to convert much earlier to colour, and supporting 405 line NTSC as the future standard for the UK. Hmmm.

Regarding the earlier talk about standards, and being able to transmit 24fps, letting the receiver show it at 72Hz, I assume this only applies to CRT displays? Can one assume that for Plasmas and LCDs they can just display 24 frames as is without flicker, as they don't have to rely on a scanning spot?

[Alan Roberts]

Several points:

Yes, Sony don't to 720P. They have eyes on the future at 1080/60P. 720P is only an interim format until 1080P/50 or 60 becomes a reality (Sony showed a prototype 1080/60P camcorder at NAB this year). 720P is popular in the US for sport, because the motion's much better than 1080 can do, yet. 720P's also popular in production because Panasonic have the world's only variable speed camcorder (except the specialist high-speed stuff, and that doesn't really count). So 1080's the way to go, 720P has to be a dead duck unless it's a junior partner to 1080 until 1080/50 or 60P can be broadcast. That's my view.

I'm not surprised at the speed of progress, remember I've been in the HDTV game for nearly 30 years, it looks slow to me. Europe has been debating for about 5 years now, ever since the US actually got on with it. There's lots of HD production capability in Europe, mostly in the UK, so we know how to do it. The only issue is access to bandwidth, and Sky have it in spades, and the will to do it when they can make money from it. National broadcasters won't join in until they have government or commercial mandates to do so. For example, the BBC's rules are that no licence-payers' money shall be spent on HDTV production if they see no benefit from it. That means co-producers bear any extra costs, although I could easily argue that the licence-payer gets a better progamme from HD production, but it all gets a bit political.

405 NTSC was indeed on the cards for the UK a long time before 625 and PAL. The remnants of the research kit were still in use at BBC R&D when I joined them in 1968. Unifying Europe on 625 was the best possible choice (405 had only 2MHz luma bandwidth, 625 has 5 or 5.5MHz, 6MHz in China), and Dr. Bruch didn't produce the final, delay-line, proposal until about two weeks before the EBU decision was made. It was a very tight run thing. But the decider was the freeing up of UHF channels which could be allocated in 8MHz chunks instead of the measly spectral space available in Bands I and III in the UK.

You've hit exactly my point about display rates. If the display doesn't flicker when running at a low rate, why should the transmission have to deliver a faster rate? Plasmas and lcds don't flicker, so they can show pictures at the native rate. However, plasmas don't show the native rate anyway because of the multiple sub-field modulation. And remember that motion portrayal on a crt is good because the spot forms a modulated delta-function, a Dirac pulse, which has Sinc function temporal response, while lcds and plasmas turn the pixels on for much longer and suffer from motion blur as a result. Display technology still has a long way to go before crts are fully ousted.

[Alan Roberts]

I'll add to all that, that 720P may well survive as the consumer, intro, level for HDTV. The HDV format is the key to this, a series of cameras that do either or both of 1440x1080/50i (or 59.94i) and 1280x720P at one or more of 25,30,50 and 60Hz. All versions are 4:2:0 so make sense at this level, and are MPEG compressed to less than 25Mb/s on tape. They also do conventional SD either directly from the camera, or a little less well from a downconversion of the recording.

This is the technology we'll see first in Europe, at affordable prices. The JVC HD10 is the first, Sony have shown a mockup of their version which looks and works like a PD170 and will be priced a little higher. JVC are aiming a joe public, Sony at low-end pro. Panasonic haven't announced yet, but they can't be far behind.

Once cameras like these (not the JVC PD10, that's an aberration inj my view) are in the shops at sensible prices, we'll have people making better pictures than they can get from any broadcaster. At that point, the broadcasters will have no choice, they'll have to go HD. The only real issues are when and how.

[StevenBagley]

I can see a problem with transmitting everything at native rate -- how would the broadcasters move from a 25fps film to a 50fps sports programme, (assuming they keep the style of continuity used now -- with fades and such between the shows).

OF course if it means a return to a more upmarket style of presentation that we used to have then maybe it'll be a good thing...

Steven

[Alan Roberts]

Think several years ahead. All transmission is digital, so there are frame buffers (many) at each end of the broadcast pipeline. The broadcaster can simply switch to a new frame rate, synchronously, via this buffer, and the coder flags the new stream as being at the new rate. The decoder detects that flag in time and formats the output in the best way tha