Help to give perspective on the CUBE/Panasonic partnership
FromIBC
I'm sorry. Can you run that past me
again?
Like all good exhibitions, IBC is already taking on a life of its own: distilling
issues, generating new buzzword jargon and providing the welcome
opportunity to nobble policy-makers and engineers at the sharp-end who
will be "in a meeting" or on voicemail for the rest of the year.
I'd expected "convergence" to win the award for most over-used word. But
so far "open" and "interoperable" are winning hands-down.
Sony wants us to know that it is now more open and is a caring and
listening company. This, of course, has nothing to do with the fact that
Panasonic - who for years have clumsily marketed products that few
people wanted to buy - is now knocking the bejaysus out of Sony with
DVCPro.
"This is a new Sony, with a new open approach to business," proclaims
Miles Flint, president of Sony Broadcast and Professional Europe. "Our
future is MPEG. Our future is open. Open systems can deliver true
interoperability. They spell an end to format wars. MPEG is the way
forward. We are doing it because it is the right thing to do. Betacam SX is
MPEG compliant."
The story of Betacam
Anyone suffering from a hangover, jetlag or format fatique may welcome a
quick rundown on the status quo (which is Latin for "the mess we are in").
In the beginning there was Betacam, the analogue format that built on
Sony's excellent but heavily mis-marketed consumer Betamax system.
This morphed into Betacam SP as Panasonic footled with failures like MII
and pro-VHS variants.
Digital Betacam was conceived in pre-MPEG days, so used a proprietary
compression system to reduce the number of bits recorded on tape (the
various D systems use no compression so cannot give long recording
times with a small cassette).
Then came Betacam SX, which is MPEG-compliant. In the plain English
which this marketspeak industry seems so anxious to avoid, this means
that the recorder uses standard MPEG compression but puts out a
"native" signal which needs conversion into the new Pro-MPEG format
which Sony and others are pushing as a future industry standard. A single
IC can now handle the conversion at four times real-time speed, and
Sony's new machines will put out standard MPEG-Pro signals.
For a full update, go to the Pro-MPEG Forum meeting scheduled for 18.00
on Monday, at the Golden Tulip Barbizon. The Forum is a newly formed
industry group, which is hoping to make MPEG a de facto standard.
Sony versus Panasonic
In the meantime, nota bene that DVD video discs and DVB broadcast TV
uses an MPEG-2 bitstream known as Main Profile, Main Level (MP/ML);
and the new Pro format is known as 4:2:2 Profile, at Main Level (or
422P@ML or 422P/ML). This is Open MPEG.
So what's the difference between MP/ML and 422P/ML?
The MPEG-2 standard is not tied to any data rate, but MP/ML handles
streams of up to 15 Mbits/s; above that speed 422P/ML takes over and
copes with rates up to 50 Mbits/s. At low rates picture quality is improved
by coding pictures in long groups, not unreasonably known as Long
Groups Of Pictures or GOPS. These mix Independent (standalone) frames
with Predictive frames (which use information from previous images) and
Bi-Directional frames (which look both forwards and backwards in time).
At the higher rates there is no gain from using B and P frames. So the
Pro-MPEG datastream becomes a rapid sequence of standalone images,
much like a motion JPEG or DV signal.
Here endeth that lesson.
Now there's DV. The consumer format is fast taking over the home video
market, driving down the price of analogue camcorders to a very few
hundred dollars. At the professional end, Panasonic is cleaning up with the
DVCPro variant and Sony is countering with DVCam. Cam won't replay Pro
tapes, but it will play consumer DV cassettes. So every videosnapshooter
can be an unpaid news-gatherer.
We now await news from Panasonic on what the latest DVC Pro hardware
will and won't play.
Tektronix on the rise
Tektronix also wants us to know that it is open. Tek has got into bed with
Avid to sell Profile servers and Avid non-linear edit systems to
broadcasters and newsrooms. (No, silly, this Profile has nothing to do with
MPEG Profiles. It's just Tek's trade name.) This means the end of
Lightworks, which will now be run down. Tough luck on Lightworks users.
You are a casualty of progress.
Tek pledges that its new systems will be interoperable and will glue
together market leader sources such as DVC Pro and MPEG. Gluing will
be thanks to a new "open system" which Tek hopes will become yet
another de facto industry standard and "open up the market".
So will Tek and Avid make this new glue available free, with no royalties
payable?
"The issue of fees is a problem," says Tim Thorsteinson, President of
Tek's Video Networking Division. "We are investing milions of dollars on
development."
Rose O'Donnell, Avid's head of research and development is more open.
"There will be no royalties payable," she confirms. "This is not altruism or
charity. It's self interest. We see it as a way to promote digital non-linear
tools. We can then offer what we think are the best."
Damp squip
In an effort to ram home the message of a new caring, listening company,
Sony devoted half its pre-opening press bash to an Industry Panel. The
idea was to debate the future and the first omens looked good. Tough on
those who couldn't make it, but the evening was to be recorded. So were
we about to hear some really frank comments, too libellous to capture on
tape?
Sadly not. Sony forgot to rig a recording feed to the PA system. So no
tape.
Actually you didn't miss much. The Panel never really sparked, with no
real focus and vague talk of "content is king" and "battles for the eyeballs".
"Bad things can happen with nonlinear systems," admitted Scott Teissler
of CNN. Dozing ears pricked up. What bad things? We never heard.
John Birt at IBC?
BIRTV, says the sign on a small stand. Has John Birt, King of the BBC,
really come to IBC, without minders, to answer questions from disgruntled
staff? Sadly no. The Beijing International Radio and TV show is drumming
up support for their 1999 event.
But Will Wyatt, Chief Executive of the Beeb, did breeze into town to
keynote IBC with a polished multimedia show. "People at IBC say it's all
about content, content, content," he noted. "Then they go on to talk about
technology."
An unguarded aside about "still trying to make the Electronic Programme
Guide work" did little to reassure those that wonder if the first generation
receivers that will launch Sky's digital satellite service on 1st October will
be good for the services that British Interactive Broadcasting will serve up
next year.
And, despite the BBC's excitement over interaction, Wyatt clearly has
some feet left on the ground.
The nuclear family which his presentation showed in 2010, knee deep in
high-tech gismos, still wanted to "flop and watch" the future equivalent of
Kojak when they got home from a hard day's interaction in the office. |
