The Year’s Worth Of Innovation And Invention

Even though many TV stations have yet to upgrade their newscasts to HD, TV technologists everywhere were talking about the next-generation TV production standard in 2012– 4K or UltraHD. And in some cases, they were doing more than talking.

CBS gave producers of its primetime programming the green light to shoot in 4K, figuring it made sense to use the best possible resolution for archiving while the 4K distribution chain gets developed.  CBS’s short-lived legal drama Made in Jersey was the first primetime show to get the 4K treatment.

Driving  4K are consumer electronics manufacturers, which are always looking for something new to boost sales. LG, Sony and others are offering or are planning to offer 4K sets, although the displays, like the early HD, are too expensive for the average consumer.

Any broadcaster thinking that 4K and its costs will go away will be disappointed, said Canon’s Larry Thorpe at an industry conference in November. “There is just no stopping it; it’s just a matter of time.”

Certain that 4K will come, the Advanced Television Systems Committee, the standards body that brought the industry and the country HD, moved ahead with work on an new broadcast standard — ATSC 3.0 — that will be more efficient and rugged than the current ATSC digital standard used to broadcast HD. Greater efficiency means broadcasters will use the standard to air 4K and even 3D.

After a six-month search, Harris Corp. found a buyer for its venerable broadcast division — private equity firm The Gores Group, which agreed to pay $225 million. Harris Morris, who has been running the division since 2010, is staying on to manage the new company, which will continue to be called Harris for awhile.

Even though the division has struggled with its one-stop-shop strategy, Morris told TVNewsCheck that he and the new owners plan to stay the course. “I think the Gores guys would tell you they are very excited by the end-to-end offerings that we have in our portfolio and they’re committed to developing leading-edge technologies across the broadcast value chain.”

The year’s other big deal was Belden’s purchase of Miranda, a TV infrastructure vendor, for $332 million. Like the new owner of Harris, the new owner of Miranda stuck with existing management, which is led by CEO Strath Goodship.

Broadcasters made little progress in bringing their long planned mobile DTV service to market. The two consortia of broadcasters — Dyle and the Mobile500 — proceeded separately and slowly to pull together the ecosystem necessary for a viable consumer service. The most significant development may have been the introduction by Samsung and MetroPCS of a smart phone capable of receiving the Dyle service.

Just this week, the Open Mobile Video Coalition, the group that was formed several years ago to develop the mobile DTV standard and promote the service, was folded into the NAB.

In ENG, bonded cellular technology from companies like Teradek, TVU, LiveU and Dejero was all the rage. It uses the conventional cell phone network for streaming live reports from the field to the studio. Unlike microwave and satellite links, bonded cellular is mobile.  It may have gotten its biggest workout during the local TV news coverage of Superstorm Sandy that battered the New York and New Jersey in October.

The coolest ENG technology of the future may be the camera-equipped unmanned aircraft or drone. A law signed by President Obama in February requires the FAA to come up with licensing requirements and safety regulations for commercial drones by 2015. The agency predicts that by 2020, there could be 30,000 drones in the American skies performing all kinds of jobs, including newsgathering.

In September, Harris became the latest vendor to offer channel in a box (CiaB), which like the many others, combines playout and master control functionality into a single IT-based platform. At IBC in September, Harris described its Versio as a robust, cost-effective way for broadcasters to quickly add new services and digital subchannels, and to provide backup in emergencies.

Florical, Miranda, Snell, Crispin, Harmonic, and Utah Scientific are among those that have also introduced CiaB solutions.

Vendors continued to push cloud-based services as a way to more increased efficiency, and appeared to be overcoming broadcasters concerns about reliability and security.  An Ovum Research survey of 200 video producers around the world commissioned by Avid Technology and released at IBC found that only 23% were using a cloud infrastructure, but that more than 75% were considering deploying it.

A new law requires TV stations to close-caption full-length programming they stream live online or to digital devices. It’s not easy, but the various companies that supply video solutions to stations say they are on the case and are promising to have solutions ready by the time the mandate takes effect next March.

The other law chief engineers had to worry about was the CALM Act, which empowers the FCC to prevent cable operators and programmers and broadcasters from airing commercials louder than accompanying programming. A variety of vendors at NAB offered products designed to monitor loudness of all TV content and make sure that some isn’t louder than others. The new law took effect Dec. 13.

While most commercial broadcasters remained unsold on centralcasting, their noncommercial counterparts have embraced it, convinced that it will take much of the cost out of their operations. One group of public stations in New York combined master control in upstate New York in December and another group plans to do the same from a facility in Jacksonville, Fla., next summer.

Read the other stories in this Year in Review Special Report here.