HDR

With NextGen TV broadcasts now within reach of more than 240 million Americans and sales of televisions and upgrade accessory devices expected to top 5 million units this year (according to the Consumer Technology Association), local TV broadcasters transmitting in NextGen TV are ramping up to support High Dynamic Range (HDR) video and immersive audio as an “always on” viewer benefit.

The network will use 165 cameras this Sunday for its coverage of the game in Las Vegas as well as pregame, halftime and postgame shows, which CBS says is the most ever for a Super Bowl. They will be supported by 19 mobile production trucks. And CBS’s 1080p HDR production from Allegiant Stadium will also be used as the backbone of an alternative broadcast on the children’s network Nickelodeon, Super Bowl LVIII Live from Bikini Bottom, that will use enhanced graphics and augmented reality to incorporate characters from the popular SpongeBob SquarePants animated series into live game coverage. Plus, there are the “doink cams.”

As ATSC marked its 40^th anniversary at last week’s conference, conversations resoundingly turned to alternative uses for the NextGen TV spectrum including datacasting and PNT applications.

Suzana Brady, SVP for worldwide sales and marketing at Cobalt Digital, and one of this year’s TVNewsCheck Women in Technology Futurist Award winners, is herding the broadcast tech industry together through her pivotal role as chair of the Reliable Internet Stream Transport (RIST) Forum.

A Sinclair/Sony/Avid experiment aims to optimize news photographers’ field time by immediately logging metadata into cameras in the field, while Starlink and 5G rollouts continue to boost reliability in more remote scenarios. Above, Vislink’s MVP Streamur Live Streaming App in action, allowing reporters to broadcast into the production workflow using a mobile device.

The fully remote production launches tonight with a new mobile fleet of 16 that’s producing the games in 1080p with High Dynamic Range with around 250 people onsite for each TNF game. (Courtesy of Prime Video)

Sinclair Broadcast Group thinks it has found a cost-effective solution in conversion technology that can take standard-dynamic range (SDR) content and transform it to high-dynamic range (HDR) content in real-time, a technology it demonstrated at last month’s NAB Show.

Whether offered as a standalone unit or combined with other components of the broadcast workflow, multiviewers are tackling a mix of formats and a higher volume of content to monitor. Above, Studio Berlin uses the Apantac KVM over IP solution for its multiviewers.

Attendance may have been almost halved by the pandemic, but tech vendors felt the more intimate environment allowed them to conduct business on a more productive level. On the show floor, the continued shift of broadcast workflows to the public cloud dominated many discussions, while others focused on NextGen TV’s pressing need to monetize.

Bally Sports game productions will provide an enhanced digital signal using HDR for all games, which will roll out over the second half of 2022.

After a 2020 “bubble” of neutral sites, the MLB returns to a more traditional postseason format this fall. Big onsite crews are back, vaxxed and masked, and they’re deploying new cameras and presentation graphics to give the games their sharpest look yet. Above, Fox’s Megalodon camera unit features a handheld mirrorless Sony camera with a shallow depth-of-field lens and a stabilizing gimbal rig that provides a very different up-close look of players.

Broadcasters are warming to using robotics for remote camera operations, having seen crucial improvements in camera movement, better object and face tracking, new movement patterns and stronger overall automation. Above, a camera operator stands behind Ross Video’s remote panbar system, capturing the action on the field at a college baseball game.

Networks, mobile truck companies and tech vendors agree the pandemic will impact HDR and UHD production through this year through a combination of equipment availability, complex new remote workflows and financial constraints.

Costs are inhibiting a flood of 4K sports production, but 1080p HDR offers numerous practical advantages, among them that the improvement in picture quality is more readily apparent to consumers than the gain from 4K resolution. Above, Sony tested an 8K camera at the Sony Open in Hawaii last year, but doesn’t expect 8K to be used for regular sports production for several years.

Fox will use more than 100 manned and robotic cameras to cover the game, including 24 “Super-Motion” cameras to support replays; 20 goal-line and end-line pylon cameras; wireless “Line to Gain” cameras that travel up and down the field in alignment with the first-down marker; and two different SkyCam systems which operate at different elevations. It will also use 72 field mics, as well as wireless player mics, to capture game audio. And that’s just scratching the surface.

Larger networks and sports broadcasters are in the vanguard of IP routing, but local stations are following more slowly. Business needs are driving the pace of transition, and HD-SDI routers are far from disappearing. NBCUniversal Owned Television Stations’ new facility for WCAU-WWSI, its Philadelphia duopoly, uses Grass Valley control software and IPG (IP gateway) cards working with Cisco switches to bridge the HD-SDI and IP worlds.

The Week Four Thursday Night Football game on Fox between the Philadelphia Eagles and Green Bay Packers was supposed to be exciting beyond the game — which came down to a goal line stand in the final minute — as it was meant to be the debut of the NFL in 4K HDR. But Fox’s gameplan failed for a variety of reasons, allowing for only a limited audience to experience the game in the hi-res format.

If you’re shopping for a new TV, a new acronym should be on your radar: HDR, or High Dynamic Range. Soon it’ll be everywhere, but here’s why it’s worth a look now.

Katy Noland, senior R&D technologist at the BBC, has been chosen as one of TVNewsCheck’s 2019 Technology Women to Watch and will be honored during the NAB Show on April 9 in Las Vegas.