Production Technology Seminar 2009 - EBU Technical

7
� Formats and Codecs:
o some consumers think that the emission format 720p is “small HD“ compared to1080i, and this
must be balanced by a good picture quality;
o one must be careful in down-converting from 1080i25 to 576i25 (SD) - mostly it works perfectly,
but some visual elements, e.g. the vertical lines of a football field, created visual distortion;
o unhomogeneity in the codec line makes transcoding necessary bringing with it conversion
artefacts;
o VITC is not well supported in the HD domain (RP188/ATC), with the need to add some TC
inserters.
� Alignment
o the transition from the CRT monitor to the TFT panels forced the camera control operator to get
the right aperture adjustment;
o large TV screens challenge frame stability, i.e. take care of steady shots from portable cameras;
o take care of lip sync 8 along the chain, that means more necessary delays have to be inserted;
o take care of handling the Dolby E signal through the different stages: there may some critical
guard interval alignment, the Ingest AVID Air Speed server only handles 24-bit, the Telestream
FlipFactory cannot pass through such a Dolby signal.
� HD Material
o Work hand in hand with the programme and marketing departments to create awareness for
producing original HD content and mark the HD programmes on the screen with a HD-channel logo.
o Be flexible in the budget planning: rental companies are charging extra for HD copies.
o Be careful by using SD material up-converted into HD programmes: the quality difference is
visible.
ORF wants to increase the number of HD programmes per day: major sports events (Olympic Games,
Champions-League, National top events, etc.), blockbuster movies as much as available, TV-Series,
Spring Event (Dancing Stars, in March), in parallel with the continuous expansion of HD-enabled
equipment, cabling and facilities (edit suites, production studios, on-air recording, etc.).
1.2 Hear it like Beckham! A new audio recording technique for sports
Gerhard Stoll, Senior Engineer, Audio System, IRT, Germany
Sports productions are a great platform for HDTV and multichannel audio. The combination of "best
picture and best sound” provides a coherent and emotional coherent impression.
The basic audio elements of sports production are:
� Atmosphere, through a mix of crowd/ambiance (front and surround fields).
� 'Sports sound effects' (e.g. the sound of the kicking of the ball) through mono and stereo game
microphones.
� Other sounds (coach talking) through camera microphones of hand-held cameras (typically provided
with stereo shotgun microphones).
� Stereo elements / music from videotape playback.
� Contributions (short replay from another game) from external links.
There are two kinds of audio environments in sports: 'static' (ambiance scene of the
stadium/arena/sports hall) and the 'dynamic' sports sound effects – you want to hear what you see on
the ground. The reproduction of the 'sports sound effects' is quite difficult, especially in soccer: high level
of the ambient noise, quite close to mikes, and low level of the ball, quite far from mikes.
The solution mostly used today to capture the 'ball sound' is to install directional mikes (typically 8 to12)
around the soccer field [8] in a height of about 60 cm above the ground. This needs a constant and
dynamic adjustment of the mikes' levels, and however this is quite often not done by the sound engineer.
8 Cf Production Technology 2007seminar report § 3.5
© EBU 2009 / Production Technology seminar / January 27 - 29, 2009
Reproduction prohibited without written permission of EBU TECHNICAL & EBU TRAINING