IBC2010 delivers the goods

If visitor attendance is the yardstick by which to gauge whether a show is successful or not, the 8.7% rise in this year’s attendance over IBC 2009 is a supposed indication that the show was successful and that the broadcast market is slowly heading towards a recovery.

Organisers claimed the total attendance for IBC2010 was 48,521, making it the second biggest IBC in history.

“The rise in attendance this year suggests strongly that IBC’s developments are delivering what the industry requires from its annual global meeting place,” commented IBC CEO Michael Crimp.

“We add value to the exhibition and conference, with initiatives like training and workshops, the Connected World, where our end of the industry could understand changing consumer behaviours, and bring in stunning technology demonstrations like NHK’s Super Hi-Vision. One of our biggest challenges was to reflect the way the industry was changing, with much more focus on strategic decisions about technology and growth. With decision-making moving upwards within an organisation, IBC has to be relevant to CEOs who previously might not have had it on their radar,” he added.

As Crimp pointed out, one of the chief attractions of the show was Japanese broadcaster NHK’s demonstration of Super Hi-Vision and its power to deliver unprecedented image quality.

Super Hi-Vision is an ultra-high definition television system that has 16 times the resolution of today’s HD with pictures at 7680 x 4320 pixels at 60 frames a second progressive transmission. The audio is equally remarkable with 22.2 channel surround sound.

The 2010 demo included a new generation of practical, full resolution three-chip cameras. One of these has been set up permanently in the centre of Amsterdam and sent live pictures back to IBC over fibre.

Super Hi -Vision generated a lot of interest among visitors.

It was also interesting to note that although 3D has not taken off commercially, it was one of the technologies along with IPTV that most manufacturers were pushing aggressively at IBC.

One impressive product that caught our eye was the 3D One camcorder that includes twin lenses and twin viewfinders. The lenses are 65mm apart, and users can see stereo through the twin viewfinders, which seem simple to align. 3D One has been designed to prevent users from shooting bad 3D. With normal 3D rigs, it is very easy to go out of alignment, something the integrated camcorder won’t do – but 3D One has taken this further by not allowing users to go negative as it’s a completely parallel system.

“This is the most foolproof 3D camera that there is. You set it down, you press record, you stop, and you have your file recorded properly,” commented Marcelo Ackermann, development and marketing support, 3D One.

Steve Schklair, 3Ality’s founder and CEO, who delivered the IBC 3D-Day Keynote warned that 3D broadcast would have to offer something more compelling that 2D for viewers to keep returning to the technology after the novelty had worn off. “If 3D content is not compelling, the technology will disappear again,” he cautioned.

He added that while 3D was a really cool tool, “a wonderful new paintbrush”, … “you’ve really got to paint good pictures with it”.

In the meantime, The BBC Academy has launched an introductory course on Stereoscopic 3D. The training course examines the challenges of planning, production, post production and

delivering 3D.

The course introduces delegates to the capture techniques used, hands-on operation of the different 3D rigs, framing and directing challenges and understanding the science behind good and bad 3D experiences.

The programme mixes studio production with location filming. It demonstrates S3D post, typical problems encountered and how to deliver a headache-free viewing experience.

Andy Wilson, head of the Centre of Technology, commented that the “training module is an essential part of the BBC Academy’s role in supporting future output and training the industry”.

“We are keen to build partnerships with companies, broadcasters and other organisations around 3D training,” he stated.

For some companies such as Hitachi and Vinten, this year was very special as both celebrated 100 years of success. IBC 2010 presented the perfect opportunity for the manufacturers’ centenary celebrations.

Hitachi used the occasion to showcase several new products including its new 1080p SK-HD1200 – the latest in the SK-HD family of HD broadcast cameras.

Its new 3G SK-HD 1200 camera offering full multi-format operation based on its 3 native 1080p 2/3 inch CCDs was especially a hit with visitors.

“Broadcasters and production companies in our region will make a serious error of judgment if they don’t evaluate this camera for their current and future requirements,” stated Paddy Roache, director and general manager of Hitachi Europe.

“The SK-HD 1200 is developed from our highly successful SK-HD1000 camera line, which was used extensively during the Vancouver Winter Games. The SK-HD 1000 with native 1080i and 720p options in triax and fibre is used extensively throughout Europe, the Middle East and Africa,” he added.

Riedel demonstrated new products including its Mediornet solution that reiterated the company’s vision of expanding its offerings to provide the infrastructure for distributing HD video, audio, intercom and data through its solutions.

Besides this, a lot of attention was paid to sports production at IBC. Sony’s picture stitching technology, which uses three co-sited cameras to produce one panoramic image was especially impressive. The image streams from the mounted cameras are stitched together to form one overall picture.

From this, an operator can create a virtual camera and position this according to the on screen action, allowing broadcasters a view of any point of interest in the scene.

The software can also be programmed with additional depth information, for example a football stadium; to artificially create a 3D view of the scene.

Several brand new and innovative technologies caught the attention of BroadcastPro Middle East at IBC and in the coming months, we hope to feature some of these in our magazine. Watch this space!

Feedback from visitors and exhibitors

IBC2010 was fantastic. It was bigger and better than 2009 with the addition of the 13th Hall. There were thousands of products being pitched for the same space and there were huge 3D demonstrations of stereoscopic production and transmission modules this year. 3D was the biggest driver for product innovation this year, with many stands displaying evidence of their latest stereo-capable kit.

Among the technologies I liked was the Adobe Flash Media Server 4 family, which claims to be the industry’s leading solution for streaming video and real-time communication; Ericsson’s commercial multi-screen TV offering, which combines the full features of IPTV, mobile TV, and web TV with a common look-and-feel for the user interface; the very innovative picture stitching technology displayed by Sony that is ideal for production on a soccer field; Dolby’s implementation of the open specification on the Axon G3D100 stereoscopic production and transmission module that allows real-time, side-by-side formatting for interlaced and progressive 3D sources and, of course, the Super Hi-Vision demo. With the exception of the soaring hotel prices, everything else was simply fantastic.

-Melvin Saldanha, DVP of engineering, Ten Sports, Dubai

Axon had a successful IBC 2010. Not only did we welcome many more visitors than in 2008 and 2009, but several projects were concluded during the exhibition. We had a constant flow of visitors at our newly designed stand.  We welcomed visitors from all over the world and the Middle East was extremely well represented (not in the least as AXON had assisted its customers with obtaining visit visa for the Netherlands).

Several new products were launched and although our centrepieces were SynView multiviewer, Cortex Master Control, the Synapse modular range and the TRACS2 compliance recorders, the eye catchers were the iPad SynTouch application (that allows for control of our Synapse modular range and our G/H3D100 module, that showed not only the several 3D topologies, but also a full-fledged 2D-3D conversion, even of live sources). Every day was concluded with the AXON Happy Hour, now an institution and a great success with a daily price-draw of an iPad. We look forward to 2011!

-Mark Barkey, regional sales manager Middle East, Axon Digital Design

I’ve been going to IBC since 2004 and was happy to go as part of the twofour54 tadreeb team this year. Everybody was talking about the Middle East and the incredible projects that were being deployed in this part of the world.

I personally went to IBC with three objectives in mind this year. First, I wanted to look at new technologies that would be relevant to the Middle

East and North Africa and that we could possibly integrate into our portfolio. Secondly, we wanted to look at new technologies that could support our training solutions with regards to quality, efficiency and mobility. Thirdly, we were on the lookout for new training solutions that would help establish twofour54 tadreeb as a leading training academy for media related programmes in the MENA region.

Our clients mainly have requirements for training in areas such as Digital Archiving, hardware/software certification, general broadcast operations as well as HD and 3D technology and we saw several impressive solutions in these areas at IBC. I was especially impressed by the new Panasonic AG3DA1 camera and Roland’s new mobile A/V mixer solutions.

-Alex Gehrig, director operations, twofour54 tadreeb, Abu Dhabi

The two main technology attractions were 3D and IPTV and almost all exhibitors had something in terms of 3D to demonstrate.

I was impressed by several products such as Snell’s real-time standards conversion and restoration system where Snell’s processing can rapidly unlock the value of previously unviable content with Alchemist standards conversion and Archangel restoration; Miranda’s 3G bps/HD broadcast infrastructure and Avid, which cotinues to dominate the non-linear editing space. With Blue order, I expect AVID to penetrate new fields of media asset management. It seems that the international market will be dominated by new giants like Miranda, Snell, and AVID in addition to the existing ones like Sony, Panasonic and Harris.

For HEAT, attending IBC 2010 was very important, as it coincided with two new contracts: an HD TV studio in Jordan and a complete TV station project in Iraq. It provided us with an opportunity to conclude our deals with our suppliers such as Sony, Miranda, Snell, For-A, Sachltler, Omneon, and others. This will boost our efforts in completing our system integration projects within the scheduled timeline.

-Omar Hikmat, managing director, HEAT for Engineering and Technology, Jordan