The Digital Fact Book Converged media 20th anniversary edition The Digital Fact Book 20th Anniversary Edition Converged Media A reference manual for the television broadcast & post production industries includes stereoscopic 3D Editor: Bob Pank Acknowledgements Mark Horton, Lenny Lipton, Steve Owen, Phil Streather, Dave Throup, Roger Thornton Quantel R&D for their co-operation and many contributions and to the many contributors and commentators from the industry around the world Copyright Quantel Limited 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1994, 1996, 1998, 2000, 2002, 2003, 2008 Extract from a letter from Michael Faraday to J. Clerk Maxwell Royal Institution, 13 November 1857 There is one thing I would be glad to ask you. When a mathematician engaged in investigating physical actions and results has arrived at his own conclusions, may they not be expressed in common language as fully, clearly, and definitely as in mathematical formulae? If so, would it not be a great boon to such as we to express them so – translating them out of their hieroglyphics that we also might work upon them by experiment? I think it must be so, because I have found that you could convey to me a perfectly clear idea of your conclusions, which, though they may give me no full understanding of the steps of your process, gave me the results neither above nor below the truth, and so clear in character that I can think and work from them. If this is possible, would it not be a good thing if mathematicians, writing on these subjects, were to give us their results in this popular useful working state as well as in that which is their own and proper to them? Extract from “On Giants’ Shoulders” by Melvyn Bragg Hodder & Stoughton 1998 2 Index Quantel and digital technology p4 Introduction to the 20th anniversary edition p7 Abbreviations p8 TV standards descriptions p9 Digital terms p10 Tutorial 1 – Into digits p183 Tutorial 2 – Film basics p189 White paper – Stereoscopic 3D post p192 Standards on-line p198 Some general browsing p199 Directory p200 Quantel contacts and addresses p202 This document is viewable as a standard PDF. However, it has been optimized for viewing in Adobe Acrobat 6.0 or later. Bookmarks have been included for added functionality, and can be found by clicking View > Navigation Panels/Tabs > Bookmarks. ‘See also’ references that have been included beneath entries can be clicked to view the associated information. 3 Quantel and digital technology In 1973, the company now known as Quantel developed the first practical analog to digital converter for television applications. That innovation not only gave Quantel its name (QUANtized TELevision), it also started a process that has fundamentally changed the look of television, the way it is produced and delivered. Quantel’s contribution to the changes leading to the digital age is best traced through its products, which have extended to film and print as well as television. 1975 Quantel demonstrates the DFS 3000, the world’s first digital framestore synchronizer. TV coverage of the 1976 Montreal Olympic games is transformed with synchronized shots from an airship ‘blimp’ freely used and quarter-sized picture inserts mark the genesis of digital effects. 1977 The first portable digital standards converter, the DSC 4002 heralds high quality and easily available conversion. 1978 DPE 5000 series, the first commercially successful digital effects machine, popularizes digital video effects. 1980 The DLS 6000 series introduces digital still storage for on-air presentation. The new DFS 1751 framestore synchronizer is just one rack unit in height. 1981 The revolutionary Paintbox® creates the market for video graphics – and, thanks to continuous development, continues as the industry standard. 1982 Mirage introduces the TV page turn and is the first digital effects machine able to manipulate 3D images in 3D space. 1986 Harry® makes multi-layering of live video a practical proposition and introduces nonlinear operation and random access to video clips. 1988 Quantel publishes the first edition of the Digital Fact Book. 1989 V-Series, the second generation Paintbox, is faster, smaller and more powerful than its ‘classic’ predecessor. 1990 The Picturebox® stills store integrates the storage, presentation and management of stills. Harriet®, the dynamic graphics workstation manipulates still graphics over live video. 4 1992 Henry®, the Effects Editor, offers simultaneous layering of multiple live video sources. Hal®, the Video Design Suite, is the first custom-built, dedicated graphics production and compositing centre. 1993 Dylan® disk array technology provides fault-tolerant extended storage for non-compressed video with true random access to material. First applications are with Hal®, Henry® and the new Editbox® which introduces online nonlinear editing. Domino®, digital opticals for movies, brings the flexibility of digital compositing and effects technology to the film industry. Its accuracy and speed open new horizons for movie making. 1994 The Clipbox® video server offers large-scale shared video storage for many users, each with true random access for input, editing and playout for news, sport, transmission and post-production. 1998 Inspiration™ the integrated news and sports production system offers the sought-after, fast-track end-to-end solution from lines-in to on-air. Stories edited at journalists’ desktops are immediately ready for transmission. 1999 Moving Picturebox® extends Picturebox stills facilities to both video clips and stills. 2000 iQ is an entirely new platform for media editing and compositing. It serves as the centerpiece of modern post and is the mainstay of many Digital Intermediate facilities. It introduces Resolution Co-existence – working with all TV formats together, SD and HD, as well as with digital film. Its unique ultra-fast hardware and software architecture allows scalability and access for third-party developers. 2002 generationQ – a complete new line of products that offers total scalability in hardware and software. The post range includes the iQ media platform, the eQ mainstream HD/SD editor and QEffects software for PCs. Graphics includes the gQ high powered, multi-resolution platform, a new Paintbox for powerful SD graphics production and QPaintbox software for PCs. For broadcast, the totally scalable sQ Server combines broadcast and browse video within the same server, while the sQ View-Cut-Edit-Edit Plus range of applications encompasses everything from craft editing to journalist ‘Cut and View’, all running on a progressive, common interface. 5 2003 QColor – powerful in-context color correction option for iQ and eQ is introduced, integrating colorcorrection into the heart of the mainstream post production process. 2005 Newsbox – a complete news system in a box, combining ingest, editing, playout and control within a single system that can be up and running within hours of unpacking. Quantel also introduced a novel approach to HD post production with its ‘Pay as you Go HD’ option for eQ – designed to give post houses and broadcasters a ‘soft start’ in HD production. Pablo – complete color correction combining image-processing hardware with color correction software for quality, performance and interactivity for in-context color grading. 2006 Pablo HD – provides cost-effective Pablo power for HD and SD. Marco – standalone desktop editing software with the Quantel editing interface that runs on a standard PC. Newsbox – complete self-contained news system available in ‘HD now’ and ‘HD upgradeable’ configurations. Revolver – secondary color correction in Pablo without using keys. Colorists can work intuitively on multiple levels within a picture to produce natural looking results. 2007 Genetic Engineering – a teamworking infrastructure for post and DI enabling different suites to work on the same clips at the same time with no compromises. Stereoscopic 3D – tools for efficient handling of 3D shot material in post. For the latest developments please contact Quantel or visit our website www.quantel.com 6 Introduction to the 20th anniversary edition The team researching and writing the first edition of the Digital Fact Book back in 1987, when digital technology represented but occasional islands in the analog sea in which we all swam, could not possibly have imagined what our industry would look like today. Back then, digital was going to make the world so simple – fixing all our problems and making our lives easy. But no one could have expected the explosion of choice that digital would bring, nor the unbelievable opportunities that have been brought about by new media channels, the internet and the mighty computer. This kind of explosion – perpetually driven yet further forward at breakneck speed by an endless stream of digital innovation – is exactly why we still need a Digital Fact Book. Today it’s all about digital content for the whole universe – a world where the knowledge and skills of the traditional ‘broadcasting’ community has cemented a fruitful union with the new wave of ‘all media’ IT-based professionals. The result is a truly converged digital world – which is why this edition has ‘converged media’ as its subheading. So what will the next 20 years bring? The team that put this edition together has absolutely no idea – but my goodness we know it’s going to be good and we’re looking forward to it! What is certain is that we will continue to track its unfolding with further editions of the Digital Fact Book. We hope you find the new edition a useful source of reference in this exciting converged world. As ever, we welcome any comments or additions – email us at [email protected]. Bob Pank 7 Abbreviations bit b kilobit kb bits per second b/s kilobits per second kb/s byte B kilobyte kB bytes per second B/s kilohertz kHz frames per second f/s megabit Mb gigabits Gb megabyte MB gigabits per second Gb/s megahertz MHz gigabyte GB micro µ gigabytes per second GB/s seconds s gigahertz GHz terabit Tb hertz Hz terabyte TB hours h 8 TV standards descriptions TV standards are written in many different ways.