TM Broadcast International 60, August 2018

Summary

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Sports Productions at Russia 2018

18

22

30

NEP Group

Mediapro

Red Bee Media

Pan Shot, the news from the audiovisual market

34 Special 4K Cameras

76 Sony’s Virtual Production

54

64

Broadcast models: DTT, Satellite and CDN

Challenges in news production

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84

SGO Mistika & Lightbender Case Study

Test zone

Editor in chief Javier de Martín

Creative Direction Mercedes González

editor@tmbroadcast.com

design@tmbroadcast.com

Key account manager Beatriz Calvo b.calvo@tmbroadcast.com

Editorial staff Daniel Esparza press@tmbroadcast.com

José Rodríguez j.rodriguez@tmbroadcast.com

Administration Laura de Diego administration@tmbroadcast.com

FUJIFILM UA 24X7.8BERD TM Broadcast International #60 August 2018

TM Broadcast International is a magazine published by Daró Media Group SL Centro Empresarial Tartessos Calle Pollensa 2, oficina 14 28290 Las Rozas (Madrid), Spain Phone +34 91 640 46 43 Published in Spain

Editorial We are going through a summer full of sports productions, where the companies involved are bringing the technology to levels never seen before. On the one hand, we refer to the World Cup, to which we dedicate a special report in this issue. We have interviewed different top technical managers of NEP, Mediapro and Red Bee Media to learn, from several sides, the challenges and details of this coverage.

However, this was not the only sporting event of interest. London hosted another edition of Wimbledon, where a fully-IP production using SMPTE ST 2110 technology was deployed for the first time. It is not difficult to notice investment and technological innovation in both cases.

In order to keep you up to date with all the developments within the sector, we also include in this issue, among other contents, a special report on 4K cameras, where we detail the most interesting equipment and brands right now in the market.

Finally, we do not want to miss this opportunity to wish you, on behalf of the TM Broadcast team, a happy summer. Our editorial staff will continue to actively work to offer you another issue full of exclusive information next month. Until then, we hope you enjoy the contents that we offer you this time.

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ď‚ş

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ATG DANMON INTEGRATES TWO PRODUCTION SYSTEMS FOR PARLIAMENTARY BROADCASTING These will allow recording and live broadcasting from the various committee rooms

ATG Danmon has secured a contract to design, assemble and integrate two mobile video production systems for one of Europe's longest established parliamentary television channels. These will allow recording and live broadcasting from the various committee rooms located within the government buildings.

"These units will replace old-technology 625-line equipment and allow proceedings to be televised in 1080i high definition," says Project Manager Howard Dixon. "ATG Danmon, being an experienced global systems integrator, won the tender on the basis of our ability to specify and deliver costTMBi - 6

effective high-performance solutions to a deadline. Both systems are designed to meet very tightly specified requirements, each allowing a high degree of production versatility. The resultant units are highly mobile, quick and easy to set up and very logical to operate."

integral Blackmagic

The contract includes nine Panasonic AK-UB300 HD/UHD multi-purpose cameras and five AWU70B remotely controlled pan/tilt/zoom cameras. Each production unit will incorporate a Panasonic camera control panel, a Telemetrics controller for the robotic PTZ cameras, and a Ross Carbonite live production switcher.

EliteDisplay multiview

Recording will be to an

HyperDeck Studio which can handle all standard definition and high definition formats up to 1080p30. A 1920 x 1080 resolution 9 inch Sony LCD monitor is being incorporated into each system for quality checking, plus a 27 inch HP monitor.

Both systems will be housed in mobile broadcast trollies built to ATG Danmon design by Custom Consoles, together with the necessary interfaces and auxiliary equipment such as a Lynx Technik video test generator, Glensound audio ident generator and DBX audio compressor/limiter.

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ENCO AND OCTOPUS PARTNER TO STREAMLINE NEWS PRODUCTION AND PLAYOUT WORKFLOWS The integration will be highlighted at the IBC2018 exhibition ENCO and newsroom computer system (NRCS) specialist Octopus Newsroom have partnered to streamline news production and playout workflows for broadcasters worldwide. Leveraging the two companies’ support for the Media Object Server (MOS) protocol, seamless integration between their respective solutions eliminates disruptive workflow barriers to let journalists focus on creating compelling, informative stories.

The integration will be highlighted at the IBC2018 exhibition, where ENCO will exhibit at stand 8.A59 and Octopus will showcase its solutions in stand 7.A39.

ENCO’s MOS-enabled ActiveX plugin enables journalists and news producers to access ENCO asset libraries directly within the Octopus client interface.

Users can search the ENCO library, preview clips, trim media as needed, and bring the results into their stories

by simply dragging and dropping the desired items.

Building on the Octopus software’s ability to combine multiple media elements within each story, the integration allows journalists to easily incorporate library assets including graphics, audio and video into their scripts.

Avoiding the need for producers to manually push rundowns, running order changes in the Octopus NRCS are automatically reflected in the ENCO automation system. The Octopus software can then trigger the ENCO system via the MOS protocol to play out the assets.

While the integration was initially qualified for radio broadcasters using Octopus Newsroom with ENCO’s DAD audio automation system, the same MOS Gateway interface is used in ENCO’s MOM (Media Operations Manager) television automation platform – thus enabling a similarly efficient workflow for Octopuspowered TV news organizations.

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BT TV ADOPTS TELESTREAM VANTAGE FOR MULTISCREEN OTT MEDIA PROCESSING Telestream’s local channel partner, Boxer Systems, worked closely with BT TV to configure the system “The Vantage Workflow Designer has proved popular with our team as an easy to understand, yet powerful and dynamic toolset. Vantage has given greater control of our VOD processing, reducing manual effort and helping the team to work more efficiently.

It has reduced multiscreen media transcoding times by up to 30 percent, which was key in selecting Vantage,” commented Peter Harvey, Head of Content Operations (VOD and Digital Media) at BT Technology.

Peter Harvey was commenting on news that BT TV, a subscription IPTV service offered by the UK’s largest telecom service provider, BT, has adopted Telestream’s Vantage Media TMBi - 10

Processing Platform.

Telestream’s local channel partner, Boxer Systems, worked closely with BT TV to specify, install and configure the system.

Telestream Switch player is now the company’s media player of choice At BT TV’s London-based technical headquarters, Vantage is being used to analyze the technical properties of VOD content, extract and create appropriate metadata which is used to drive Vantage workflow decisions and to transcode VOD content into high quality multiscreen formats for OTT delivery. In addition, Telestream Switch player is now the company’s

media player of choice, with multi-format support, solid file inspection and support for captions and subtitles playback.

Employing Vantage has allowed BT to launch enhanced features into the BT TV APP & Web player, enabling customers to access multiscreen versions of any rented or purchased content with the minimum of delay. The project supports the BT TV APP across iOS and Android devices as well as Amazon tablet. A later release will incorporate access to large screens, including Apple TV, Chromecast, Amazon Fire TV/Firestick and Samsung Smart TV’s.

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CP COMMUNICATIONS PROVIDES COMPLETE COVERAGE AT U.S. OPEN FOR LARGEST RF EVENT IN UNITED STATES TO DATE CP Communications this year successfully managed the entire RF transmission infrastructure for the 118th U.S. Open Championship, which took place June 12-17 at the Shinnecock Hills Golf Club in Southampton, NY. A significant contributor to the production team the past three years, this year marked the first time that CP Communications was entrusted with all RF transmission responsibilities.

This included the management of 34 RF cameras, including five RF 4K HDR transmitters for live broadcasts by FOX Sports.

CP Communications also managed three RF X-Mo cameras for slow-motion, onair playback; one RF Stedicam; and four (of 21 total) HD cameras reserved for Sky, TV Asahi and other international broadcasters.

As the sole RF vendor, CP Communications also managed 38 miles of fiber, a MIMO mesh control system for entire course coverage — the largest-ever mesh deployment for golf — and an extensive Dante audio network from Audinate with 56 RF intercom channels TMBi - 12

(using an RTS ADAM system) and 40 RF microphones across 18 holes. Additionally, the team handled all signal distribution, routing and troubleshooting between three CP Communications mobile trucks, two broadcast compounds, and a remote RF Communications Center.

CP Communications brought its flagship HD-11 and HD-21 RF production trucks and its RF8 Fiber BUnit truck, which accommodated Fox’s fiberoptic and communications systems, to this year’s event.

The two RF production trucks were positioned adjacent to each other in the main broadcast center, where Fox Sports produced more than 40 hours of live, unique content across four channels

each day to broadcasters in more than 140 countries. A split compound strategy was utilized this year, divided by a distance of over 3000 feet, to provide more space for FOX Sports oncourse technologies and staff. The remote RF Communications Center was set up near Hole 13 for managing and routing intercom channels and other audio – including 600 portable radios across more than 40 channels all tied back to the two broadcast compounds.

Brad Cheney, VP of Field Operations and Engineering for Fox Sports, notes that CP Communications’ continued investment in technology and personnel were paramount to the success of a live sports production of this scale.

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“CP Communications has worked with us since the start of the USGA on FOX to advance the way we see, hear and interconnect systems to provide the most compelling multiplatform content for our viewers. CP’s continued investment in 1080p HDR and now 4K HDR transmission systems enabled another large step forward in image quality for viewers,” said Cheney. “We were able to receive multiple 3Gb/s signals across a single fiber. This allowed us to push 4K/HDR forward without

incurring additional costs or time, while having the same full camera control via their IP mimo-mesh control network. This was the first show that I’m aware of that used five 4K/HDR RF cameras simultaneously for live production. We knew we were pushing the limits, and if you’re going to do that you need to have the right people to help you adapt these new technologies in real time.”

Both HD-11 and HD-21 featured RF routers with a fiber interface to allow the trucks to work in conjunction

with each other. Each truck also applied MultiDyne VF9000 fiber transmission platforms to natively accept 3Gb/s (4K) and HD camera feeds over RF from Sony cameras in the field. The signals remained in pure RF across the entire architecture before being handed to the Fox Sports team in raw form.

Heitmann ensured that he had a specific crew on top of monitoring and troubleshooting given the advanced technologies and large-scale infrastructure in place.

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PAN SHOT

PEBBLE BEACH SYSTEMS OPTIMIZES ITS MARINA PLAYOUT SYSTEM Pebble Beach Systems has optimized its Marina playout system to ease the migration from legacy and EOL systems such as ADC, Omnibus, and Sundance automation systems. In addition to Marina’s comprehensive library of migration tools, support has now been added for ADC v12 playlists. With Marina, the ability to create a hybrid, synchronized playout chain with any combination of hardware and software gives broadcasters and multichannel originators flexibility to transition any part of that playout chain at a pace to suit their scheduling and operational requirements.

As legacy automation systems reach end-of-life, organizations want to take advantage of the flexibility and power of modern, centralized, software-based automation systems.

However, many are concerned about migrating years of accumulated data from their legacy system database to a new automation system. For any business, having a hard cutover to an entirely new system comes with considerable risk. Are all staff TMBi - 14

adequately trained? Is it really necessary to change every component at once?

Can we preserve our existing investment in channel technology? Is there a path to virtualization and the cloud?

Legacy broadcast automation databases often contain descriptive and timing metadata for hundreds of thousands of clips. Much of the descriptive data input by operators is considered critical to the successful use of the asset. Just as important is the metadata that describes the timing information. When an asset is ingested, an operator must determine the true start time, skipping any garbage frames, and the true end time for clean playback. Segment timings for breaks are also key. Both descriptive and timing metadata are stored in

the legacy database, but if that data is lost during translation to the new automation system, control operators can’t guarantee a clean broadcast output.

Having personnel re-analyze and re-mark all clips in the new database is unsustainable, but Marina’s existing integration with practically all the popular broadcast scheduling and traffic systems enables organizations to standardize their data exchange, while direct API integration with third party MAM systems enables retention of existing workflows.

When migrating to Marina, not only is all metadata transferred, but an active database bridge is also created between both systems to keep the systems in sync and enable them to run in parallel. “Having an

PAN SHOT

engineer show up and run a one-time database conversion process is not a solution for most customers,” says Ian Cockett, CTO and one of the founders of Pebble Beach Systems.

“We realize that hard cutovers are unrealistic and overly burdensome, so the method we provide keeps the legacy and the Marina databases constantly synchronized, running in parallel, ensuring operations can make a wellorchestrated and managed transition on their own terms, in their own time.”

Having a hybrid approach means not only running any legacy equipment in parallel, but also having the ability to run a mix of SDI and IP equipment. Pebble’s

integrated channel technology device, Dolphin, allows SDI or IP playback so that operations can switch to an IP based infrastructure when they are ready, and everything is tested. “It’s one thing to build a greenfield site from the ground up with the latest IP infrastructure,” says Cockett. “For everyone else, moving the entire playout chain to IP represents another potential point of failure that many broadcasters are rightly hesitant to undertake.”

Operator change management is a further key consideration during system migration. The Marina UI layout can be configured to closely mimic a legacy system UI which helps with initial training and uninterrupted operation.

With time, additional data

and augmented feature sets can be revealed to operators by the system’s administrators.

Virtualization of playout is a hot topic, but not every channel is a good candidate for moving to a public or private data center today. As technology and business models continue to evolve, it’s very important for any new playout system to have a path to virtualized deployment. Orca, Pebble’s virtualized playout solution is already providing cloud playout for multiple customers. So, whether a broadcaster needs a path to virtualization today, or tomorrow, Orca and Marina provide a future proof strategy with no need for staff to learn a new interface.

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Sports Productions

World Cup 2018 A new milestone on the road to technological innovation The World Cup has marked a new milestone in technological innovation. As we already know, the broadcast industry moves faster and faster, and companies seeking to be global leaders have to make a great effort to keep up.

This is especially significant in the coverage of global sporting events aimed at mass audiences. The last World Cup, held in Russia from June 14 to July 15, is the perfect example.

We have been talking to several top technical managers from NEP Group (a production company), Mediapro (a multimedia communications group) and Red Bee Media (a media services company). All these global companies have actively participated in the championship. With their help, we analyze, from several sides, the challenges and details of this coverage.

By Daniel Esparza

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Sports Productions

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Sports Productions

NEP Interview with Hugh Potter (Technical Projects Manager at NEP UK) and Brian Clark (Sales Director at NEP’s Major Projects Group).

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Sports Productions

GROUP We would like to learn more about your participation in the World Cup. Could you highlight to us some of your projects there?

NEP Group worked with multiple clients at the World Cup, including The Fox Broadcasting

Company. This involved full International Broadcast Centre (IBC) operations with a studio in Red Square as well as remote production from control rooms at the IBC and in Los Angeles. The NEP team also provided a back up studio and venue

kits at many of the venues feeding back to the IBC. The World Cup production control room was manned by 35 production crew and for it’s capture, ingest and replay operation, NEP UK used 13 EVS XT3, 17 XTAccess, 13 IPDirector, 2 DB Servers, XFiles.

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Sports Productions

What main challenges did you find during the coverage?

Logistics were the biggest challenge for NEP Group. The extensive requirements for Visas and Carnets meant that the parameters for the project needed to be set out clearly ahead of deployment. The team also found it was more difficult than usual to add extra facilities once in the country, due to certain restrictions.

How did you solve them successfully? Did you have to overcome any unexpected challenges?

Planning is critical and NEP UK worked with Fox US for over a year in the run up to the World Cup, to reduce the number of unexpected challenges on site. The team also ensured that they had enough capacity to provide flexibility and contingency plans.

What makes NEP different from other production companies when it comes to large sporting events like this one?

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NEP’s global reach is a major benefit for clients as the team are able to call upon local NEP offices for equipment and crew – this saves considerable time and money in terms of freighting and installation.

Local knowledge of venues, regulations and language are also very helpful for the smooth running of events. NEP Group has been working with the Fox team since the Confederations Cup in Russia in 2017 and have built a strong relationship with them over time. This partnership allowed for a closer relationship and tighter integration than would have been possible otherwise.

Would you highlight any specific product/solution used by NEP that you have considered essential for the coverage of this World Cup? NEP’s depth of project delivery experience is key to managing major events and allows the team to offer strong support for broadcasters, federations, productions around the globe. The NEP UK crew’s

Sports Productions

excellent understanding of Fox’s needs and methods proved invaluable to the delivery of this project and it helped the client to feel confident when requesting facilities. Overall, the NEP UK team were personally invested to deliver a service that Fox could rely on and deal with requests efficiently.

What is your stance regarding remote productions? How useful do you consider to cover this type of event?

NEP UK used remote production extensively for the FIFA World Cup, with 15 miles from Red Square to the IBC and over 6000 miles from Moscow to Los Angeles.

Remote production gave the clients flexibility and allows NEP UK to provide more facilities at the IBC control rooms, than would be practical in Red Square alone.

How have you contributed to deliver the World Cup in 4K-HDR? NEP UK ingested the host broadcast services 4K HDR feed, adding captions and commentary, before passing that to both the Fox US 4K distribution channels and Hi Sense for its 4K app.

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Sports Productions

MEDIA

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PRO

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Sports Productions

Mediapro is a leading group in the European audiovisual sector, specialized in content integration, production and audiovisual distribution. With operations worldwide through its 50 offices distributed across 32 countries on 4 continents, Mediapro provides the creativity and technical solutions necessary to design, produce and distribute audiovisual or multi-channel projects.

They have been offering their services during the World Cup to more than 40 channels. We had the opportunity to learn more about its coverage through JosĂŠ Manuel Rio Serrano, Project Manager of Mediapro for the World Cup.

How would you rate your coverage of the World Cup? What is most important to us is what our clients think. All the clients who came to us looking for our services during Russia 2018 expressed their satisfaction with the result. The group celebrates this new success considering all the different technical production models we have worked with and the deployment of numerous work teams. We have endeavoured to apply the greatest technological innovations that an event like this deserves. Besides, we have extensive TMBi - 24

Sports Productions

experience in events of such magnitude around the world and with the same international significance.

What do you think Mediapro contributes to an event of the magnitude of the World Cup? As usual, the MEDIAPRO Group has tried to ensure

that the experience acquired throughout its history in productions of similar demand and magnitude is seen as an added value. We strive for the highest quality and innovation in all our projects. The group has a good relationship with HBS and they know us from previous projects we have worked on together,

both as service providers for RHS and in Host Broadcaster projects.

What outstanding technological innovations have you deployed for this coverage, compared to previous editions or recent events?

For the 2018 World Cup in Russia, due to the current context (we

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Sports Productions

already know that technology is evolving at a dizzying rate), we adapted all our work and equipment to fibre connections. Despite the tremendous effort involved in the constant readjustment in the face of continuous evolution, the MEDIAPRO Group feels prepared -as demonstrated in the World Cup in Russia 2018TMBi - 26

to work with these new connections, believed to be the most practical and professional solution for large events in the future.

MEDIAPRO wants to and must always be at the forefront of innovations applied to audiovisual productions.

Among our novelties is a 4K UM in Red Square that we have used in the services for beIN Sports

MENA, on EVS XT4 platform, with the creation of a high-capacity MCR for ingest, playout and network video editing.

Another novelty that we have developed together with OVERON has been the interconnection of video content between Red Square, the IBC and local offices in Paris, Madrid and Doha.

Sports Productions

What are your main technical challenges?

As a continuation to the previous question, MEDIAPRO Group has established a robust Fibre optics conversions system for hybrid SMPTE camera connections, which have worked flawlessly. For this purpose, we have used many different signal multiplexing systems over Fibre optics, for

interconnection with the CIR/TOC in the stadiums.

The biggest challenge, both at the operational and production levels, has been to adapt to the logistics of each country, with heavy UM and means transfers between cities, with the sole objective of successfully meeting the expectations of all clients who hire our services.

How did you equip your ten mobile units? Are they all 4K? Please explain the main elements of your workflow.

For the 2018 Russian World Cup and after assessing the needs of all our clients, we moved three UM 4K mobile units; the rest were HD. However, many of them were equipped with 4K

Sports Productions

cameras, and all our UMs were equipped with 12 cameras for unilateral production with 2 EVS in one of them. We have thus managed to meet the great technical challenge of the services requested.

Besides, the MEDIAPRO Group has also set up multi-chamber studios at the 2018 World Cup in Russia, with lighting and the development and installation of its own sets.

Would you highlight any other parts of your deployment?

For the 2018 World Cup TMBi - 28

in Russia, the MEDIAPRO Group could highlight, fundamentally, the work of 400 people, coordinated in the different areas of coordination, logistics, production and edition; the transfer of 10 UM with their support trucks; 21 DSNG with cameras and some of them, depending on the service, with editing; 32 ENG equipment with 4G transmission and editing; 10 minivans Switcher Box with production of a camera and coordination with the IBC; the development of

an IBC with studio for the Argentine public television; an IBC for beIN MENA and a studio in Red Square with integrated MCR.

You've served over 40 channels. What are the specific challenges involved in working for so many people at such an event?

For the MEDIAPRO Group, the greatest challenge in the 2018 World Cup in Russia, as in all its projects, has been to guarantee utmost excellence with the best profitability in the services

Sports Productions

demanded by our clients, also offering service possibilities to occasional clients.

How have you used IP and remote production technologies?

On this occasion, due to the choice of services of our primary clients, we did not need to resort to remote solutions, like IP (although we did in the draw for the World Cup

groups in Doha). Having said that, we based many of our internal communications on them, although, concerning video, we only used remote technology to give beIN MENA and France a signal through the OVERON encoding systems.

Would you like to add anything else?

The 2018 World Cup in

Russia has been a major challenge for the MEDIAPRO Group. The profound synergy of all the areas that make up the group and the people who work in them has translated into an extremely satisfactory result, and we can now add another event to our portfolio that centralises the greatest demands in all areas at an international level.

Sports Productions

RED BEE

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MEDIA

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Sports Productions

Interview with David Travis, Chief Portfolio Officer, Video Services Red Bee Media

What challenges did you find when delivering the World Cup in UHD-HDR for Dutch National Television?

Since this was an experiment with new technology together with NPO/NOS, the main challenges involved managing uncertainties and to create a custom solution. The studio setup we were working with is based on 1080i and does not support 3G signals (1080P). Based on this we had to create a complete and separate broadcast chain, that was still automated.

In addition another challenge was latency. We expected that it would take longer for the UHDHDR feed to reach the broadcast center in Hilversum. But the opposite was true and the HD feed arrived later than TMBi - 32

the UHD-HDR one. The reason for this is that the HD signals are transported via satellite and the UHDHDR feed via IP (fiber). To resolve this issue, we had to delay the UHD-HDR signal with specific hardware which was not readily available.

There are also two main learnings from a viewer’s

perspective about managing feeds with HDR and UHD. The camera shots for UHD were much wider than regular HD in some cases and therefore some viewers switched back to HD to have a better and closer view of the game. Secondly not all viewers had an HDR (HLG) supported television and

Sports Productions

they received poor quality as a result of the lack of HD support.

In addition, you distributed the NPO 1 UHD channel through multiple distribution networks via satellite, fiber, cable and IPTV. Did you find any specific challenge here?

In general, this was not a challenge no, but the satellite operator requested the uncompressed 4x3G TX signal instead of a compressed multicast IP feed. They used these signals to feed their own encoder for higher bandwidth and experimental settings for best user experience.

Overall, what is your stance regarding these types of transmission?

This is the third broadcaster for whom we’ve delivered feeds in UHD quality and we have gained significant experience since our first project over two years ago. Going forward we expect to see an increase of these projects due to both technical

advancements in the field and an increased demand from viewers. We are increasing our knowledge and expertise and we are looking forward to delivering UHD/HDR images to even more clients and their viewers in the future.

Tell us about the tests you did with your OTT Services during the World Cup. In creating the setup for showing all World Cup games in every McDonalds restaurant in Sweden, we got a clear confirmation on the speed, efficiency and quality of our Managed OTT Services offering. The feeds were verified and fully up and running only a few hours after McDonalds greenlit the project. The Red Bee Media Managed OTT Services gives anyone, not only broadcasters and traditional media companies, the opportunity to start streaming their content within minutes – which our project with McDonalds in Sweden clearly showed.

From a technical perspective we put a lot of emphasis on automated testing, as part of the Red Bee Media Continuous Deployment process. All micro services were tested individually and in end-toend scenarios using our extensive test suite, which is constantly growing. In this particular case additional load test were added to validate customer specific requirements. Needless to say, these tests were automated for future reuse.

Would you like to add something?

As a global media services provider Red Bee Media has a broad range of services that has been at work all through the World Cup, covering every possible aspect of creating a great live sports production. Including studio production, playout, streaming services, managed OTT services, UHD/HDR live feeds, live subtitling, Piero Sports Graphics and correct info through Content Discovery services.

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Panorama: 4K Cameras

4K CAMERAS The present

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Panorama: 4K Cameras

This time around, we bring to our pages an ambitious showcase detailing the array of options available presently for content recording in 4k.

By Luis Pavía

Nowadays, it is commonplace to find the label “4k” on a wide array of audio-visual products.

And although there are still many standard definition devices in service, 4k/UHD should now be the benchmark format for the creation of all our media content.

With the aim of facilitating your professional endeavours, and well aware of dangers of doing otherwise, we offer you a selection of cameras running in both 4k and UHD that encompass all functional aspects, performance levels and purposes.

On the following pages, you will find tables with comparative appraisals of the standout data for each camera, whenever it has

been possible to obtain this directly from the manufacturer, or from reliable sources, to assist you in your decisionmaking process: resolutions, sensors, formats, recording supports, connectivity, and so on…

Under no circumstances is it our intention to suggest these tables are exhaustive, we are fully aware that this would be impossible, as whilst data is gathered, new models are launched on the market. For various reasons, ranging from launch date to editorial space, we have been obliged to leave some of them out. Thus, we would like to take this opportunity to apologise in advance if in the

maelstrom any major model has been overlooked.

Fortunately, the world has become more global than in the past, and practically all cameras can run smoothly at 50 as well as 60Hz, meaning the interest in this content is duly increased whilst bearing in mind our readers of the international edition. It is similarly possible that some models, or the specific features of certain models are not available for all markets.

For organisational purposes and to provide a certain level of coherence, we have had to select a series of classification criteria, an arduous task given that there are always models that may TMBi - 35

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Sony PXW-Z280

fit perfectly well into different groups. It must also be stressed beforehand that their appearance in a certain group in no way means that some models may not TMBi - 36

be applicable to another, or even others. The dividing lines are often somewhat blurred.

The purpose of the has been established as a means of creating an

initial classification.

Amongst the first significant data we always take the native resolution: UHD (3840x2160), 4k (4096x2160), or >4k (any other greater one, duly

Panorama: 4K Cameras

that they are not relevant in certain cases, nor are they in the opposite.

Indeed, herein you will also find information relating to connectivity.

The fitting of SDI and/or HDMI is all well and good, but the option to select equipment for our work that is capable of providing IP connectivity directly, or streaming services to broadcast directly without the need for additional external devices may tip the scales.

indicated). This means that their order of appearance within each table strictly adheres to alphabetic criteria.

Another significant piece of data is always the sensor size, a fundamental feature that has a direct bearing on the visual aspect of our creations. In this way, as different groups cannot contain the same characteristics, given

In the autonomous camera group, the type and recording support is a necessary detail. Thus, both the capability of delivering signals of higher quality or reduced compression, as well as those recorded internally, will finally allow for us to boast better options when processing and editing, though this requires the support of additional external recorders.

In this piece, we have purposefully overlooked pricing, as each market and client have their own quirks and each one already knows what they

are looking for. In the same way, we have omitted mobile telephones as recording devices, not because these are deemed “unworthy”, but moreover because their renewal cycles are so swift that a large number that might be included would be out of circulation or updated by the time these pages hit the shelves. Irrespective of their possibilities or drawbacks, pros and cons, it is an irrefutable fact that they are now providing content in a wide range of broadcasting spheres.

The first group is comprised of “action” cameras, all these small, light and versatile units that can be placed anywhere to unique viewpoints, or even attached to our own bodies to provide a subjective overview of practically any type of activity. Not all of these are stand-alone, meaning this will be a decisive factor when determining their appropriateness for our needs in each scenario. Stand-alone TMBi - 37

Panorama: 4K Cameras

cameras are also useful at the end of a selfie-stick or on small and light handheld stabilisers. In this group, we will find the world’s smallest 4k camera, at the moment!

“Hand-held” cameras: In this group encompasses the entire family of cameras devised as standalone units, to carry and operate “in your hand” in the traditional manner, with a viewer and optic, either fixed or interchangeable. Typically used in ENG (Electronic News Gathering) settings, they are undoubtedly the most versatile and the most numerous group.

Here we can find cameras that fit into the palm of your hand, as well as larger models, though not reaching the size of “shoulder-mounted” cameras. Envisaged as being autonomous, although due to their adaptability, they could be used as small studio cameras or auxiliary shooting equipment.

“Photographic” cameras.

How could we overlook an entire grand family of TMBi - 38

cameras? Reflex and compact, which meant a major revolution in the world of visual narrative, making the “cinematic look” affordable to almost all budgets. Owing to their sensor size and the wide range of optics available, in almost no time, they have found their own niche in multiple spheres in audio-visual creation.

Shoulder-mounted and mid-arm cameras. In this range, we also find cameras that could fit in the “hand-held” group, yet due to their design, concept and functional aspects, we have decided to separate them owing to their idiosyncrasies.

Furthermore, they also include the traditional ENG newscaster cameras for mandatory over-theshoulder use. Amongst them are also the easily adaptable models for use in studio projects, even though these will be models initially intended for use as stand-alone equipment.

PTZ (pan-tilt-zoom) Cameras. Until recently, these were far from

widespread and almost exclusively used in videoconference settings.

Thanks to their image quality, performance levels and integrated robotic movements, these are worthy members of the following group. They

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Blackmagic URSA Mini 4k

require an external power supply and do not feature an integrated recording device.

Studio cameras. As their name suggest, here we find all those cameras which, although they may

be used as hand-held devices, their conception and connectivity makes them particularly suitable for use in the studio.

Cinema cameras. In this case, the most sophisticated features are

on offer to obtain the best images, yet almost always in controlled settings used by working teams with wide-ranging experience and knowledge to achieve the best results.

We wish you every success in your choice.

TMBi - 39

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Action Cameras

Dreamchip Atom one 4k mini 16

Fitfort 4k waterproof action

GoPro Hero 6 black

Sony RX0

SENSOR Resolution

Sony IMX174 4096x2160

Exmor RS Cmos

Size

1” 3,45 um

1”

RECORDING 4K/UHD (up to)

4k@47,96

UHD@25

UHD@60

Only output

HD (up to)

1080@60p

1080@60p

1080@240p

1080@60p

720@120p

720@240

1080@1000p

H.265

RAW, XAVCS, AVCHD

SD

Micro SD MS micro

Other formats (up to) Codec Support

no

File

no

Mp4

OPTICS Fixed optics

170º

Yes

Zeiss 24/f4

no

no

no

n/a

Microphone

Dual 3G SDI 10bit 422

n/a

Micro HDMI Micro USB (bidirec)

Size (mm)

36x36x79

62x45x33

59x41x30

Weight (gr)

123

118

95

Screen

2” tactile

1,5”

GPS

Yes

Exchangeable mount

C Mount

CONNECTIVITY Input Output

DIMENSION

63

OTHERS

Wi-fi

2,4 GHz

Stabilization Submersible (m)

TMBi - 40

5 GHz Sí / limited

30 con

10 sin / 30 con

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Dreamchip Atom one 4k mini 16

Fitfort 4k waterproof action

GoPro Hero 6 black

Sony RX0

TMBi - 41

Panorama: 4K Cameras

JVC GY-LS300

JVC GY-HM250

Panasonic HC-WXF991k

Sony FDR-AX100

TMBi - 42

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Hand-Held Cameras

JVC GY-HM250

JVC GY-LS300

Panasonic HC-WXF991k

Sony FDR-AX100

SENSOR Size

1/2,3”

JVCKenwood Super 35

1/2,3” BSI MOS

1” CMOS Exmor R

4K/UHD (up to)

UHD@30p

4k@60p

UHD@30p

UHD@25p

HD (up to)

1080@60p 422

1080@60p 422

1080@60p

1080@50p

1080@120p

720@30p

RECORDING

Other formats (up to) Codec

AVC/H.264

XAVCs/H.264

Support

Dual SDHC/SDXC

SD/SDHC/SDXC

SDXC/MSPro

File

Mov

Mp4

Mp4

12x optical zoom (29,6-355 equiv)

Leica Dicomar 20x optical zoom (30,8-626 equiv)

Zeiss Vario Sonnar x12 optical zoom (29-348 equiv)

OPTICS Fixed optics

Exchangeable mount

Yes, micro 4/3

CONNECTIVITY Input

XLR audio

XLR audio

Microphone

Output

3G-SDI, HDMI

3G-SDI, HDMI

Micro HDMI

DIMENSION Size (mm)

90x84x224

Weight (gr)

790 without battery

OTHERS Screen

3,5” 920k pixel

3,5” 920k pixel

3” tactile

921k pixel

Wi-fi

Yes, 2,4 GHz

Yes, 2,4 GHz

Stabilization

Yes

Yes

IP connectivity

Yes

Yes

Streaming

Yes, RMTP

Yes, RMTP

TMBi - 43

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Mirrorless Photographic Cameras

Blackmagic Pocket Cinema

Panasonic Lumix GH5s

Sony Alpha A7S II

Sony Cybershot RX-10 IV

SENSOR Resolution

DCI 4k

Size

18,96 x 10 (4/3)

Live MOS 17,3 x 13

Exmor CMOS Full frame 35,6x23,8

Exmor CMOS RS 1” 13,2 x 8,8

4K/UHD (up to)

4k@60p

4k@59,94p

UHD@30p

UHD@30p

HD (up to)

1080@120p

1080@59,94p

1080@60p

1080@60p

1080@100p

1080@1000p

RECORDING

Other formats (up to) Codec

CinemaRaw, ProRes422

AVC/H.264

XAVCs/AVCHD/H.264

XAVCs/AVCHD/H.264

Support Support

CFast 2.0, SD U2,

SD UHS II

SD U1/MSPro

SD U1/MSPro

File

Mov, mp4

OPTICS Fixed optics Exchangeable mount

Zeiss vario Sonnar T 25x Micro 4/3 (MFT)

E Mount

CONNECTIVITY Input

USB C (bidirec), miniXLR, microphone

microphone

microphone

Output

HDMI Atype, headphone

HDMI 422 10bit, headphone

HDMI 50p

microUSB (bidi) microphone

DIMENSION Size (mm)

86x96x178

61x96x127

Weight (gr)

94x133x145

584

OTHERS Screen Wi-fi Stabilization

TMBi - 44

5” HD tactile Yes, 2,4 GHz

3” TFT 1228k pixel

3” 1440k pixel

Yes, 2,4 GHz

Yes, 2,4 GHz

Yes

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Sony Alpha A7S II

Sony Cyber-shot RX-10 IV

Panasonic Lumix GH5s

Blackmagic Pocket Cinema

TMBi - 45

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Canon EOS 1Dx Mark II

Canon EOS 5D Mark IV

Nikon D500

Nikon D850

Olympus OM-D E-M1 Mark II Fujifilm X-T2

TMBi - 46

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Reflex Photographic Cameras Canon EOS Canon EOS 1Dx Mark 5D Mark II IV

Fujifilm X-T2

Nikon D500

Nikon D850

Olympus OM-D EM1 Mark II

SENSOR CMOS 35,9x23,9

CMOS 36x24

CMOS III 23,6x15,6

23,5x15,7

4K/UHD (up to)

4k@60p

4k@29,97p

UHD@29,97p

UHD@29,97p

UHD time lapse

HD (up to)

1080@60p

1080@59,94p

1080@59,94p

1080@59,94p

1080@60p

Other formats (up to)

1080@120p

720@119,9p

Codec

Mjpeg,AVC/ H.264

Mjpeg,AVC/ H.264

AVC/H.264

AVC/H.264

AVC/H.264

AVC/H.264

Support Support

CF tipo 1, CFast 2.0

CF tipo 1, SDXC U1

SDXC U3

SDXC, XQD

SDXC, XQD

SDXC U3

File

Mov, mp4

Mov, mp4

MOD

Mov, mp4

Mov, mp4

Mov, mp4, avi

Canon EF

Canon EF

Fujifilm X

Nikon F

Nikon F

Micro 4/3 (MFT)

Input

Micro/líie, USB 3.0 (bidi)

Micro/line, USB 3.0 (bidi)

Micro Usb 3.0 (bidi), Microphone

Microphone

Microphone

Output

miniHDMI 422 8bits, headphone

miniHDMI 422 8bits, headphone

microHDMI

Size (mm)

83x158x168

151x117x76

133x92x50

81x115x147

79x124x146

47x83x120

Weight (gr)

1340

800

507 with battery

760

915

390 with battery

Screen

3,2” LCD 1620k pixel

3,2” LCD 1620k pixel

3” 1040k pixel

3,2” TFT 2359k pixel

3,2” TFT 2359k pixel

3” 1037k pixel

GPS

Yes

Yes

Optional

Yes

Size

35,9x23,9

Live MOS 4/3” 17,3x13

RECORDING

OPTICS Exchangeable mount

CONNECTIVITY

DIMENSION

OTHERS

Wi-fi Stabilization

Yes

Yes

Yes

in optics

Yes

TMBi - 47

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Mid-arm Cameras Panasonic AGDVX200

Panasonic AG-UX180

Sony PXWFS5 II

Sony PXW-FS7 II

Sony PXWZ190

Sony PXWZ280

SENSOR 4/3” MOS (MFT)

1” MOS

Super 35 Exmor CMOS

Super 35 Exmor CMOS

3x 1/3” Exmor CMOS

3x 1/2” Exmor CMOS

4K/UHD (up to)

UHD@59,94p

UHD@59,94p

4k@59,94p

UHD@59,94p

UHD@59,94p

UHD@59,94p

HD (up to)

1080@59,94p

1080@59,94p

1080@59,94p

1080@59,94p

1080@59,94p

1080@59,94p

Other formats (up to)

4k@24p, 1080@120p

4k@24p, 1080@120p

1080@180p (ext 2k@240p)

1080@960p (ext 4k@59,94p)

Codec

AVC/H.264

AVC/H.264

XAVC, (ext RAW), AVC/H.264

XAVC, (ext RAW), AVC/H.264

XAVC, AVC/H.264

XAVC, AVC/H.264

Support Support

2x SDXC U3

2x SDXC U3

2x XQD

2x SDXC, MSPro

2x SDXC, MSPro

2x SDXC, MSPro

File

Mov, mp4, avchd

Mov, mp4, avchd

Fixed optics

Zoom x13 (28-365 equiv)

Zoom x20 (24-480 equiv)

Zoom 25x (28,8-720 equiv)

Zoom 17x (30,3-515 equiv)

Exchangeable mount

No

No

E Mount

E Mount

Size

RECORDING

OPTICS

CONNECTIVITY Input

2x XLR, USB 3 (bidi)

2x XLR, USB 3 (bidi)

2x XLR

2x XLR

2x XLR, USB 3 (bidi)

2x XLR, USB 3 (bidi)

Output

3G-SDI, HDMI

3G-SDI, HDMI

2x 3G-SDI, HDMI, headphone

3G-SDI, HDMI, headphone

3G-SDI, HDMI, headphone

3G-SDI, HDMI, headphone

Size (mm)

181x216x374

173x195x346

159x246x247

112x129x173

190x202x420

179x202x427

Weight (gr)

2700

2000

2000

830

2300

2600

4,3” 2760k pixel

3,5” 1150k pixel

3,5” 1560k pixel

3,5” 1560k pixel

3,5” 1560k pixel

3,5” 1560k pixel

Yes 2,4 GHz

Yes 2,4 GHz

Yes 2,4 GHz

DIMENSION

OTHERS Screen Wi-fi Stabilization

Yes

Yes

No

No

Yes

Yes

IP connectivity

No

No

No

No

Yes

Yes

Streaming

No

No

No

No

Yes

Yes

TMBi - 48

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Panasonic AG-UX180

Panasonic AG-DVX200

Sony PXW-FS5 II

Sony PXW-FS7 II

TMBi - 49

Panorama: 4K Cameras

PTZ (pan-tilt-zoom) Cameras

Panasonic AWUE70

Sony BRCX1000

SENSOR Size

1/2.3”-type MOS

1” CMOS Exmor R

4K/UHD (up to)

UHD@29,97p

UHD@29,97p

HD (up to)

1080@59,94p

1080@59,94p

RECORDING

Other formats (up to)

1080@24p

Codec

MJPEG

Support Support

Micro SD

no Panasonic AW-UE70

OPTICS Fixed optics

Zoom 20x (29,5-612 equiv)

Zoom 12x

Exchangeable mount

No

No

Input

Microphone, line

RJ-45 (bidi)

Output

3G/HD-SDI, HDMI, LAN (bidi), mini USB (bidi), RS-232 (bidi), RS422 (bidi)

4x 3G-SDI, HDMI

Size (mm)

160x186x179

198x260x238

Weight (gr)

1500

4300

Screen

No

No

PoE+

Yes

Yes

Wi-fi

No

No

Stabilization

Yes

No

IP connectivity

Yes (only control)

Yes (only control)

Streaming

No

No

CONNECTIVITY

DIMENSION

OTHERS

TMBi - 50

Sony BRC-X1000

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Studio Cameras Blackmagic URSA Mini 4k

Hitachi SKUHD4000

Ikegami UHK-430

Panasonic AK-UC4000

Sony HDC 4800

SENSOR Resolution

UHD

UHD

Super 35

4x 2/3” CMOS

3x 2/3” CMOS

4,4k sensor

Super 35 CMOS

4K/UHD (up to)

UHD@59,94p

UHD@59,94p

UHD@59,94p

UHD@59,94p

UHD@59,94p

HD (up to)

1080@59,94p

1080@59,94p

1080@59,94p

1080@59,94p

1080@59,94p

1080@240p

UHD@400p

B4 2/3”

B4 2/3”

Mic-line, TBC

Mic-line, TBC

Size

RECORDING

Other formats (up to)

OPTICS Exchangeable mount

EF,(optionall F or PL)

B4 2/3”

B4 2/3”

Input

Mic-line, TBC

Mic-line, TBC

Output

SDI 12G

Hybrid fiber optic, 4x3G-SDI

4x3G-SDI

12G-SDI

Multi 3G-SDI

Size (mm)

133x191x262

149x243x340

151x267x372

160x268x347

Weight (gr)

4.700

4.500

4.500

5.000

Several options

Several options

Several options

Several options

Yes

Yes

Yes

Yes

CONNECTIVITY

DIMENSION

OTHERS Screen

5”

Intercom Wi-fi

No

No

No

No

No

IP connectivity

No

With CCU

With CCU

With CCU

With CCU

Streaming

No

No

No

No

No

Blackmagic URSA Mini 4k

Ikegami UHK-430

TMBi - 51

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Cinema Cameras

Arri Alexa LF

Canon C700

Red Gemini 5k

Sony Venice

SENSOR Resolution

4448x3096

4622x2496

5120x2700

6k

Size

36,7x25,5

Super 35 CMOS

30,72x18,0 S35

36,2x24,1 CMOS

4k@150p

4k@60p

5k@96p

4k@59,94p

HD (up to)

1080@240p

2k@240p

1080@59,94p

Other formats (up to)

2k@240p

4k@120p Redcode Raw, ProRes, DNxHD/HR

RECORDING 4K/UHD (up to)

Codec

4k ProRes, ArriRaw

RAW, XF-AVC, ProRes

RAW, X-OCN

Support Support

SxS or SXR

CFast

2x Express Card 34, SD

LPL

EF (optional PL, B4)

PL

USB (bidi), RJ45 (bidi)

OPTICS Exchangeable mount

CONNECTIVITY Input

line

Line, TBC

Output

6G-SDI

SDI, HDMI

3G-SDI

12G-SDI, HDMI

DIMENSION Size (mm)

Weight (gr)

133x159x172

7.800

1500

3.900

OTHERS Screen

F-LCOS

GPS Wi-fi IP connectivity

TMBi - 52

3” 1036k pixel

Several options

Optional Si, 5 GHz

Yes Yes

Remote Control

Yes

Panorama: 4K Cameras

Canon C700

Arri Alexa LF

RED Gemini

TMBi - 53

TECHNOLOGY

Broadcast models: DTT, Satellite and CDN Broadcast is changing, this is undeniable. And one of the areas in which we have seen a progressive evolution has been in the means by which the images reach our homes. In TM Broadcast, three of the most common types of transmission will be looked at in depth: DTT, satellite and CDN.

By Yeray Alfageme, Business Technology Manager Olympic Channel

TMBi - 54

TECHNOLOGY

TMBi - 55

TECHNOLOGY

DTT Towards the end of the 20th century, we experienced a transformation in the method through which television images entered our homes. We shifted from receiving analogue images through an antenna on the roof to these being digital, thus DTT, Digital Terrestrial Television came into being. This change was a considerable increase in both the quality of the images received, bidding TMBi - 56

farewell to seeing images with noises with strange shadows, along with the coverage, less signal and less power was now needed with meaning this could reach more places spread over our geography, as well as in the product on offer, since in the same radio-electric space, digital technology allows the chance to house many more channels.

The increase in the quality of the image was evident, without going into the subsequent definition

increase with the arrival of HD. This was possible thanks to the fact that digital TV signals are less prone to interference and digital receivers allow for the reception of the signal

TECHNOLOGY

in a sturdier manner than their analogue counterparts. The change was perhaps not so stark in the cities, although areas of the same ones that did not have an optimal reception were now able to enjoy a higher quality image, as well as

in the rural environment, places with typically worse coverage of television signal experienced a dramatic change for the better in most cases. And it can be stated that in most cases as there were places, until the television distribution

network improved, where the image could barely be made, since with little signal and quality, analogue television allowed for the reception of images, even if intermingled with noise and signal losses, to receiving nothing, as is the

TMBi - 57

TECHNOLOGY

case in a good digital environment, the TV signal today or may be viewed or not, there is no middle ground.

There was also an automatic increase in geographical coverage with the change in technology since much less power is needed to receive it. An analogue TV channel needed around 90 dB to be able to be received with optimum quality while a digital channel is enough with 60 or even 40 dB to be able to be viewed, always perfectly. This meant that many corners would be able to receive a signal that failed to arrive beforehand. As we are dealing with a terrestrial network, whose means of transmitting the signal are located on land, there is significant dependence on the proximity and quality with which the signal is received from our nearest transmitter and depending on the topology of the terrain this also makes the network somewhat expensive, since in complicated environments multiple broadcaster TMBi - 58

points are required to be able to cover this area properly. As we will see later, this is one of the major differences between DTT and the other means of transmission that under examination.

A further improvement was in the range on offer, since the number of channels that we can have thanks to the implementation of digital technology is much greater than with the former analogue channels.

An analogue TV channel in standard definition, remember that there were countries such as Japan that started to broadcast channels in high definition before making the leap to digital technology, occupying a bandwidth of 8 MHz. This analogue transmission channel was renamed multiplex, since it allowed more than one digital transmission service to be included in the same, with which it was possible to broadcast up to 5 digital channels and certain radio services, in the same radio-electric space where previously there was solely space for

a single television channel. We never did manage to multiply the offer by five, they were around three times the number of channels on view, since the implantation was progressive and initially there was not the same space for the digital channels as for the analogue channels, yet

TECHNOLOGY

former analogue network.

today we can indeed talk about a significant increase once the transition to the digital world has ended and even with the implementation of high definition channels, which obviously require greater bandwidth, it can be said that we enjoy 5 times more channels of television in the DTT than with the

However, there are certain aspects of DTT networks that must be taken into account when using this type of system for signal distribution.

Normally they are public property, which implies that they are highly regulated environments and the creation of new services, such as channels, is usually slow and tedious. In addition, as we forwarded beforehand, its implementation is expensive, and this is one of the reasons that they are publicly owned. As they are signal broadcasters located on land, the investment in the signal distribution network to them and the number of issuers needed to cover a large audience are expensive and difficult to implement in most cases.

These two aspects mainly make methods such as satellite or content distribution networks, CDN as its acronym in English, more convenient in certain cases.

Satellite Simultaneously with the terrestrial distribution of television, both analogue and digital, another method of making the images burst into our homes, the satellite, appeared. Initially, it was a much more global method since a single broadcaster allows for the covering a much wider area of coverage and, due to the modulation method used, the loss of quality was minimal.

A satellite transmission system basically consists of a broadcasting centre in which the signal or signals that one wishes to transmit are received and from which said signals are sent to satellites located in space. The entire processes of coding, compression, multiplexing and adaptation of the signal to the environment are carried out in this centre on the ground to simplify the satellite systems, since performing any maintenance or repair work on these on the ground will always be TMBi - 59

TECHNOLOGY

Hispasat satellite coverage footprint.

much cheaper and simple to do it on the satellite several thousand kilometres away. If not, let them ask NASA about when they had to repair the Hubble Space Telescope shortly after entering service, quite a feat.

The satellite is only responsible for collecting these signals sent from the broadcasting centre on the ground, changing their frequency of work and returning to ground in the TMBi - 60

specific geographical area for which the system has been designed. The reason for changing the frequency signals is to avoid down signals, much more powerful, interfering with rising ones, and this process is carried out by the transponders of the satellite, which are relatively simple systems.

The geographical limitation of a satellite's range is achieved by modifying, literally deforming, the satellite's

antenna so that it only covers the desired terrestrial surface, avoiding interference with other surrounding satellites.

For this footprint to be constant, the satellites must be placed in an orbit in which they rotate at the same speed as the earth with respect to its axis, and this is achieved in the famous geostationary orbit, which is located at an altitude of 35,786 Km. Today, there are so many

TECHNOLOGY

services that require this orbit, that it is beginning to become truly saturated, meaning the launch of new systems on it is no longer feasible in certain areas due to collision risk.

A satellite transmitter will always cover much more surface area and therefore will reach more population and more audience than a terrestrial one, yet the control of its

coverage is more complicated since at the edges of its footprint larger antennae will be enough to receive its signal, always up to a limit of course. Therefore, the use of advanced coding and access control systems are almost always necessary to avoid issuing in adjacent countries or in undesired areas.

In addition, the

implementation and maintenance of a satellite television station is costly, and it is usually operating companies that offer these services to broadcasters, so maintaining satellite TV broadcasting services ends up being expensive in the long run. An advantage over DTT is that in this case the implementation of new channels and services is much more

TECHNOLOGY

simultaneously and reliably. There are regional CDNs, but these are in the minority.

Without this type of networks, the Internet could not be understood today as we know it, since almost any content that we visit on the web comes to us thanks to a CDN that serves us near our location. streamlined and swifter since the satellite operator controls the capacity of the same and its configuration and, for example, launch new channels around a great sporting event such as an Olympiad or a World Cup and remove it at the end of it here becomes feasible, something that in DTT is unthinkable.

These two broadcasting methods, with their differences, are similar and easily comparable. In terms of costs and coverage, for example.

However, the method that we will see next is a major shift with respect to these since it makes use of networks not designed for the transmission of linear TMBi - 62

TV signals to transmit them and also allows a bidirectional communication, not only the viewer receives information in their device receiver, but you they can also ask the network to change and act differently depending on their needs.

We refer to CDNs.

CDN Content Delivery Network. Content distribution network. A CDN is little more than a network of information servers connected to the Internet and distributed worldwide, which allows us to access the same content from different parts of the world

Of course, one of the main uses of these networks is to serve audiovisual content, since it needs much more information to be transmitted, and as a consequence, optimising the transmission of this information through this type of networks is pivotal to be able to send us the amount of available services.

Environments such as YouTube, Netflix and even the television distribution networks of operators such as Movistar and Vodafone, make use of this technology to deliver the images to their subscribers. However, there are two different types when we talk about

TECHNOLOGY

distribution based on CDN: IPTV and OTT.

with our decoder as in the case of Vodafone.

IPTV would be a broadcast method more similar to that represented by the distribution on DTT or satellite of television channels since, although it makes use of data networks to transmit the information, these being networks specifically designed for this purpose.

The subscribers receive the content in the decoders connected to their televisions through the Internet access network and said decoder does not work outside that network. However, when we talk about OTT, a change comes into play.

Over-The-Top. OTT services use the standard Internet network to make multimedia services available through it.

Services such as YouTube, Netflix or the Vodafone television service operate in this way. Irrespective of whichever Internet provider or ISP we are connected to, the images may be received in a standard manner, either by accessing a website as in the case of Netflix, as

A CDN network is cheap to implement and there are many providers that can offer this service worldwide at a very low cost compared to satellite and terrestrial distribution.

In addition, the control over the medium is absolute since not only can geographic rules be used to block the reception of the signal, but we can use methods of authentication of devices and users to control not only where but also who may view our content.

Finally, the flexibility over the broadcast is total since we can activate not only channels, but services at our whim, not even the network operator requires knowledge of the use we are making of it, which maximises the utilisation of the product and allows us to customise the available offer through the same.

One final detail, but one which must not be overlooked. We have previously commented that the terrestrial or

satellite distribution networks were unidirectional, that is, the spectator receives the signal passively and enjoys the services offered without the possibility of choosing much more.

However, in a data network the user can communicate with the network, which makes it possible to offer video on demand services and many more future possibilities that operators increasingly develop thanks to this new way of broadcasting content.

As can be seen, DTT or satellite transmission networks offer us different characteristics for the same type of service and have positive and negative points easily comparable between both, but the transmission based on data networks, CDNs, offers us many more possibilities besides at a much lower cost. There can be no doubt that the audio-visual industry is taking giant steps at the present time.

TMBi - 63

EVENTS

TMBi - 64

EVENTS

Sponsors

Text: Daniel Esparza Photos: Pedro Cobo

The TM Broadcast magazine held the second edition of its cycle of breakfast events on Thursday, 5 July at the Santo Mauro Hotel in Madrid. These events aim to bring together the heads of key areas of television production in one space to explore challenges, trends and critical issues for the future of the sector.

At the beginning of the meeting, the magazine's editor, Javier de Martín, recalled that this initiative coincided with the celebration of TM Broadcast's tenth anniversary and its position as the undisputed leader in the sector in Spain. The magazine is also one of the most widely-read magazines in the world with its headline TM Broadcast International.

On this occasion, the debate revolved around the

PARTICIPANTS TVE • Patricio de la Nuez: Director de Medios & Explotación PP.II • Víctor Sánchez: Director del Área Técnica TVE TV3 • Víctor Clariana: Responsable de Digitalización de la Redacción de Informativos TV3 • Xavier Ferrándiz: Responsable del Departamento de Ingeniería e Infraestructuras de la CCMA CANAL SUR • José Enrique Zamorano: Director Técnico de CANAL SUR • Ramón Alberca: Jefe de Producción de Informativos de Canal Sur TELEMADRID • Vicente Alcalá: Director de Ingeniería de TELEMADRID • Diana Paz: Subdirectora de Producción de Informativos de TELEMADRID AVID • Gonzalo del Val: Director Comercial Iberia, Grecia y África de AVID CHYRONHEGO • Aldo Campisi: Vicepresident LATAM ChyronHego • Alfonso Cruz Nombela: Director General de Clearcom.

SONY • José Antonio Bolós: Sales Manager SONY Spain • Felip García: Marketing Manager HIVE (SONY) Europe

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Xavier Ferrándiz, Responsable del Departamento de Ingeniería e Infraestructuras de la CCMA

technological challenges in television news production. Top technical managers from TVE, TV3, Telemadrid and Canal Sur attended the meeting together with several senior representatives of AVID, Sony and ChyronHego (with ClearCom), the event's sponsors, who also joined the analysis.

Luis Sanz, a renowned technical television TMBi - 66

Víctor Clariana, Responsable de Digitalización de la Redacción de Informativos de TV3

consultant and a regular contributor to this magazine, mediated the breakfast event.

Media convergence, unified writing We are witnessing a context of media convergence (television, radio, Internet and social networks). This scenario raises the possibility of creating a combined

newsroom with multimedia editors capable of producing content adapted to different media. All the televisions represented agreed with this trend, but each one was at a different stage. “We are in different stages of the process, but travelling towards the same goal” said José Enrique Zamorano, technical director of Canal Sur.

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We are, therefore, going through a transition, which leads us to consider whether televisions have already integrated multimedia systems and made them available to the journalist.

TV3 is one of the television stations immersed in this convergence process. In this context, TV3 confirmed at the meeting that it had analysed several of these tools but had not found any applicable to television and radio, according to

Xavier Ferrándiz, head of the Engineering and Infrastructure Department of the CCMA. The Catalonian corporation introduced Dalet Galaxy in its radio streams, to assess whether this solution could also applicable to television.

“We're not sure yet” Xavier admitted. Dalet was not present at the event to explain their proposal.

One of the challenges posed by Xavier to undertake the convergence project was the technological and

Patricio de la Nuez, Director de Medios y Explotación PP.II de RTVE.

human legacy since this process also requires a change of mentality on the part of the editor. In this sense, Víctor Clariana, head of Digitisation for the Newsroom, explained that TV3 was provisionally applying a bimedia model with an extension to trimedia. “Every editor should know about radio, television and the Internet, but works for two media (radio-Internet and television-Internet)” he summarised.

TVE is in a similar situation. Patricio Núñez,

Gonzalo del Val, Director Comercial Iberia, Grecia y África de AVID (left) y Víctor Sánchez, Director del Área Técnica de RTVE (right)

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José Enrique Zamorano, Director Técnico de CANAL SUR

the director of news media, explained that the public corporation already had a convergence of content, where the same editor prepares content for radio and television.

“All regional news programmes are convergent” Patricio said.

Regarding the tools, Víctor Sánchez, director of the Technical Area, explained that TVE has two platforms connected by a series of gateways that allow sending audio TMBi - 68

Ramón Alberca, Jefe de Producción de Informativos de Canal Sur

and video indistinctly.

The technical director of Canal Sur, José Enrique Zamorano, confirmed that they had not found a unique tool that offers services for radio and television news either. For the time being, the company was also opting to use systems with gateways for content sharing. Like other television stations, Canal Sur was already planning the physical unification of the newsroom. This

project is scheduled for the third quarter of next year. José Enrique also emphasised the unification of the MAM system: “That will be the seed of unification”.

Andalusian television has eight news production and broadcasting centres, so it has a highly distributed news production system.

In the case of Telemadrid, with only one production centre, the structure is more straightforward. Its director of Engineering,

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Vicente Alcalá, mentioned that they had met rejection by proposing to unify radio and television: “Unification has been more directed towards television + web and radio + web”. Telemadrid also has open content gateways.

Vicente Alcalá stressed, in fact, that the most important thing for the editor would be to access the material. He downplayed the importance of using a

Vicente Alcalá, Director de Ingeniería de TELEMADRID

unified tool, however. He also alluded to the times to explain the differences he perceived between one medium and another: “The demand for publication times marks the natural flows of each format. The web is immediate, radio is agile and dynamic, and television is sluggish.”

Her colleague, Diana Paz, deputy director of news production, argued that a digital transformation process is needed in the mindset of

the newsroom: “We want journalists to create content for television and the Internet. We will insist on this during the next year.” According to Diana, this process also requires integrating social networks into production flows. "There are more and more screens, and we have to reach them all."

Aldo Campisi, vice president of LATAM at ChyronHego, pointed out that the way we consume content has changed

Diana Paz, Subdirectora de Producción de Informativos de TELEMADRID

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José Antonio Bolós, Sales Manager SONY Spain

radically. We want it now, on demand. “The big challenge is to produce much more content with the existing infrastructure” he said, noting that “the current demand for content is the highest in history”.

In this vein, Alfonso Cruz, Clearcom's CEO, commented that the broadcast grid is beginning to become meaningless: "Except for TMBi - 70

Felip García, Marketing Manager HIVE (SONY) Europe

specific events, the user will consume mostly in VOD." Regarding the changes in the user's habits, Felip García, HIVE Marketing Manager for Europe, recalled a useful piece of information to understand the current context a little better: “65% of people under 25 don't watch the news, but 95% of people over 65 do. And we must reach out to everyone.”

Cataloguing systems and cloud services Canal Sur has a distributed structure so that each production centre has an autonomous system for ingest, reproduction and archiving. “It was the right choice when we installed it, but our focus now is on more centralised storage

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management. In production systems (except ingest and playout), we are moving towards a centralised model” explained José Enrique Zamorano.

In cataloguing, Zamorano acknowledged that Canal Sur still has a long way to go. The company has two levels of cataloguing; one at the production level and one at the MAM level.

TVE, on the other hand, has an automatic

Aldo Campisi, Vicepresident LATAM ChyronHego

cataloguing system based on artificial intelligence.

Víctor Sánchez, from the public corporation, explained that they currently have a private cloud, on-premise, implemented in the news and regional centres: “We are considering a hybrid solution, with part onpremise and part public cloud. We're working on it, and we want to have it by the end of the year. We know that the model must be cloud, either public or

private.”

Later, however, Víctor qualified this position: “The cloud does present some problems. The figures do not add up yet.”

In any case, the future is, according to him, quite clear. “Everything will tend towards the public cloud, for implementation and updating. Right now, changing versions can be a somewhat complex task.

In the future, we all dream that things will change.”

All the professionals

Alfonso Cruz Nombela, Director General de Clearcom

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present alluded to the headaches caused by version changes.

naturally migrate to the cloud”.

For his part, Felip García added that Sony does not see the cloud only as a storage platform, but also as a production platform.

MOJO (Mobile Journalist) and backpacks

Vicente Alcalá, from Telemadrid, considered that the cloud was not worth their while for the time being. Concerning cataloguing, Vicente explained that his television divides the material into two large groups: complete and gross programmes. Real files are the raw ones. The channel has managed to have the cataloguing done directly from the production system where it has been ingested, which speeds up the process.

A trend observed among the speakers at the table was the MOJO (Mobile Journalist). They agreed that its advantages in producing news reports is noteworthy. This technology allows you to do live productions from your mobile phone. In the words of Víctor Clariana, “TV3 will begin to lead journalists towards this model”. The network has conducted several experiments. “It offers a wide range of options, although it does not work for all types of coverages” explained Víctor.

The trend in TV3 is to do without manual indexing and use automatic systems, according to Xavier Ferrándiz.

“Automatic cataloguing is richer” he said. Xavier considers the cloud viable for specific services, such as cataloguing or coding: “Many services will

From TVE, Patricio de la Nuez agreed with Víctor: “It's a revolution in sensitivity and proximity, and very useful for lastminute coverage. In the future, our informants should be armed with this technology. TVE has produced a programme with MOJO on an

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experimental level.

José Antonio Bolós, Sony Sales Manager for Spain, summed up the advantages of using this technology: “You can take mobile phones anywhere, which is just what a newsreel should do.

Without forgetting that quality is an important factor.” His colleague Felip García added a nuance of interest: “Mobile phones are not only elements of capture; they also allow editing, for instance.”

Another point on which all the professionals present agreed on was the revolution that backpacks have brought to news production. According to Xavier Ferrándiz (TV3), “backpacks are turning television into radio because they bring live TV to the level of the latter medium”. Canal Sur agreed, “Right now, you can't conceive a news programme without backpacks”, summarised Ramón Alberca, its head of news production.

Telemadrid also supported this position. In

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the words of Diana Paz, “we can no longer live without backpacks”. TVE has already made remote productions using several backpacks simultaneously, said Patricio de la Nuez.

Graphics Some technical officials present at the meeting admitted that their televisions reused too much content. From ChyronHego, Aldo Campisi added that this was all the more frequent in the graphics section.

The function of graphics is to inform, visualise and entertain. “If you present the content visually and creatively, you engage the viewer” said Aldo Campisi.

“Our role is to help companies simplify these processes. In the past, the time, the cost and the personnel required to offer these contents was very high. Not anymore.”

Alfonso Cruz highlighted the Cameo solution from ChyronHego, distributed in Spain by ClearCom, with a technology capable of integrating all the demand

Javier de Martín, Daro Media Group CEO , event organizer (left) and Luis Sanz, event moderator (right).

for graphics in a newsroom into a single product.

Aldo Camisi also added a key factor: “Metadata is a great way to automate the creation of content and graphics. More content can now be produced with fewer people.”

Gonzalo del Val, commercial director for Iberia, Africa and Greece of AVID, argued that an

attractive and didactic graphic environment manages to attract and retain the audience: “Immediacy on its own is not enough. Analysis is essential. The viewer already knows the information. A news bulletin must enrich the content, and graphics systems play a crucial role here, also considering how they can be integrated TMBi - 73

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with the rest of the production chain.”

In this paradigm of change and technological evolution, Sony developed Media Backbone Hive. It was Sony’s way of responding to these new needs (centralisation of news, cloud, etc.). “It is a system based on microservices” contributed Felip García.

In this line, Gonzalo del Val wanted to highlight the MediaCentral solution offered by AVID. In Gonzalo's words, one of the keys lies in using “standardised protocols”.

Moreover, manufacturers must be able -according to him- to integrate the artificial intelligence previously developed by companies with sufficient investment capacity, to give a concrete use to this industry.

Future of information programmes In the final part of the conversation, the professionals present TMBi - 74

debated the future of news production. All the television stations admitted that they did not know for sure what evolution news programmes will undergo.

“We are investing in products that we don't know will have much or little life” admitted Xavier Ferrándiz. “We have the impression that there will

always be a market interested in live programmes, but the future is uncertain”.

While the written press has migrated to the web in recent years, television has not yet managed to take this step. “Televisions are quite irrelevant on the web” confirmed Xavier.

“We're still news-centric”.

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advances.

From TVE, Patricio considered that the Internet requires a new audiovisual language in the processing of information. “It's not about dumping television content on the Internet” he concluded. With this mentality, TVE has spent years developing a product called “News in 4 minutes” adapted to the web and mobile devices.

Vicente Alcalá (Telemadrid) acknowledged this point but wanted to highlight the fact that news programmes can be found on the Internet. Diana Paz assured that the advantage will always lie in live specials, whose management must continue to be improved as the technology

Finally, concerning the preferred contracting model for each television station, the technical managers present alluded to the problem of operating as public entities. José Enrique Zamorano, of Canal Sur, admitted that it was difficult for them to maintain a stable level of investment. “The investment capacity is not always adapted to our needs for technological renewal”. Zamorano argued that Canal Sur was entering an IT model with more demand for renewal.

In the case of TVE, Patricio de la Nuez stated that it was sometimes

difficult for them to explain their investments: “They don't understand why we want the second generation of backpacks, for instance. They tell us the old ones still work.

This process can take years to complete.”

Patricio said that this was why they were trying to integrate updates and new versions in this type of long-term contracts, precisely to avoid becoming obsolete.

TV3 has recently operated with a leasing model that has made it easier for them to update their systems regularly.

“We have done quite well, but I am forcing things for us to invest once and for all”, summarised Xavier Ferrándiz.

After the roundtable, all the professionals present at the debate, including the manufacturers, had the opportunity to meet up in a private room at the Hotel Santo Mauro to exchange impressions of the event and to chat in a more relaxed way on different topics of interest.

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Sony puts its new live production service to test at a Red Bull event TMBi - 76

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Virtual Production enables high-quality broadcasting at a fraction of the cost Live event broadcasting has traditionally required a very costly deployment of infrastructure, equipment and personnel to the event site. There is no room for failure here and there is limited room to reduce costs. All the elements of the production workflow must operate seamlessly, demonstrating reliability.

Besides, technological advances have raised the standards of quality in the coverage of major events, and the level of investment required.

The World Cup is just the latest example.

Technological development has also allowed many other events, whose coverage requires a more contained budget, to be broadcast as well.

It is, therefore, necessary to differentiate between events for mass audiences and those aimed at more specific audiences.

The company invited a select group of specialised press to Switzerland to present its new live productions service

The latest solution developed by Sony, Virtual Production, has been designed to cover this second group of mid-size events, in a context where live content streaming continues to grow.

This is an on-demand production service that incorporates a complete set of tools needed for professional live streaming.

The company invited a select group of specialised press to the Swiss city of Sarnen to tell us first-hand about this launch and its implementation during the Alpenbrevet race.

The Alpenbrevet race is an event organised every year by Red Bull in which its participants, more than 1,200, cover a mountain circuit of almost 100 kilometres on a motorcycle.

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Virtual Production is designed for high-quality, low-budget productions; two requirements that had to be met in the YouTube and social networking streaming of this race. A brand like Red Bull cannot be linked to poor quality production, but at the same time, it is a mediumsized event that requires a contained investment.

The cost savings of this new solution is only possible because the system uses Amazon Web

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Services (AWS) cloud technology. Infrastructure requirements are thus minimal. The system allows you to deploy a set of up to six cameras.

One of the advantages of Virtual Production is its great simplicity of use, as Nicolas Moreau, Solutions Marketing Manager at Sony pointed out during the press presentation of the product. Getting this was a priority for the company.

Nicolas Moreau revealed to TM Broadcast that the main challenges presented by this system are the configuration of the cameras and connectivity. Regarding the first challenge, Nicolas Moreau explained that it could easily be solved by teaching the user how to configure the camera to stream through this service. Regarding the second, Nicolas acknowledged that Sony could not control the

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connectivity section because it does not provide these services. As for Alpenbrevet, Red Bull checked the availability of a 4G connection before the start of the race to ensure this aspect was covered.

If a camera shows symptoms of poor connectivity, the operator controlling the system is notified so that he or she can switch to another camera. Moreover, the service also offers the option of launching prerecorded content in the event of a live connection failure.

Nicolas Moreau

confirmed that the service had been very well received by those who have used it and stressed that many customers have especially appreciated its integration with social networks. This tool allows you to add to live streaming to Tweets previously located through a search tool included in the system.

Manager of Red Bull. In addition to the price and ease of use, one of the advantages of the new system is its flexibility: "Thanks to Virtual Production, we don't need to deploy a mobile unit or other hardware products.

In this case, all we needed was a notebook and a set of cameras.�

He also revealed that Sony wants to bring this system to Spain to cover regional events that were not previously possible to cover.

Virtual Production will be presented at the IBC in September. As several company managers highlighted during the event, the service has just been launched and will be incorporating new options in the future.

We also had the opportunity to talk with Hubert Zaech, Production

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CASE STUDY

SGO Mistika & Lightbender Case Study

Beyond the looks of Startup, Sony’s tech-infused thriller Series

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CASE STUDY

Startup, the Florida-set series, distributed by Sony’s streaming service Crackle in the US and Amazon Prime Video in Europe and Japan is not the mellow tech-industry

satire one might expect when hearing its title for the first time. It is a fierce thriller set in the fuzzy world of cryptocurrencies and the dark web.

LightBender, a boutiquesize finishing facility in Santa Monica created Startup’s final look, ensuring the show’s murky crime revealed it’s true colors. “We took care of conform, VFX plates, SDR & HDR color grading, marketing materials, mastering and final deliverables. All of it completed in SGO’s postproduction hero suite Mistika Ultima,” told Juan Ignacio Cabrera, lead colorist and founder of LightBender.

Cabrera worked on the Startup series together with two assistant colorists Fran Lorite and Álvaro Barrasa.

Third season of Startup on its way, this time shot in 8K! An extremely tight schedule was one of the biggest challenges Cabrera, Barrasa and Lorite faced while colour grading the Startup series.

“Delivering a quality show without any major issues in three different delivery TMBi - 81

CASE STUDY

versions was quite demanding, so having the best possible toolset was essential; It allowed us to be as efficient as humanly possible.”

LightBender had to deliver the UHDTV version first, so the workflow was designed to be UHDTV native from beginning to end. “That requires a lot of bandwidth and we were working on multiple systems simultaneously.

Luckily, we have SGO’s Open Storage solution which enabled a centralized working environment with all the machines running at the same time and over the same project seamlessly.”

The original shooting resolution was another of the project’s complexities.

“We were working with 6K RED files and needed to create an HDR delivery, so we decided to unify everything to UHD EXR-16 image sequences, keeping all the TC information, tape names and other information to allow a quick re-conform if needed,” continues Cabrera. The LightBender TMBi - 82

team is about to start the third season of StartUp, this time shot on Helium 8K to make the show even more demanding and dramatic!

Mistika Ultima enables a nonlinear modern postproduction workflow LightBender Studio completes feature films and also TV series where lately, there has been a significant increase in production. “Mistika Ultima allows us to tackle from low-budgets shows to incredibly complex blockbusters with ease!”

Cabrera has been using award-winning Mistika Ultima for more than eleven years and in his opinion, versatility is one of the most apparent advantages of SGO’s hero suite. “The flexibility you have with an infinite timeline, being able to have numerous versions in the same space, extremely powerful conform tools and the ease to work with

multiple versioning and mastering requirements are the things that make your life easier.”

In Mistika Ultima both conform and color grading happen in the same place.

CASE STUDY

“It does not force you to follow any specific order.

You can go back and forth as you need. It is a unified environment, not a ‘Frankenstein’ made up of different programs, modules or plugins.”

Mistika Ultima allows making creative decisions right to the very last minute, keeping a solid workflow throughout.

“When the pressure is high and the production team start to get nervous, being

the facility that helps and makes things easier is what makes the client want to come back. We could not do that without Mistika Technology.”

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We try

FUJIFILM UA 24x7.8BERD 4K LENS

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FUJIFILM UA 24x7.8BERD

Lab test carried out by Pablo Martínez

offer. In 2015, the Company launched its debut zoom lens for television, offering exceptional optic performance levels for 4K cameras with 2/3 of an inch lens mount format, owing to the increase of 4k content availability. With this launch, the “UA” series came into being, which encompasses lenses specially designed to offer cutting-edge technical and constructive characteristics with optic performance that allows for 4K compatibility in all type of recordings.

Currently, within the “UA” series, we can find eight models which perfectly fulfil our 4K image capturing needs.

For many years now, we have all been well aware of the FUJINON optical devices from the manufacturer FUJIFILM, with these being a worldwide benchmark in terms of high-quality, present in our daily work with a wide range of lenses on

The arrival of the latest instalment to the “UA” series, which will be analysed in this lab test, leaves behind a hitherto unknown quality for manufacturers of broadcast lenses for television, through the provision of the best of both ends of the 4K compatible broadcaster lens market: a lightweight and portable lens for ENG format cameras, combined with an angular aperture measuring 7.8mm along with a 187mm zoom feature (without duplicator), duly endowing it with, in this new addition, the ability to meet users’ demands, above all in 4K ENG camera systems: having on-hand a light and portable lens with angular scope and unique zoom.

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 TEST AREA

DELVING DEEPER The newest member of the “FUJINON UA” family, the UA 24x7.8BERD, hit the shelves in January last year, surprising, with regard to its relatives in the “UA” family, with an angular aperture measuring 7.8mm and the ability to double its focal distance, reaching as far as 374mm in zoom mode using the duplicator, a series of performance figures hitherto unknown for broadcast optics compatible with 4K. The construction technology of the UA 24x7.8BE offers us a high-precision optic in an entire set weighing (lens plus parasol) of merely 2.1kg and a size of just 220.5mm. These figures are sufficient to consider it both compact and light.

The research and development team has clearly pulled out all the stops when undertaking the construction of this lens, with excellent optic performance for 4K image capture in the entire range offered by the zoom. The optic is manufactured with TMBi - 86

FUJIFILM UA 24x7.8BERD

HT-EBC (High Transmittance Electron Beam Coating) patented by FUJIFILM (multiple coating process for lenses, thus ensuring high-performance in optic transmissions close to 99% and with just 0.2% reflexion rate within a wide light spectrum, which drastically reduces reflections, along with the effects known as “ghosting”, alongside aspherical technology to increase light transmission and reduce colour palette aberrations, which is of the utmost importance when we need to film content in 4K HDR. It is worthwhile highlighting that the maximum aperture range is f1.8, which allows for unrivalled performance for 4K recordings. Similarly, the incorporation in the inner construction of the “iris” of new blades for aperture/closure, which takes us in the direction of a more circular aperture, providing a bokeh (term used to refer to the quality and merits of the soft-focus function) softer and therefore smoother, and more attractively visually.

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 TEST AREA

The lens includes a 16bit encoder, capable of offering high-resolution output for the data captured, including zoom and focal positions, meaning there are considerable improvements to, amongst other parameters, the interaction between zoom and focus remote elements.

FIELD TESTING To carry out the field testing, work was undertaken with several settings formats: a camera dependent on a Mobile Unit (MU) with HD settings; a camera dependent on a Mobile Unit with 4K HDR settings; and an outdoor shoot with an ENG using 4K settings.

As a reference point, the technical characteristics of the signal capturing equipment, with regard to the HD MU, a 3CCD image capturing system was used; for the 4K HDR MU the choice was 3 x CMOS and for the ENG camera, the image capturing system was formed by 1 CMOS, bearing this in TMBi - 88

mind, the results obtained were as follows: The lens was fitted during a sports broadcast in the “offside” position, in such a way that we were able to evaluate its behaviour in response to flowing movements and

the feel the operator gets when working constantly with the zoom and focus, with a lens of this type.

The event took place at midday with notable backlighting in certain areas. After observing the optic’s behaviour,

Viewsonic LS800WU

comparing it with those that are normally mounted in this specific position, and straining it on certain occasions to try to achieve colour palette aberrations, and the results were better than expected. Despite strident efforts to force their appearances, we were unable to obtain any reflection or “halo” on the image captured, which in certain situations we have noticed with some of the optics with which we work. Once the event had finished, the “CCU” camera operator’s opinion was extremely positive, both with regard to the working precision of the lens with remote systems (it must be borne in mind that we are using 16 bit here), as well as the images taken.

After specifying with some highly-regarded colleagues in the profession and taking advantage of the fact that an international event needed covering, I was allowed to perform lab tests with one of the 4K MU on-hand. The lens fitted filming duties for one of the camera

positions for the gala being broadcast and I was able to verify its behaviour during the same, as well as in a series of initial tests when they were setting the lighting with 4K and HDR image capture activated. It must be said that the images’ quality and definition, even when forcing a marked lighting contrast, were outstanding, excellent results all round. The comments made we very positive bearing in mind the behaviour of the lens with so many zoom possibilities and such a contained size.

Finally, the litmus test remained, not so much with regard to behaviour in terms of image capture and the absence of colour palette aberrations, moreover in response to operational ease and handling. The lens was installed on an ENG camera that was filming a documentary on the environment. The filming lasted two days, and once it was over, the operator spoke very highly of the equipment, namely: having the possibility of

working with this lens permits ideal handling between a perfect aperture angle for the majority of the recordings and a powerful zoom that allows for us to achieve close-ups that were not possible with standard lenses of the size offered by this one (in this scenario, the equipment had two lenses mounted in accordance with the crew’s needs, a wide-angle and the one being assessed in this article).

To sum up, as had been clearly mentioned beforehand, we have before us an all-purpose piece of equipment ideal for any setting, with the best technical specs one can find at the moment in this range of 4K lens systems.

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