NAB 2011 – Some Favoured Moments

NAB, the annual convention of broadcasters, ends weaving a spell of optimism about the future. This is more palpable than for many years since the recession began to bite. Rising attendee numbers have returned, and there is a whole galaxy of new technical toys for the world to occupy their time with.

In many ways NAB has changed dramatically over the last ten years. The by-word then was ‘content is king’. The most important thing to get right (meaning popular) was the ‘programme’ format. This year there was very little discussion about programmes, except for three issues. Why the great success for a musical series about school kids called ‘Glee’? Why the success of anything Simon Cowell touches such as ‘American Idol’ the talent show. Why reality shows about roughnecks are so popular, as reported in the earlier blogs. Perhaps it’s just fashion, and the public’s cyclic search for something it has not seen before?

For the technology side, people got really excited about some new types of TV camera called ‘4K’ cameras. They have at least four times as much detail as an HDTV camera. One ‘4K’ camera on show produced the sharpest picture ever seen coming from a commercial camera. Of course, the better the quality of the picture, the longer the time before Joe Public hits the zapper button, so this 4K definitely has a future. But who would be brave enough to say that the HDTV will not last many years before it is outdated? Don’t tell the accountants you read this.

Another cause for excitement among US broadcasters was the idea of broadcasting TV to handheld receivers such as mobile phones. It’s not a new idea, but the plan is that the main US networks will shortly be available to as you wait in the rain in the bus queue in the morning clutching your mobile phone. This is something tried and failed in Europe. Here, people were not willing to pay subscriptions for TV services on a mobile that they could watch at home in greater comfort for free, so there was no way to pay for the extra transmitters needed. Could we be forgiven for thinking the same pattern will repeat itself in the USA?

Most of all there was the excitement about using television and Internet together – ‘Transmedia’. It’s an interesting challenge for creative people, and it will have some impact. But I wonder if the biggest factor shaping success of all is not related to technology – it is the ‘programme format’ If you find one that the public likes, at least for time, you have the world in your hands. But no amount of gadgets or technology can help if you don’t.

Goodbye TV remote control?

I think I have seen the future. It’s like the present only more expensive. Today our lives may be largely sitting on an armchair with a TV remote control and a drink in the hand. Tomorrow may be entirely different. We may be sitting in an armchair with an iPad and a drink in the hand. Welcome to the world of the ‘two screen’ experience.
Here at NAB, the boffins at ‘Georgia Tech’, one of the venerable US universities, have been setting their mind to what may happen in the ‘two screen experience’ – once we are untied from the shackles of our friend the TV remote, which Homer Simpson claims to be his ‘non judgemental’ friend.
The iPad (or similar) gets its content via your home Wifi of digital telephone ‘G3’ network. The content might come from the broadcaster of the TV channel you are watching, or from some central organisation.
The first ‘application’ shown was an ‘electronic programme guide’ via the iPad. Essentially you have a horizontal bar which can be ‘swished’ to the left or right, and contains the programme schedule for a channel in small pictures. Then there is a vertical bar which crosses the horizontal bar at whatever time it is now. You can swish this vertical bar to look at the schedule of other channels. Then, down the bottom there are small screen of the current running programmes in your five most watched channels. You have to admit it’s easier than finding what you want via a remote control.
A second application had a horizontal scrolling bar with the plot or story of the programme as it develops. At intervals, the iPad points out other programmes which are related to that point in the programme, and which can be watched on-line directly via the iPad. A third application had a horizontal scrolling bar with the story of a drama. At intervals, the viewer could change something in the plot, by scrolling a vertical bar. In effect, this was ‘interactive drama’.
They were intriguing options, but I did wonder if this system could have an over whelming advantage over the remote control. Could it be less easy for it to fall and disapear down the armchair armrests, or for the dog to nibble at it? That’s really what we need, isn’t it?

NAB: Subtitles can be more fun?

At the NAB convention you meet the mighty, and the mighty small, influences on broadcasting.    One of the small but fascinating was demonstrations by Ryanston University in Canada.   They have been busy making TV subtitles and other aids  more fun to use for those with disabilities.

Subtitles are ubiquitous for digital television today.   Over the years they have remained pretty much the same.  Do they always have to be simple and (maybe) boring?   Ryanston thinks not.   They have a whole range of options.  One was to use a ‘comic book’ convention where the text is in a shaded block, as you see in comic books.  Another was to use ‘thought bubbles’ with those silly things you see in e-mails – ‘emoticons’.

But these were not  found to be winners in trials with the deaf.  What they liked most was a third option termed ‘kinetic text’.   Here the size and shape and position of the subtitles can  move and change, and the font can be changed, to reflect the ‘emotion’ of the scene.   Remember how ‘Batman’ did fights in the 1960s?   ‘Biff’ and ‘Bang’ added?   This is more or less it.   In tests, the deaf really liked this style.

Ryanston also looked at ‘audio descriptions’.  This is the additional voice track that is added to TV programmes to tell blind people what is happing in the scene.   They found  in trials that, all other things being equal,  people liked (somewhat) the voice of the person giving the descriptors to be of the opposite sex to the dominant sex  of the people in the programme.   But, strangely enough,  what they really liked best was for the audio description to be like one of those old ‘film noir’ movies,  where the main character or  protagonist reads a voice over describing what is happening.   When asked if they ‘trusted’ the audio descriptors, the replies they gave were directly linked to the trustworthyness of the character in the drama.

There was more.  The  University also had a  ‘chair’ which was wired to vibrate (in different parts) at the different frequencies of the sound track.   This, it seems, really adds to the enjoyment of those with hearing disabilities.   I can only report that it felt like I was ‘itching’, and scratching didn’t help.

TV on the move at NAB

At the NAB convention this year, most programme makers and managers are in the grip of technology and gadget fever, but there is slightly more  to it than that.

True, there are two main elements which top the agenda.

The first is how to make programmes which successfully exploit what you can do with both television (and radio) broadcasting itself and, at the same time, use the web or mobile phones.  This is called a ‘cross media’ or ‘multi-platform’ strategy.    How can you best enlarge your audience’s experience?    How can you use what you have in television and radio, to make money on the web and the mobile phone?

The other headline subject with a technology base is the ‘why’s and how’s’ of making television programmes in 3DTV.  In fact, the whole Convention is opened by James Cameron, Hollywood’s father of successful 3D movies.

But not all is forgotten about the programme ‘fashions’ of yesterday.   Certainly no one speaks much of plain vanilla drama or news, or even ‘new talent’ shows.   But a new type of ‘reality’ show is the rise, and may well await us in Europe.   This is the category of ‘Testosterone TV’.    It is reality TV programming that specifically caters to those who like to watch men driving cars and trucks fast and dangerously, dangling from trees, toiling with the waves or underground.   This is mostly but not totally lapped up by large numbers of male viewers.

I think I may have the ‘killer concept’ for the TV executives here.   How about reckless truck drivers in 3D, with medical and accident records available via the web’?  Should I put this forward?

Day 2: Yogi at NAB

Today was a slack day for NAB, with no exhibition yet, and just a few ‘sessions’.    One of the sessions was a whole series of presentations by the team who made a recent (and money-making) 3D feature film, ‘Yogi Bear’.  The film combines ‘live action’ with ‘computer generated’ characters.  They explained how it was done, and what they had learned.

The story is based on a television cartoon series from the 1960s of the same name.  It’s about two bears who live in Yellowstone national park (called ‘Jellystone’ national park in the story) in the USA.

Let me confess.  I loved Yogi Bear as a kid.   I would probably have gone to see this movie when it came around a happy man.   Not anymore.

First, not a single moment of the movie was shot in a sunny Yellowstone national park – it was all done in New Zealand.   The weather was constantly raining during the shooting.  It wasn’t sunny at all – the blue sky was added by computer afterwards, and the actors were protected from the rain by sheets above their heads.

In the final film, we see Yogi Bear added-in by computer in all his glory.   What actually happened on the set was that a tall actor with a strong New Zealand accent and few bits of fur glued to him pretended to be Yogi.   Then, when the actors knew where to go, what to do, and what to do, to the millimetre, the false Yogi stepped away, and the scene was shot clinically without him by the human actors.  Then the computers took over.

Seeing and hearing about these steps really takes away the shine away from watching the film.

What were the two most important lessons the team claimed to have learned about making a 3D film?

The first was that the strong 3D effect of having something poke forward into the audience should be used only occasionally, otherwise it loses its impact.   Most of the time the action should take place ‘behind’ the ‘plane’ of the cinema screen.  Amen to this.

The second lesson was that, after a series of 3D films, it was now recognized by the production team that the best and most effective use of 3D is for ‘slapstick comedy’, where actors fall over or throw things at each other.   Good to know the  advanced technology is proving valuable to society?

Day 1: In line for NAB

Every year tens of thousands of professionals from the media industry gather in Las Vegas in the USA for the National Association of Broadcasters’ (NAB) Convention. Any journey to the USA today includes a consecutive series of very long ‘queues’ of ‘lines’ – and for your blogger it was no different this year. Lines for ‘check-in’s, ‘security checks’ at airports, taxi’s at airports, receptions at hotels, breakfasts at hotels, and so on. Half of life waiting to get somewhere and half there. The lines wind back and for, and double back on themselves.
It’s impossible not to hear the discussions of others doing this penance of waiting in lines. Since many of the people in them were heading to join their 90,000 colleagues at NAB, hot issues at NAB are, unsurprisingly, what they talk about. So, even before the Convention begins, by ‘osmosis’, you pick up the NAB subjects of the year.
One of the most lines-talked-about this year was the move by ‘YouTube’ to start making its own TV ‘programmes’ for YouTube. For many years, YouTube has been about clips of (say) wonder cats playing pianos, or some kid acting like are Darth Vader. They were often ‘amateur video’ – something for professionals to scoff at. The users of YouTube are legion, and in every country of the world, but it was a different world to ours as professional broadcasters. If, now, YouTube uses those ‘piano playing cats’ clips to ‘leverage’ into the professional media business, and into the hearts of viewers, this could be serious. Could YouTube become a powerful professional media force, and disrupt the normal order of things for broadcasters around the world?
Another ‘line-subject’ was the spread of 3-D television services. The story was that in two years time, every TV in the world sold will have the capacity to display 3DTV, and there will be about 100 3DTV channels across the world by then. If true, this would be a much faster rise than happened for HDTV, where the first services in the world actually started in the late 1980s. There were certainly sceptics about 3DTV. There were those who thought that Europe would be in the vanguard for 3DTV led by Pay TV operators. My first thought was that this was nonsense, until I remembered buying my own 3DTV set at home. Maybe the hype will carry 3DTV to success?
The official NAB convention starts shortly, and I am here to tell you what happens. One thing – please don’t tell my boss about the value of eves-dropping in the lines. He might say that next time I don’t have to go to the convention itself, just wait on all the queues and come home.

NAB 2011

NABlog Day 5 : Stranded by the Ash Cloud

There would normally be no Day 5 of NAB, but your blogger is still in the US.    I left  NAB and Las Vegas for Washington with United Airlines smiling and nodding that the connecting flight from Washington to Europe would go.   As we landed at Washington, I switched on the mobile phone (yes, this is allowed in the US).  My wife had sent a text message ‘flight cancelled’.

When the doors opened I knew exactly what I had to do (I have flown British Airways).  You run like the devil for the ticket desk, so you get there before the people Tsunami.  I was fast. There were only six irate people in front of me.  The lady behind the desk made an art form of unhelpfulness.   The only flight with a seat free was six days away.   And no, United would not find me a hotel, or meet any costs.  This was, she said, ‘an act of nature, not United Airlines’.  Good to know.

Could I have my suitcase? I asked.  She scowled “Alright, but it will take about four hours to get it!”.   I asked “Does it have to walk to the belt?”.    She thrust a piece of paper at me with a URL on it.   “You can find a cheap hotel here”  “Do I look as if I have a laptop open and a wifi service provider?   Relations were bad, but did not match the heat of an Irish traveller at the next desk “There is an corridor of air through to Dublin, I tell you!”   Probably some Guinness on his incoming flight?

I did  eventually get my case, and found the ‘cheap hotel’.  Why cheap?  Because it was in the wilderness and near the airport.  “What kind of jet noise would you like?”, said the hotel desk guy. “‘medium to very loud’ or ‘ear-splitting’”?   Actually he didn’t really say that, it was part of the dream I had at night.   The Hotel also has no restaurant, but I don’t really mind five days of cup-a-soup.

By the way, you may like to know that Europe’s complete air standstill gets very little coverage on TV news here, so I have to hope someone will call me when the skies clear.  The story is short and usually after the ones about Sarah Palin or about a psychic cat in Utah.

Please blow very hard, and maybe the ash cloud will go away.

NABlog 2010 4: Have you augmented your reality yet?

Would you like to help?

Or should we shoot a feature on it?

Hands up if you know what ‘augmented reality’ is ?   Something to do with ‘big brother’?   Is there anything farther than that from ‘reality’?   OK, I’ll tell you.  Augmented reality is when the ‘experience’ is made ‘better than real’ by using electronics.  You go to a music concert, and while watching the orchestra, you watch hanging big screens out of the corner of your eye which have tight close-ups of the bassoon and triangle players looking anxious.   You see – better than reality.   Imagine walking down the street and watching the people rudely push past you.  The augmented reality would be where you get more than that – say your i-Phone gives you intimate details of people who pass -  reality has been ‘improved’.       Is this going to be part of the future of the media?   Is it going to be part of the way we live?   Those NAB delegates who were not worried about 3D, mobiles, or losing their jobs as journalists, worried about ‘augmented reality’.    But today its really a ‘concept’ waiting for someone to see how and when it could be done.   There is always next year’s NAB.

Internet itself, and in particular the use of ‘social networks’ continues its steady path to ubiquity.  The results of one survey showed that, for the first time in the history of mankind, the number of hours per week Canadians spend using the Internet (a little over 18hrs)  exceeds the number of hours they spend in front of the television (17hrs).   The large man next to me from New York said that Canadians  also spend 19 hours a week staring into space.  I dismissed this.  Actually the TV figure of 18 hours per week is not so bad, and actually continues to rise.  The Internet hours however is rising quicker than TV hours.   The hours for radio remain about the same.  Maybe, people just stay home more and watch TV and Internet because they are short of cash?

One last event.  In the giant Convention car park the local people asked for volunteers from among the delegates to ‘build a house’ as a gesture of support to the local homeless.  I never saw more than one (the same one) delegate helping to build the house.  But I did see at least 14 announcer/TV crews in front of the house shooting news items about it.   That’s the business we are in.

NAB Day 3: What is a ‘Public Broacasters’ lot?

The EBU is an organisation of ‘public service broadcasters’.  The approximate equivalents in North America are the  ‘Public Radio’ and ‘Public Television’ stations.   These are ‘Public Broadcasters’.    What is the diference between Public Broadcasters and the ‘Commercial Broadcasters’?    Could  the distinctions in the US apply in Europe too?   Your correspondent met several people who have worked  at different times for both Public Broadcasters and Commercial Broadcasters in the US.   They told me that “the major difference is that there is a lot less swearing by the staff in Public Broadcasting”.   Good to have a clear vision?

When people  here are not worrying about why they are not following 3D TV, they worry about what they should be doing in ‘mobile TV’.  The issue is being able to broadcast to ‘handheld receivers’, which might be incorporated in a mobile phone in future  This is a dream we went through in Europe five years ago, until the first trials brought home to us  that a) a good mobile broadcasting network needs  many new transmitters to be built, b) to build a new  transmitter network you need money, and c) the public is not willing to pay for such services, so you have no money to build the new transmitters.   It was quite simple.   Wherever there has been broadcasting to mobiles in the world, there has only been limited success.

In the US, they have come to broadcasting to handhelds by several routes.   The first was via a pay service, called Flo.   Recently, the national TV networks have been getting together to provide a stack of tv services to handhelds. These would be their normal TV channels,  but scaled down in technical quality.    The system is called by the engineers ‘ATSC-M/H’, in order to protrct them from the non technical.  Everone else now calls it mobile digital TV.

Time will tell whether what has not been very succesful in Europe can be succesful in the US.  We might geuss that the laws of economics do not change that much when the cross the Atlantic, but time will tell.