NAB 2008: The Las Vegas Team Blog
InterMedia Lab staff Jeremy Toussaint and Per Christian Larsen reports from The NAB 2008
The main seminar at the NABShow2008
which is of interest to us, covers the following:
Harness the power of the Internet for increased distribution and new audiences. This exciting new conference will focus on the latest technology to create and deliver Internet-ready content. The program, covering the Flash Video and the new Adobe Media Player as well as the latest in delivery options for mobile devices, will teach effective techniques for video compression and developments in web technology.
Pre-exhibition meeting
On our first day in Vegas, slowly recovering from 19 hours traveling between Oslo and the US, we were invited to half-day meeting with the AVID Company. This was a meeting for targeted customers only were Avid presented the new products to come. Based on a new hardware platform the new Avids has increased their power to a new level. Todays interfaces are based on Firewire, so the CPU and the interface unit communicates through PCIe allowing speeds up 10Gbit/s between the CPU (the machine processor), the GPU (the graphic-adapters processor) and the editor video-interface. Our exiting Adrenalines can only play 1 stream of DVCPRO HD in half resolution. This is a preview mode and do not show the material full quality when editing. In the upgraded version it will play six layers of HD video in full resolution. It also gives the user a better experience since all the small delays when pressing start/stop etc is gone. A new feature is subtitling and realtime timecode overlay. This means that we can export a movie with timecode burnt in the video, create subtitles in i.e excel based on the timecode and the avid will produce the subtitles automatically.
There were also lots of news on the Interplay, especially on the Assist, which is a logger/tagger for the unity environment. Its now possible to define your own groups of metadata and export later on as an XML. Full screen playback is also a new feature that will make this application more versatile.
DAY 1
Session 1: In-Depth: Video Production for the Web
The presentation covered mainly the steps towards publishing video material on the web, via two channels, video in a browser and podcasting. They particularly put the emphasis on the fact that the audience that can be reached via the web is far greater than the one reached by traditional TV networks. They also presented statistics and demonstrated that web video is as popular as podcasting, and that the target audience age ranges from 10 to 55 in equal proportions. Most of the presentation dealt with the pre-production, production and post-production aspects of the filming process, and not really about the web content delivery. The two speakers commented on the importance of knowing the target audience and context in order to plan, prepare, capture and edit the material while avoiding common pitfalls such as rapid-spanning on small size videos for example. They also provided us with tricks when working with multiple cameras in regards to scene preparation, camera and lights positioning and editing. They finally presented some case studies, giving us a good feeling for the difference between standard and HD videos, as well as small and large distribution levels.
The conclusion that we can draw is that all the equipment and setup required to shoot standard and HD video footage is already present in-house at Intermedia. It was very comforting to see that we have recently reached this level of video delivery while following a similar workflow to the one presented. We were one of the few organisations which currently has the technology, knowledge and staff to produce high-quality material for web delivery, either embedded or via podcasting. The latter is definitely a distribution channel we should consider, and particularly in the context of 'kunskapskanalen' and 'locke' projects. The technologies mentioned regarding the delivery were very much focused on Adobe Products, and it seems clear that by using Adobe Flash, we are definitely up-to-date. Adobe Media Manager was also largely mentioned (although not demonstrated), and this should be something to investigate.
Session 2: Encoding video fpr maximum impact (Per Christian only)
This session was an 1.5 hour session about video-encoding and workflow. I hoped to get some tricks and tips about how to increase the quality of compressed video compared to the size of the file. This subject was touched, but the presentator was more focused on workflow and quality control. And guess what, there was a lot to learn about that as well.
One of the key points is to ensure that you have the best possble quality of the video-material which will be encoded. This apply to what format the material is edited in and how it is exported from the editsuites. Knowing who the audience is, is also of great importance. That leads to testing the playback devices or environments the audience uses. So encoding for Ipods requires an Ipod and you should actually test the files in the users typical targeted environment.
Documentation is crucial both in the process of making the encoding profiles and also as a documentation of settings that works, and the one that fails.
Session 2: Social Networking Through Location Based Services - Web 2.5a (Jeremy only)
This session was presented as a kind of roadmap of the evolution of the web, in relation to the evolution of geo-locating techniques. The main concept covered was based on the idea that the only person at one location at a particular time can only be that person. If that person holds metadata about itself, then this information can be accessed via geo-location mechanisms and can provide "Location Based Services". Wikipedia offers the following definition: "Location Based Services (LBS) are information services accessible with mobile devices through the mobile network and utilising the ability to make use of the location of the mobile device."
The combination of web2.0 and mobile devices is the current state, meaning that you can look for information regarding the location you are at and also the location you are going to. All the services provided are accessible to you only upon request. However, the web2.5 paradigm is meant to be the pairing of gps, wifi, bluetooth and embedded computing on mobile devices in order to provide information sorted by preferences and metadata to create custom content delivered to the end user based on location. The greatest impact will be on Social Networking with services such as: subscription based information (sports, shopping, etc), experiences (audio, video, animations), geo-connectivity (life-tracking, geo-tagged picture/video libraries, etc).
As a conclusion to this presentation, it is very interesting to see that Intermedia is already pretty active in this sector. A first experiment providing video based on location was conducted with the ENCODE01 project. ENCODE01uses Bluetooth for geo-positioning in order to deliver cultural video content to the user while prompting for his/her participation. Another project based on web2.5 technologies named NARRAHANDaims also at developing a mobile narrative system using a wiki and GPS platform. We should definitly pursue our research activities in this domain as our current theoretical and technical know-how can already enable us to deliver rich (video, flash, etc) and geo-related content to mobile devices.
Session 3: Mobile Video with Adobe Flash
The presentation started by a convincing demonstration that Flash is really now almost everywhere. Flash Lite (version for Mobile Devices) is currently present on the top 20% of all handsets and Adobe's target is 80% in 2010. Flash is definitely going to be around for a while... A couple of phone applications were then demonstrated live, with direct access to video content streamed directly to phone. Flash offers a complete environement to devlop, test and deploy quickly dynamic, interactive and media rich phone applications, and this on a very large number of supported handsets.
In a second part, the speaker focused more on the backend service and the level of control than can be reached via the server side. While the Flash Client application that resides on the phone remains very small and very light, a lot more logic can take place on the server side with streaming, security, interaction and response.
The projects at Intermedia have gradually been using more and more Flash elements over the past couple of years, and we have been able to measure the benefits of this technology in presenting interactive content on the user end. It would now be pretty interesting for us to evaluate what could be achieved on the server side, which could potentially give another dimension to our projects in the way we deliver our audio/video streamed content. This appears to be also directly related to our efforts in the web2.5 area.
DAY 2
Session 1: In-Depth: Flash Media Server & the Adobe Media Player
Session 2: Bundling Flash with Adobe AIR
The two sessions we attended today were mainly focused on Adobe products. The first presentation started on the Flash Media Server solutions, which can be declined in to different products: Flash Media Server and Flash Interactive Server. These two solutions offer great potential in streaming video content to a variety of platform, from high definition and large size videos for desktop applications, to heavily compressed and small videos for mobile handsets. In addtition to the streaming performances, these server solutions are bundled with a nice set of functionalities, including unlimited bandwidth, unlimited user connections, security, logging and tracking. One of these solution would really help Intermedia to understand and to control how we deliver video-based contents throughout our projects, as well as analysing our target audience (for example if a student has watched a video completely, where did he/she stop, what did he/she look at, etc).
The second topic which was largely discussed concerned the newly released Adobe Media Player. This application essentially is a video aggregator for online video content. Simply explained, this media browser will let you access web TV shows and web video channels directly to your desktop. Beyond the web-TV aspect which is not so much of interest for us at Intermedia, it is clear however that this type of player would help us to solve a lot of technical difficulties that we encounter when delivering video content in our projects. More information regarding this player came in the following session which dealt with Adobe Air. Adobe Air typically brings the web Fash content to the desktop. This means (and that's a little revolution) that the web in longer accessible ONLY via a web browser. AIR is a technology to develop desktop applications (cross-platform) which have the power to access all web services exactly like a web-browser, but also which can access the local computer environment (this is the cool part 
). For example, the file system can be accessed, or pop up windows in the style of the Operating System can be launched. In our projects at Intermedia, and especially in the lab, we currently spend a lot of time debugging and testing web applications so that what we deliver is compatible and visually equivalent across the different users platforms and browsers. This very time consuming part of each project, could be largely reduced by such technology because the way it looks on one system, is the way it will look on the rest of them.
Session3: Branding video on the web.
Some seminars make you sleepy, some feature some interesting topics and some make you want to say "Wow"!!! This one was a "wow" seminar. We followed different types of productions and found out what branding (graphics elements, pop up text, etc.) can do for a simple "talking heads" production, discussions and video-lessons. Very much like in previous sessions, this presentation really helps us to confirm the potential of InterMedia and how its resources are just waiting there to be utilised and compete with high-end media production organisations.
To conclude, Per and I would definitely agree that the Adobe platform has a huge potential for our current and future activities at Intermedia. Adobe Flash player is currently installed on almost every computer and on the top 20% of all handsets. This gives us instant video streaming to all web connected devices in very good quality. The latest change in vision that the web no longer belongs only to the web browser is also a trend we should try to follow because in addition to the technical revolution, this could have a major impact on web services for education.
DAY 3&4
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The exhibition at the NABShow is absolutely huge as over 1600 leading suppliers from around the world showcase their tools and services. The 297000 square meters of exhibition are divided in 3 main halls, respectively, South, Central and North halls. Per and I spent our first exihibtion day at the South Hall in order to query and found about the latest technologies in the broadcasting world.
We started by focusing on transcoding systems. We paid a visit to our current software system supplier to see how easy/difficult it would be for InterMedia to develop new interfaces and new functionalities when converting videos. The customisation of this system can be achieved via an API (Application Programming Interface to communicate withe the core of the program). The good news is that this API is now available to us free of charge. Furthermore, we looked also for other solutions than the Agility system we use today. Despite being a good product, we feel that it is lacking flexibility, above all in the perspective of buiding an automated and web-based conversion system for Intermedia. Their pricing policy is also a little bit too agressive and we get charged for new codecs when they are released.
Rhozet is another vendor with a product called Carbon Coder. It is more affordable and you get all codecs (current and coming) and its XML based with a free API. We got an evaluation license and will start to test this software to find out if it is stable and if it can deliver what we have planned for.
Cameras
I also visited Panasonic, the vendor of our production cameras introduced a few new models on the show. One called HVX 170 very much the same as the HVX 200 we use today, but without a tapedeck. That means that it only stores video on memory-cards and therefor it is likely that this will be less expensive than its bigger brother.
They also lauched new cameras with a new codec, AVCHD. This is an codec based on H.264 and it compress twice as much compare with the cam's we uses today. The picture quality is said to be the same as before, but its not ment for post production , but to shoot good quality on less diskspace. Recording media is standard SD card which is affordable and solid.
On the last day of the exhibition, we carried on our tour of the floor, mainly focusing on video equipment. The range of cameras on display is extremely varied and goes from some really small HD Camcorders (1920x1080), to extremely High-Definition cameras (7500x4218). There was also some stunning demonstrations of Very High Speed cameras (up to 1 000 000 frames per second), knowing that we usually shoot at 25fps!!! We also experimented with a lot of camera accessories, such as stabilisers, back-packs with mechanical arms, lights and lenses. Furthermore, we browsed through lighting accessories, that are made for either on-the-go filming or for mounting in a studio. We were really impressed by the progress made in LED lighting, and how simple it becomes to control an homogeneous light source with intensity and color range variations.
On the topic on mobile video, the most covered area was by far Mobile TV. Most suppliers were demonstrating technologies to deliver TV, IPTV (internet TV), and live feeds (programs, series) on handets. Not much was new at the handset level, and therefore it was mostly question of delivery mechanisms (GPRS, 3G, Wi-Fi, etc). Intermedia currently has no projects dealing with live/continuous video feed, and therefore it is clear that we should focus on current video formats for handsets such as: FLV, 3GP, RM, or MP4.
Concluding remarks
The NABShow is definitely a very good opportunity to keep up with latest technologies in the video world. This is true for video hardware such cameras, lights, transcoders and graphics cards, but also for the software side and compression CODECS. We picked up some really good tips and tricks throughout our discussions with the exihibitors, we got answers either on the current material that we use and from the competition. This leads us to think again thoroughly about our video workflow at Intermedia, and more importantly on our use of video medias throughout all our projects. We are very excited about testing some new components and technologies back home, and also try to lift up our video production as we are on the right track both equipment-wise and knowledge-wise to do so. We found out that by combining video skills and programming skills, we will be able to configure much better some of our video processing tools, and therefore end up with a much more generic/dynamic platform and video workflow at Intermedia. We will be more than happy to share our experiences with the ones interested and hope to spread our enthusiasm to the rest of the team!!
