http://www.avinteractive.com/news/case-study-4k-gets-papal-blessing-05-06-2014/
In a major outside broadcast, the ceremony during which Pope Francis raised Pope John Paul II and Pope John XXIII to sainthood was transmitted live in 3D and in Ultra HD.
Centro Televisivo Vaticano (Vatican Television Centre; CTV) with facilities partner Sony produced the two-hour, 27 April broadcast from St Peter’s Square, Rome in 3D, HD and 4K in what Sony claimed to be a first-of-its-kind parallel production. It was certainly complex.
The HD production was captured by 15 HD cameras ringed around the Square and concentrated on a central outdoor platform. Coverage was carried by 100 broadcasters and viewed by an estimated audience of 200 million worldwide. The simultaneous 3D production was produced by Sky Italia and Telegenic, the regular outside broadcast partner to BSkyB for 3D events. This involved six native stereo pairs of HD cameras plus three additional HDcams converted from 2D into 3D.
While CTV recorded Pope Benedict in 3D in 2011, this event was the Vatican’s first live 3D transmission and was broadcast by Sky Italia, Sky Deutchland and BSkyB. The 3D production was screened live to 1,000 cinemas (mostly in Europe) in conjunction with Italian distributor Nexo Digital, with some North and South American theatres taking a delayed 3D recorded feed.
The event was also projected in 3D on a giant screen at a 500-seat basillica in Sotto il Monte, near Bergamo in the north of Italy – the birth place of Pope John XXIII.
The 4K piece of the production proved another test run for Sony equipment and workflow. Feeds from six F55 cameras and two HD radio cams upconverted to 4K, were encoded and distributed as four 3G HD-SDI signals by Globecast from CTV’s OB16 production truck to a Eutelsat satellite. There it was multiplexed into a single MPEG4 transport stream and beamed back to the Vatican’s Paolo VI suite for viewing on a 4K Bravia set.
The 4K signal was also planned for live projection via Sony’s 4K SRX- R515P projector at Czestochowa, Poland, a place synonymous with Pope John Paul II. While this did not pan out, discussions are on-going with CTV to organise a later event for the remote 4K projection of the ceremony.
Progressive technology
For a body working for the head of the Catholic church, CTV is surprisingly progressive in its use of advanced AV technology. The last General Audience of Pope Benedict XVI on 27 February 2013 was also captured in Ultra HD, as was the first mass of Pope Francis, celebrated on 19 March 2013, though neither was aired live in the format.
For a body working for the head of the Catholic church, CTV is surprisingly progressive in its use of advanced AV technology. The last General Audience of Pope Benedict XVI on 27 February 2013 was also captured in Ultra HD, as was the first mass of Pope Francis, celebrated on 19 March 2013, though neither was aired live in the format.
The company has made considerable investment in Sony technology. This includes the 24-camera OB16 with 3G infrastructure primed for 4K action; a fully tapeless control facility which rests on Sony’s Media Backbone asset management platform, and the digitisation of a 10,000 hour archive from tape on to Sony’s Optical Disc Archive (ODA) storage format.
Established by Pope John Paul II in 1983, CTV films the activities of the Holy Father and Holy See – the central government of the Roman Catholic Church – and produces its own programmes, provides footage for other broadcasters and keeps an extensive archive for future use.
The Vatican’s goal is to develop productions that “enhance the involvement of people” and provide “wider archive fomats,” explained Stefano D’Agostini, CTV technical director. “Ultra HD gives incredible detail and a real emotive quality. It is probably more natural than 3D because there is no artificial tool in front of the eyes. We are looking at 4K as the highest quality to store material in future.”
Key in this regard was the mastering of the event at 4K resolution on to ODA. Footage was recorded at 422 10 bit and encoded in Sony’s production format XAVC. “Sony technology will make watching this historic event closer to reality for hundreds of millions of viewers,” commented David Bush, Sony Europe’s director of marketing.
This is one of a number of tests on live events Sony is organising to explore different aspects of 4K production. Chief among these is the 4K multicamera recording of the World Cup Final from Rio in July, but the manufacturer has widened the type of event away from sports. Last year Sony recorded Peter Gabriel and Muse in concert in Ultra HD, and in March it worked with the National Theatre to screen a production of War Horse live to cinemas in 4K.
“This particular event is important because of the integration of different formats which we believe to be unique,” explained Bush. “The three directors have access to feeds from each production. HD could be upconverted to 4K, and the 4K could be offered as a downconversion to HD. The 4K image could also be ‘cut out’ (zoomed into) and offered to the HD production (the feeling is that a 4K master image offers a better quality HD image). We’re not saying one way is right or wrong, it’s about exploring different scenarios to find out what is practical.”
Four Pontiffs present and past
The ceremony itself was also unique in that it represented the first time two Pontiffs had been canonised at once; also the first time two living Pontiffs had presided over a canonisation (Emeritus Benedict, who quit as Pope last year attended the mass). Up to a million pilgrims and 100 foreign delegations swelled Rome to try and get a glimpse of the event on 27April, with half a million crowded into St Peter’s Square. To help them giant screens were set up in nearby streets and elsewhere in the city in addition to the four permanent giant Panasonic LEDs flanking the Papal platform.
The ceremony itself was also unique in that it represented the first time two Pontiffs had been canonised at once; also the first time two living Pontiffs had presided over a canonisation (Emeritus Benedict, who quit as Pope last year attended the mass). Up to a million pilgrims and 100 foreign delegations swelled Rome to try and get a glimpse of the event on 27April, with half a million crowded into St Peter’s Square. To help them giant screens were set up in nearby streets and elsewhere in the city in addition to the four permanent giant Panasonic LEDs flanking the Papal platform.
Relics of the two former Popes were held up as part of the ceremony. For John Paul II, a vial of his blood, and for John XXIII, a piece of skin taken from his body after it was exhumed for his beatification in 2000.
In a touch worthy of novelist Dan Brown, the funding partners to this event include the Knights of Columbus – founded in New Haven, Connecticut in 1882 to respond to the spiritual needs of immigrants marginalised by 19th century society. According to its press statement, the organisation has helped finance CTV’s three OB trucks as well as the Vatican’s satellite uplink and downlink transmitters in order to spread the Gospel with advanced communication.
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