Is Linear On Demand the Future? 3SS Is Betting on It

Streaming Media

If telcos and ISPs are to survive beyond being a doormat for internet traffic into the home, they have to find a way to aggregate, slice, dice, and serve the myriad content available to consumers. 3 Screen Solutions (3SS) has developed a working solution for linear on demand that it says is the next stage of operator UX evolution.

https://www.streamingmedia.com/Articles/News/Online-Video-News/Is-Linear-On-Demand-the-Future-3SS-Is-Betting-on-It-139114.aspx

The concept was first aired by the German STB and multiscreen UI/UX specialist in 2016. Now, partnered with Media Distillery and XroadMedia, 3SS is offering platform operators an end-to-end solution that plugs into Android TV Operator Tier set-top boxes and enables linear on demand (LOD).

LOD essentially pulls together programming from multiple live and on-demand sources and blends it into a personalised linear playlist. Content sources could be streaming services like Netflix or YouTube and other websites, mainstream TV channels, and broadcaster catch-up.

"We could see that linear on demand was the logical step that needed to happen when the two worlds of big screen TV and OTT on-demand services started to merge," says Kai-Christian Borchers, 3SS Managing Director. "When we talked about it 3 to 4 years ago, the penetration of TV OTT services was low and so LOD didn't get a lot of recognition. Now that Android TV is making such a huge impact in the market, those operators adopting it are finally tackling the challenge of taking down content silos."

The 3SS linear-on-demand experience features characteristics plucked from Netflix. "Netflix pioneered the binge watching behavior by stitching the next episode of a series onto the end of another, and then at the end of a season, automatically playing another piece of content relevant to that viewer's taste," Borchers says. "Imagine a collection of content, curated to the individual, taken from multiple sources and presented as a channel. That's linear on demand. To provide this service you need to have a deep link directly into content from third parties."

Media Distillery uses machine learning methodologies to recognize the visual and audio aspects of a video, including face, speech, object, logo, and text. This granular indexing of what actually makes up a piece of video enables user searches that 3SS says yield highly diverse and accurate results.

This tech is combined with XroadMedia's content discovery and personalization solution, which learns from users' selection patterns and history. Programs and clips from multiple content sources are presented as an integrated linear playlist as part of 3SS's 3READY UX solution, which includes voice control using 3READY Assistant. The combined linear-on-demand solution uses cloud-native technology.

"Truly personalized TV can only be achieved with granular user profiles and accurate content metadata," Borchers says. "With this new joint platform, multiple layers of high-quality metadata are made available in real time to help viewers find their desired content, thereby promoting viewer engagement."

There are hurdles to this approach, which 3SS acknowledges. "Ad-supported broadcasters will fight to keep their viewers within their silo (channel) and will resist anything that takes them away," Borchers says. "Now, you could launch a linear-on-demand service that did not include certain content providers, but we believe that in order for it to work everybody has to see benefit. There has to be a monetisation path for broadcasters."

Midroll ads would be less problematic but pre- or postrolls shown between content raises the question of who would share in that revenue or own the ad slot.

"These are questions we've not answered yet," Borchers says. "Right now, this is a technical concept. Technically it is working and we can demonstrate it. Customers will lend the concept much more weight in the market to drive this forward."

The LOD concept is analogous to Sonos, where the speaker company allows the user to connect several content music sources that they subscribe to—Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Prime, Soundcloud, etc.–and to compile and play playlists of tracks via the Sonos app regardless of their origin.

"In video we have the opposite trend where services compete to offer exclusive and original content," Borchers notes. "This kind of walled garden is making it even more cumbersome for end consumers to navigate. The key to LOD is an entry point and single sign-on where all a user's subscriptions are managed and curated."

Borchers thinks such a model is win-win for operator and consumer.

"From the consumer's point of view they are—or soon will be—feeling crushed by all these OTT services. The operator has the chance to create something for them that keeps them in their value chain or risk becoming a dumb pipe. In today's highly competitive marketplace, service providers need to increase stickiness of their service. As a super aggregator they can offer a frontend capable of elegantly navigating the user through personalized content choices leading to increased viewer enjoyment and loyalty."

3SS says operators are currently focused on getting their Android TV propositions live. "Once they've mastered this, they will tackle the next level, which for most cases is LOD," Borchers says. "I think LOD is more of a legal hurdle and not a technical one. We could see operators go live with this within two years."

Roland Sars, CEO of Amsterdam-based Media Distillery, says "It's time for TV service providers to deconstruct and re-sequence their content, to serve up right-size, on-topic personal experiences."

Recent 3 Screen Solutions deployments include Uruguayan cable and OTT service provider TCC.  The hybrid AVOD/SVOD platform Joyn from ProSiebenSat.1 and Discovery is live with 3SS 3READY Frontend UI Framework. Other 3SS Android-based system deployments includes Swisscom TV 2.0 in 2014, since updated to Swisscom TV OS3, and Canal Digital OnePlace and Con Hem TV Hub, both launched in 2018.

Your next phone will shoot 8K video

RedShark News

The debate about the wisdom and bare necessity of recording 8K rumbles on but the ability to do so is an unstoppable force arriving soon in your next high-end smartphone. Qualcomm wants you to know that its technology is leading the way by previewing an 8K video processed using its latest Snapdragon chip. We assume it looks amazing but lacking an 8K screen we’ll have to take its word for it.

https://www.redsharknews.com/technology/item/6967-your-next-phone-will-shoot-8k-video

8K will be one of the bells and whistles on flagship 5G enabled devices released this year. Android ones like the Galaxy S20 fitted with the Snapdragon 865 are anticipated to be announced next week at Samsung’s Unpacked event in San Francisco.

The 2-minute 8K video posted by Qualcomm on YouTube was shot in November at the Grand Canyon and other Arizona landscapes like Horseshoe Bend, and the Petroglyphs near Antelope Canyon.

We’re told it was shot on a “prototype Snapdragon 865 smartphone with a Sony IMX586” CMOS sensor.

The Snapdragon 865’s Spectra 480 Image Signal Processor can process 2 gigapixels per second, which gives it enough processing power to natively capture 200-megapixel photos (featuring 33-megapixels per frame) and shoot 4K HDR video while shooting 64-megapixel photos at the same time.

This level of processing power also allows unlimited 960fps slow-motion recording – a significant upgrade on current slo-mo functions which have around a ten second run time.

The 10-bit HDR capability means support for both HDR10, HDR10+ and Dolby Vision with Rec.2020 colour or one billion shades of colour (I doubt you could count them let alone see them).

A key question which will only be answered when handsets release is just how storage is being catered for. 8K video will generate a lot of data, so memory will have to be upped accordingly. Instant uploads to the cloud are probably the solution and that’s where 5G comes in.

Gigapixel speed photography is just one element of the Snapdragon 865 chipset which is 'loaded with 5G,' according to Qualcomm. The chip maker promises desktop-level gaming and “staggering” multi-gigabit 5G connectivity.

Once linked to a 5G network, expect download speeds up to 7.5Gbps and a 35% increase in the power efficiency for intense tasks, like gaming. Upload speeds might reach 3Gbps and Qualcomm is combining 5G and 4G spectrum for faster throughput. Wi-Fi 6, the new Wi-Fi standard which will also speed download and upload times, is supported too.

Also on board is Qualcomm’s AI Engine packing twice the performance of its predecessor. The Hexagon Tensor Accelerator pushes 15 trillion operations per second to fuel ‘intuitive mobile experiences in photography, gaming and voice interactions such as real-time AI translation.’

A new ‘Sensing Hub’ in the chip ensures highly accurate voice detection and ‘always-on’ contextual awareness for smarter virtual assistants - all while using extremely low power.

The Snapdragon 865 is expected to be the brains of phones including Google Pixel 5, LG G9, OnePlus8 and Sony Xperia 2.

The Irishman - interview with Roberto Rodrigo

RED Digital Cinema

Killing Time

Time and memory are rendered with precision film emulation and pioneering VFX camera work by Rodrigo Prieto ASC, AMC for Martin Scorsese’s acclaimed saga of crime and punishment

https://www.red.com/the-irishman

Martin Scorsese’s gangster epic The Irishman is, at heart, a meditation on the passage of time and in particular the memory of events as recalled by Frank Sheeran, a mob hitman played by Robert De Niro.

Director of photography Rodrigo Prieto ASC, AMC, (Brokeback Mountain, Silence) faced two challenges in translating this idea to screen. He had to find a way of visually delineating the different decades of the story’s timespan and simultaneously grapple with the visual effects required to transform the appearance of the principal actors.

“We tried hard to tell the story from Sheeran’s perspective and to give the audience a feeling of their own memories and lives,” Prieto explains. “Having read the script and the book it felt to me that representing the passage of time would be more appropriate for the texture of motion picture film negative. Scorsese referenced the patina of home movies but he specifically didn’t want it to look like Super 8 or 16mm so that started the whole process of researching how to achieve a feeling of memory.”

At the same time, Prieto began discussions with the picture’s VFX Supervisor, Pablo Helman of ILM, about the process of digitally de-aging actors including De Niro, Al Pacino and Joe Pesci.

The director’s brief was to find a way of photographing the actor’s performance without any of the conventional invasive motion capture techniques such as facial tracking markers, head-mounted cameras or repeat performances in a controlled environment.

“The actors’ performance had to be captured on the set while they were interacting with each other and under the on-set lighting,” Prieto says.

Helman showed the director and his DP a proof of concept of ILM’s proposed solution in which a scene from Scorese’s Goodfellas was re-enacted by 74-year old De Niro, de-aged to appear in his mid-40s.

“The concept worked extraordinarily well but required synchronising the shutters of the main camera with two witness cameras,” Prieto explained. “Synching the shutter is really difficult to achieve with film negative in addition to which the witness cams needed to move in unison with the main camera. They needed to function as essentially the same camera head. Both of these impediments precluded shooting on film.”

The straightforward route would have been to shoot entirely on digital and add grain to achieve the desired look but Prieto felt strongly that only negative would deliver the echoes of memory the story demanded.

“The whole last section of the story didn’t need any de-aging – the opposite in fact,” he says. “We were to use make-up and prosthetics to make the actors appear older. I knew I wanted to retain the characteristics of film and add extra grain to that section and I didn’t think that could be achieved in post.”

Concluding that they would shoot digital for the VFX scenes and 35mm for the other half of the film, it became extremely important to ensure a seamless transition between the two.

“It couldn’t fall short,” he stresses. “There had to be continuity of texture.”

Prieto’s research had led him to emulate classic still photography from the 1950s and 1960s, an idea which Scorsese liked and which Prieto further explored with color scientists Philippe Panzini at Codex and Matt Tomlinson at Harbor Picture Co. They also tracked down the Kodak chemists who had made the original emulsions for Kodachrome and Ektachrome.

“We went in deep to figure out how different colors were achieved and how they reacted and shifted once the image was projected or printed. Based on that we created a series of LUTs which Matt applied to the film negative. This was the first step to defining the look for the movie.”

The next step was finding a digital camera to match the LUTs. Prieto tested a couple of different systems by photographing the same set up on his film choices (Kodak 500T 5219 for night time and 250D 5207 for daytime sequences) and on digital.

“I asked the art department to provide panels painted with the production’s colours, some with wallpaper and others with cloth. I also shot stand-ins and then the actors in costume all in exactly the same way, from the same angles, and same lighting and applied the LUT. It was the RED Helium that best tracked the LUT and gave me the same color reproduction for film and digital capture that I needed.”

With LUTs emulating Kodachrome and Ektachrome for the 1950s and 1960s, Prieto deployed a bleach bypass process called ENR for the early 1970s. The result, doubled down for the later period of the story, offered less color saturation and more contrast.

“I wanted to create a look later in the movie which was the opposite of the colour saturated Kodachrome. In essence, as the narrative arc of the movie changes, we drain the color and this is emphasized even more once Jimmy Hoffa, Sheeran’s friend, is killed.”

All the LUTs were applied for dailies as well as the final DI for film negative shots and the RED Helium.

Meanwhile the VFX rig was being finessed in a series of trial and error. Witness cameras were mounted either side of the RED Helium director’s camera (fitted with Cooke Panchro and Zeiss high speed lenses) to provide stereo views of the actor’s face. Each witness cam was modified by having its Infrared (IR) filter removed so that the sensor only recorded IR light. A ring of LEDs around the lens also threw infrared light onto the actors’ faces to neutralize unintended shadows (while remaining invisible to the production camera and the actors).

Prieto explains, “The process provided a full set of data of every frame of each performance and all of the on-set lighting and camera positions that would be needed in post.”

After every take they photographed a mirrored sphere, a grey sphere and colour chart and then a Lidar scanner positioned where the actor’s face would have been. They captured the environment in 360-degrees with bracketed-exposure for High Dynamic Range and fed the data plus the IR information into ILM’s VFX pipeline.

“ILM were able to replicate the on-set illumination in their computers with incredible accuracy,” Prieto recalls. “In the DI we could toggle between the digital image and the final image and the lighting was exact. That was remarkable.”

The rig itself had to be sufficiently lightweight be able to be carried on any kind of rig, crane or head that Prieto or Scorsese wanted. There could be no restrictions. This included the ability to remove one of the witness cameras and fit it to the top of the RED if the shot dictated, for example, shooting up against a column. Even then, the three-camera rig proved too heavy for Steadicam so this necessitated a two-camera version with the second witness cam positioned independently to complete the triangulation of the actor in 3D space. They also ensured that the width of the rig could pass through standard size doorframes.

“Since Scorsese likes to shoot dialogue scenes with two and sometimes three cameras simultaneously this gave us the challenge of positioning six or sometimes nine camera bodies so that they wouldn’t be in shot.”

For all the film emulation techniques and VFX breakthroughs, The Irishman is a masterwork of controlled storytelling.

“Everything was designed to facilitate the artistic content and to shoot the movie with the freedom to allow for any artistic intention from Scorsese’s side or my side,” Prieto says. “The camera language was planned to put the audience into Frank Sheeran’s perspective.

“He’s a methodological man. For him, killing is a job. It’s about efficiency, so the camera behaves that way. We avoid any special camera moves, instead composing simple frontal frames and plain pans following, for instance, a car in perfect profile. Sometimes the camera is static. As Scorsese said, Sheeran’s character moves like clockwork. We even retrace the same angle and type of shot at different parts of the movie.

For Prieto, who is BAFTA, ASC and Academy Award nominated for his work on The Irishman, the achievement was immensely satisfying.

“I had to call on everything I’ve learned and all my experience. It was a like facing a final exam every day.”

The Mandalorian totally redefines CGI for television

RedShark

The Mandalorian’s digital backlot upgrades how we think about rear projection and matte paintings.

Star Wars ‘side-wel’ The Mandalorian lands in our universe next month with state-of-the-art visual effects that build on one of the oldest tricks in cinema’s book. Rear projection was introduced by Hollywood in the 1930s, typically as moving backdrop to characters ‘driving’ a car or, more heroically, by Alfred Hitchcock to film Cary Grant chased by a crop duster in North by Northwest. The concept was adapted to front projection (by Kubrick for 2001: A Space Odyssey) and then to green screen with computer graphic backgrounds to the live action filled in in post.

https://www.redsharknews.com/production/item/6963-the-mandalorian-is-totally-redefines-cgi-for-television

There’s always been criticism of green screen by directors and actors unable to visualise what they are playing against and by cinematographers not able to light the scene properly. In addition to which it’s an inherently post process, adding time to the production and removing many creative decisions from the set.

Director Jon Favreau, who masterminded VFX breakthroughs in Disney films The Jungle Book and The Lion King, was having none of that when he was asked to guide The Mandalorian into being.

Taking virtual production techniques arrived at when shooting those features as well as new technology from Disney’s VFX house ILM, The Mandalorian has redefined CG for TV.

It’s done so on a whopping budget compared to most series, rumoured to be north of U$100m for eight episodes, but this is Star Wars we’re talking about. It’s not only a heavily VFX-driven story but it’s carrying the Empire’s nit-picking fanbase into new territory, not to mention being the flagship for the Disney+ VOD service. So, it had to work.

Instead of investing in massive sets and occupying large soundstages (which Star Wars films have historically done at Pinewood), the show uses a series of rear-projected LED screens that essentially act as a real-time green screen.

Called ‘the Volume’ during production and subsequently dubbed ‘Stagecraft’ by ILM, the technology’s real innovation is that when the camera is moved inside the space, the parallax of the CG environment changes with it. If the camera pans along with a character the perspective of the environment moves along with it, recreating what it would be like if a camera were moving in that physical space.

This wouldn’t have been possible a few years ago but compute power is now fast enough to render realistic 3D environments in real time. The rendering itself is powered by Unreal Engine, the games engine used to create the digital sets of The Lion King.

As with The Lion King, The Mandalorian’s directors (including Bryce Dallas Howard and Taika Waititi) and cinematographer (Grieg Fraser) used virtual reality headsets to pre-vizualise scenes. The blocked and lit approximate scenes were assembled in editorial into a more refined cut with the right pacing and that served as the template for ILM to pre-populate the rear projection screens with photo-real landscapes prior to shooting.

For the actors this approach was beneficial since they could relate more to the story surroundings, for instance knowing where the horizon is, even if the screen was only in their peripheral vision. It meant too that light from the LEDs served as fill light on the actors and props, making the illusion much more complete and eliminating the need to remove green screen light in post. The result is that much of the episode can be shot ‘in camera’ and is therefore a boost to the faster turnarounds of a TV schedule.

“We got a tremendous percentage of shots that actually worked in-camera, just with the real-time renders in engine,” Favreau explained at Siggraph 2019. “For certain types of shots, depending on the focal length and shooting with anamorphic lensing, there’s a lot of times where it wasn’t just for interactive – we could see in camera, the lighting, the interactive light, the layout, the background, the horizon. We didn’t have to mash things together later. Even if we had to up-res or replace them, we had the basis point and all the interactive light.”

It’s also like a digitally upgraded version of the matte paintings used in Hollywood’s golden age to create an epic scale to studio-bound productions. Half a physical prop for a starship might be built on set with the remainder an LED illusion.

ILM’s design is also an advance on the system pioneered by international postproduction group Stargat Studios. The US company built a multi-facility business with offices in Colombia, Vancouver and Malta (and at one point in London and Germany) offer a ‘virtual backlot’, designed as a low-cost alternative to shooting on location. It featured on series such as The Walking Dead, Grey’s Anatomy and NCIS.

The Mandalorian is set five years after the events of Return of the Jedi but 25 years before the events of The Force Awakens and like Rogue One can be considered a side story (sidewel) rather than pure prequel. Series two lands at the end of 2020.

AV evolves the hospitality space

AV Magazine

The customer experience is undergoing profound change, and brands are confronted with the digitalisation of the customer journey and the importance of meeting the needs of hyper-informed consumers who want everything on the spot.

https://www.avinteractive.com/features/market-features/av-evolves-hospitality-space-31-01-2020/

On cruise ships, in hotels or restaurants, the use of visual content with supporting audio is seen as an essential means to engage visitors by placing them within a unique and memorable environment.

“A connected hotel space today means much more than placing a few screens on the walls,” asserts Marta Fernández, CMO at Netipbox Technologies. “The transformation in both technology and the expectations of the consumer, who seeks maximum interaction with every product and services consumed, demands completely customised solutions. Hotels should not focus on selling accommodation but on personalised experiences.”

Mood Media suggests consumers are increasingly drawn to venues that they find captivating and exciting. 4K videowalls are one way of instilling loyalty.

“Installations allow restaurants and hotels to curate a unique visual brand story,” explains Linda Ralph, vice-president of international business development. “Humans process visual cues faster than text or even spoken words. This places the consumer at the heart of the sensory experience.”

A great example can be seen in world-renowned chef, Paul Pairet’s Shanghai restaurant, Ultraviolet which allows guests to sit in a dining room surrounded by large screens displaying artistic visuals to accompany each dish. “The videos help offer a unique dining experience facilitating a new level of immersion,” Ralph claims.

Hotels
The arrival of players like Airbnb has quickly put the hotel industry under pressure to deliver exceptional customer experiences. For a long time, guests were able to find services that they did not have in their home such as international channels. Now, international travellers have everything at home and are looking for something more.

“BYOD is especially important,” says Christophe Malsot, director of hospitality, leisure and retail EMEA for Crestron sales agency, Technological Innovations Group (TIG). “Hoteliers have to provide guests with the capacity to use their devices and all contents on a TV set in the room, presentations on the meeting room, playlists for music – it is now a must have.”

“Matching the capability of the hotel infrastructure to the desired guest experience is a real challenge,” says Colin Farquhar, CEO at IPTV specialist, Exterity. “We often see hotels looking to provide a next gen experience but with a previous generation network, often still delivering TV on coax. Understanding the connectivity and infrastructure piece is fundamental before you can go any further.”

He adds: “Guests want to be casting Netflix to their room TV and they don’t want a lot of break-up in that experience. Casting has become an essential part of what hotels are expected to provide but this depends on what capacity is coming into the hotel at peak times and how well it delivers potentially hundreds of different user video experiences at the same time.”

The concept of the ‘smart hotel room’ has risen up the agenda because of its positive enhancement of the customer experience. A smart room, Malsot explains, is one in which everything from lighting scene settings to Do Not Disturb notifications can be managed through touch panels, keypads, personal smartphone or voice commands.

“Hotel staff should be able to use and maintain it without effort,” he says. “When you enter a guestroom, the learning curve for a client should be close to zero. They should understand immediately how the room is working. So, this means the hotelier has to be helped to build its tender and has to provide AV with a unified control system to provide a perfect and easy to use solution.”

The Lutetia Hotel in Paris has been refitted for whole building control with Crestron systems. Guests are provided with touch panels on the walls, without any keypads. Room control is done only via icons.

“Anyone is able to use the controls, whether millennials or older generations, without any training or instructions,” Malsot says. “It offers a fun and useful novelty factor with technology hidden away behind the scenes.”

“Hoteliers have to avoid deploying AV without careful technical design and without a functional analysis of what’s required and how it should integrate,” he insists. “An update or new installation can be done in several stages, but this has to be properly prepared. The target for AV equipment is to be perfectly integrated and not just interfaced.”

It’s the whole experience
It’s not just the room but the whole hotel/resort experience which benefits from harmonised AV customisation. Interactive information points, digital shop windows, self-service kiosks, menuboards, structured or anamorphic videowalls, or even via smartphones… “the possibilities of digital signage and AV for hospitality facilities are unlimited,” says Fernández. “All devices are capable of serving as a communication or interactive media between the property and the client.

“Strategically placed in lobbies, elevators, rooms, entrances and exits, corridors, conference rooms, restaurants and cafeterias or event spaces, the facility is able to use AV to send completely personalised messages to guests, communicate events, conduct cross-selling or manage the occupation, through a realtime update.”

If there is one thing that guests ask for, it’s an easier, quicker and simpler process when they arrive at the hotel, go shopping, or want to eat or leave. Technology allows customer focused businesses to streamline back-office functions (some hotels even automate room cleaning), as well as allowing customers to take control of their experiences through the use of technology.

On-demand hotels with easy reservations, robotic concierges, a telephone that serves as a key, connected speakers dedicated to hotel services or an electronic bracelet that replaces wallets and gives access to activities are all examples of this trend.

“Virtual reality opens up new levels for hotels and restaurants to engage with consumers, particularly in the booking phase,” says Ralph. “The Conrad Hotel in the Maldives, for example, allows guests to personalise their visit in a VR app by picking a room with a view above or below the Indian Ocean.”

The common areas should also provide proper audio adapted to work well in that environment, whether it’s a bar, restaurant, lobby, spa or garden. AV can also offer a good mix between advertising and information like an interactive map to discover a city, for example. In the guestroom, AV can also provide faster guest services and increase revenue. Crestron, for example, can deliver a user interface through touch panels to let the customer order room service, book a table in the restaurant, or access other amenities.

“In the near future if you join a meeting in the hotel, you can preset temperature for your meeting room prior to arrival, pre-select in-room services, select and control the AV you will use during the meeting, and have a private network for your device,” says Malsot. “5G will then also make online content streaming and live interactions more streamlined during large interactive speaker sessions.”

While the emphasis of AV in hospitality projects is often focused on entertainment and information, the tech has another very important use: security.

“When digital screens are placed in a large and complex property, if they are interconnected, they can be used as an emergency alert system,” Fernández says. “This type of connectivity is especially important in properties and resorts that have multiple buildings, swimming pools and service buildings. Digital displays, managed from a central system, can reveal vital details about where guests should go in the event of emergency, what they should do, and so on.”

Restaurants fightback
Because of the massive impact of home deliveries, restaurants must reinvent the customer experience even more to give consumers a good reason to go out for dinner. Beyond the particularly powerful Instagram effect, which now has a table reservation functionality through Quandoo, restaurants have a menu of technological tools to tempt and sate the diner’s appetite for a memorable experience.

Building the experience
Nothing if not memorable, RoboCafé which opened in Dubai last August is entirely run by three robots. Chatbot voice recognition or voice control is becoming a staple of American drive-throughs. Video screens are routinely used to significantly increase convenience for consumers. Menus have been projected on to tables or viewable in augment reality phone apps. The OTG chain offers iPad menus and mobile app ordering for a speedy service throughout airports in the US.

The rise of digital menu boards is not confined to QSR. The Pan-Asian restaurant Mama Fu uses 42-inch screens to display its beautifully illustrated menu to customers. The screens can be altered in realtime, allowing the restaurant to instantly show new offers. By night the screens double as art installations as they display HD photography of different Asian landscapes.

“If audio and visual tools are used in the right way, it can transport customer experiences in the hospitality industry to be far more than simply serving food or giving travellers a bed to sleep in,” suggests Ralph. “It can help brands come to life and build unforgettable experiences that ultimately result in a much stronger sense of brand loyalty.”

Tokyo restaurant Tree by Naked Yoyogi Park enhances the experience by a projection of images that introduce guests to stories connected with each plate. While diners enjoy their meal, they wear adapted headphones as a narrator brings the dishes to life in a more dynamic and personal way. The creative projections have been curated in partnership with Japanese artist Ryotaro Muramatsu.

UK proAV -Adopting new approaches

AV Magazine

The UK industry may be pretty tightly-knit – everyone knows everyone – but it’s definitely cosmopolitan in its outlook. That won’t change, deal-or-no-deal trade deal this time next year, but the ramifications of the 2016 EU Referendum underscore are still not settled.

https://www.avinteractive.com/features/territory-features/adopting-new-approaches-31-01-2020/

Leaving Brexit aside for a moment, let’s place UK AV on the world map. Exterity CEO Colin Farquhar says the country is world renowned for its innovative use of AV tech. “Many international companies use the UK as a base to refine their requirements for global rollout,” he says. “Oddly, while the scale of projects we were involved in a year ago dropped slightly, this year we’ve seen the number and scale of tenders growing driven by refits in corporate builds and new facilities.”

Innovation on a global scale
Steve Selwyn, CEO, Mirage Associates (Dataton’s partner in the UK) agrees. “In my experience, some of the major mature markets tend to be quite segmented geographically. The UK AV industry, though, is creative and very international in its scope. It has been the ‘go to’ when it comes to major projects, regardless of the country of origin. Maybe it’s because there is a solid depth of knowledge accrued over many years and a willingness to share that knowledge.”

This leading position is confirmed by Ian Sadler, sales manager at Cabletime: “The globalisation of businesses has meant that customers take a more cookie cutter approach, so that all offices in all locations are using the same systems. We find that the UK leads the way in design and implementation and this gets spread out among international offices.”

Mike McHale, Kramer’s local manager deems the market noteworthy for the complexity of its AV installations and commends the domestic corporate culture for its willingness to embrace new technologies.

“Changes in funding methods for UK universities have driven a very high level of investment in AV compared to the rest of Europe,” he says. “The City of London, being the largest financial centre in Europe and a big consumer of AV for meeting rooms and VC, is also a significant differentiator.”
Liam Hayter, workflow and solutions architect, NewTek EMEA dubs the UK “less risk-adverse” than others and “more willing to adopt new approaches and methodologies. In short, it’s a far more agile market.”

With a bird’s eye view of trends across the globe, B-Tech AV Mounts is left feeling that the UK and Ireland are playing catch-up with Asia and the US at least when it comes to digital signage.

“For example, despite healthy sales in the UK, uptake of LED has been outperformed by our operations in Europe and APAC,” says Mark Walker, director of operations. “So, from a UK and Ireland perspective, there is still lots of room for growth, which is great for the market.”

The upgrade of interactive whiteboards (IWBs) to interactive flat panel displays (IFPDs) is currently the primary driver behind demand in the UK education market. According to Promethean’s Alistair Hayward: “Adoption of IWBs and IFPDs in the UK is at least three years ahead of any other country – this is supported by the excellent knowledge and capability of the AV channel.”

However, in the K12 class, “budget challenges and political uncertainty” has led to schools protecting staff salaries as a precaution, while AV and ICT have taken a back seat.

“In the wake of the General Election, we anticipate increased confidence in the market which should see an uplift in spending,” Hayward hopes. “Schools are acutely aware of the benefits of IFPDs in teaching and learning environments and are keen to see investment in edtech.”

Brexit has to be mentioned
Brexit has been top of the agenda for so long that it feels like any significant impact and concerns have already been largely weathered. The dramatic currency shifts back in 2016 are unlikely to be repeated.

“Companies do business with companies, so we are not seeing any political fallout from the UK’s decision to leave the EU,” is McHale’s take. “We are seeing requests to be billed in EUR which is something that we are able to do.”

Exterity, B-Tech, Barco and Mirage all report steady if unspectacular business “despite the continued uncertainty and indeed fears surrounding Brexit for many,” Walker says. “Once it finally gets done, any remaining uncertainty which might be delaying projects will likely get things moving.”

Mark Leahy, key account manager, Barco characterises the situation as “delicately buoyant,” … “Like it or loathe it, Brexit now looks set to happen and the pound should strengthen further, bringing the right sort of focus to the UK along with additional investment.”

“Rental companies are very busy and the projects seem just as big and technically challenging as ever,” reports Selwyn.

“It’s been very difficult to calculate the impact of Brexit,” says Hayter. “People have certainly been more cautious with spend this year. However, this has necessitated more content to be produced, for corporate townhalls, earnings calls and other general on-going communications.”.

The jobs that are already in the pipeline are moving forward, “but no one is following through on plans to move into new offices, or investing in new buildings until they know what will happen,” reports Sadler. “There is no lack of interest, but who wants to be accused of making the wrong decision at this stage? Certainty it will allow people to move in a particular direction.”

Government-backed investment “is most likely to see an increase in digital signage and information display, projects in hospitals, waiting rooms, bus stations and travel termini,” he says. “Traditionally, of course, AV and IT installations for public services were specified and installed separately, but now we will see the technologies working in tandem on an IP network.”

The promised construction of new hospitals over the next few years will deliver control room and signage installs in medical and training facilities. Decisions on efficiency savings can also bring opportunities.

“The ongoing Northern Ireland Courts project and HMRC projects demonstrate a desire to achieve better value for tax payers,” says McHale. “Government departments are embracing home working and more flexible attitudes to employment which in turn is driving investments in meeting rooms and VC facilities.”

He also notes customers taking more of an interest in efforts to improve the sustainability of packaging. “They are asking questions about our use of plastics, the recyclability of our packaging and how much of our packaging uses recycled materials.”

Compliance is increasingly important, particularly to banks, financial services companies and law firms. Sadler says. “They need very strict control over who sees what content, and to ensure the complete chain is secure. You can’t just turn up as a user, insert a USB stick and expect to watch your wedding video. Data moving around the corporate network must go through an approved admin process.”

In summary then, Joe Crawley, regional sales manager, disguise, says the UK “is full of some of the most experienced operators and invested parties, which gives the region a real advantage in terms of quality and industry knowledge.”

A showcase for the UK’s superiority may arise from the mud of the Thames estuary by 2024 if the £3.5bn planned London Resort is built. Before then, several AV firms are focused on delivering for the EXPO 2020 in Dubai.

“In addition to the legacy structures which will remain following the end of the EXPO, each country participating will submit their own national pavilions, the vast majority of which will utilise extensive AV elements,” says Crawley. “It’s something we’re super excited about for this year!”

Republic of Ireland
The UK’s relationship with the republic of Ireland has been thrown into sharp focus because of Brexit.

“There is a concern among Irish customers that VAT would be chargeable immediately on import from the UK, that tariffs could be introduced, and prices will rise,” says McHale, who says Kramer has prepared contingency plans for customers who are anxious about this, meaning goods destined for Ireland can stay within the single market.

“Irish buyers are very pro-European and are worried about (Brexit) because, as a big trading partner, they don’t know what the rules will be,” says Sadler. “A few years back a lot of big companies were investing (in Ireland) because of tax relief, but during the recession these companies pulled the plug. Now we can see green shoots of recovery, and cranes on the Dublin skyline again, thanks to EU grants.”

He adds: “AV business in Ireland is all about big conglomerates which need multiple AV systems for their new buildings. I can’t see Brexit impacting on the overall demand for AV because the market is expanding, and is unlikely to change.”

Lower corporation taxes, in comparison to other EU countries, have made Ireland a haven for technology giants. You only have to take a stroll down ‘Silicon Docks’ to see the giant logos from Facebook, Twitter, Google, LinkedIn et al. It’s a vibrant market.

“The workforce is highly technology literate, and this is filtering into the education sector and school strategies,” says Hayward. “Schools are advocating implementation of the latest IFPDs to address the skills demand for a workforce in the technology sector and are capitalising on opportunities available for students with strong digital literacy.”

Retail AV
There has been a lot of reinvestment in the high street, too, particular in QSR and retail and betting shops. “Retail and betting shops alone represent more than 41,000 locations, so the opportunities for all levels of the AV industry are huge,” Walker says.

As in the UK as a whole, food and beverage chains are trying to outdo each other when it comes to the use of AV.

“We’ve seen many examples of existing premises with perfectly adequate signage being completely refurbed to house the latest tech,” Walker adds. “Business in Ireland feels a lot more personal than the UK. A far more hands-on approach with customers seems to bring the best results.”

Broadcasting the Six Nations: Behind the scenes of the TV production

IBC

From machine learning-driven analytics to 4K drone, the broadcast of the 2020 Six Nations rugby tournament will feature some innovative kit as well as some tried and trusted technology.

https://www.ibc.org/create-and-produce/broadcasting-the-six-nations-behind-the-scenes-of-the-tv-production/5410.article

2020 marks the fifth of a six-year deal between ITV and the BBC that sees the rights for all Six Nations matches shared between both broadcasters on television and online.

The BBC kick offs proceedings this Saturday with Wales against Italy at the Principality Stadium while ITV’s first game, kicking off shortly afterwards, is Ireland versus Scotland from Dublin’s Aviva Stadium.

A number of production toys have been introduced to Six Nations coverage in recent years including corner flag cameras, ref cams and assistant ref cams, specialist lineout cameras and aerial wire-cams and this year’s event will use all of those again and more.

As host broadcaster in Cardiff and Edinburgh, the BBC are deploying 32 match cameras. This includes remote-controlled drone Batcam, Spidercam, two Hi-Motion for super slow replay, a Steadicam, three RFs, another roving RF, corner post mini cams, ref and assistant ref cams, and for the first time on the Six Nations, dressing room cameras and coach box cameras.

BBC Six Nations producer Matthew Griffiths explains: “The coach box cameras and the dressing room cameras aren’t new technology to rugby but this is the first year we will have them on Six Nations after agreement from all of the Unions.”

“This year we are using Batcam 2.0, which is a 4K ready drone (made and supplied by London-based Batcam TV) with 5-axis stabilisation with which we can get steady shots and bigger close-ups even at 240mm.”

ITV’s line-up is a little different for its host of games from Twickenham (including England v Wales on 7 March) and Dublin. It will deploy thirty cameras at Twickenham, all available for replay via EVS, and include two HiMo camera, five Slomo, four handheld RF, an RF for lineouts, four corner flag cams, two railcams (behind the try lines) and a Spidercam. It also has a Sony F5 roaming ENG camera able to shoot Slomo sequences and send to the EVS wirelessly.

The main facilities partner for both broadcasters is Telegenic, now part of the Euro Media Group, and a regular part of weekly Premiership Rugby production.

It will supply OBs for ITV’s presentation and host at Twickenham feeding direct to Red Bee Media for ITV Live Presentation. Arena is supplying mobile facilities for ITV’s presentation from Dublin and Rome. NEP Connect is used for all contribution and comms with highlights editing and playout from BT Timeline in Stratford

The BBC has a similar arrangement where world feed coverage of each match is performed on-site as are the BBC’s live domestic programmes. The BBC’s live match coverage is distributed around the world by fibre and satellite by Pitch International.

No remote or UHD production“There aren’t currently any plans to move to a remote production model because of the number of cameras and the complexity of the production of a World Feed and a separate domestic programme feed,” says Griffiths.

The TMO will watch the match as usual on TV screens away from the immediate vicinity of the game, with access to Hawk-Eye camera angles.

The Rugby World Cup in Japan last year had all 48 of its matches produced in UHD alongside HD but Six Nations production is still an HD-only affair. While the BBC is ready to push the button and stream 4K over iPlayer, the shared nature of the host broadcasts means that broadcasters in Ireland, Italy, France plus ITV would need to switch.

“There are on-going discussions about this,” Griffiths says.

Some matches at the World Cup also featured the Canon Free Viewpoint volumetric capture system. This kit synthesised image data from 125 Canon 4K Cinema EOS cameras located around the Yokohama Stadium in near real time and allows for a virtual camera operator to fly a camera through the action on the field and create 1080p replays from any angle.

While Premier League soccer clubs like Liverpool FC have been outfitted with a similar system from Intel, no UK rugby venue – not even Twickenham – has this facility.

Record viewing figures“The rivalries and history of the Six Nations can make every match feel like a World Cup final, and with similar camera specs to the World Cup, we aim to make every game as spectacular and enjoyable,” Griffiths says.

“For me personally, rugby coverage is all about geography. It is so important to make sure the viewer knows where the play is on the field and in which direction the play is going in. It’s also really important to be able to see what might be going on off the ball or to see dummy runners. Spidercam offers fantastic shots and can help the viewer feel right up close to the action, but it’s important to keep that in context.”

Wales’ victory over England in Cardiff last year attracted a peak audience of 8.9m on the BBC, more than an FA Cup tie between Manchester United and Chelsea in the same week.

Covering the Celtic nations is particularly important to the BBC as it helps fulfil their PSB remit, fundamental to its licence-fee remit.

“For us, Six Nations matches are more than just rugby matches,” says Griffiths. “Each match is a big event in its own right. Our viewers will range from die-hard fans who go to games every week to people who have never watched a game before and don’t know any of the laws. We have to make sure our coverage caters for them all.”

Non-linear content is playing a bigger and bigger role with online hits, social media and iPlayer numbers rising all the time.

The BBC will provide live TV coverage of Scotland’s, Wales’ and France’s home games on BBC1 and BBC iPlayer. Highlights of every match, as well as in-play video clips of BBC matches, will be available via BBC Sport website and app.

The BBC Live pages also cover every minute of every matchday with live text commentaries, in-play video clips, stats and social media content, as well as selected streams and text commentaries on the Women’s Six Nations Championship which takes place in parallel to the men’s tournament.

AI-driven predictive analyticsAs the official technology provider of the Championship for the second year running, Amazon Web Services (AWS) is providing machine learning-driven analytics for the live broadcast. Amazon Machine Learning Solutions Lab is working with data and analytics organisation Stats Perform on the event.

Stats available for the broadcasters to use include information on balls won, impactful tackles, and crucial line breaks, visits to the 22-metre area and data on rucking efficiency – which is often one of the most mysterious parts of the game.

Other stats will predict the probability of a successful conversion or penalty kick. This calculation happens in real time while the kicker sets up to take a kick, and takes into account the location of the kick on the field, the period of the game and score, and if the kicking team is playing home or away. It also analyses historical data, for example, the average success rate of the kicking player in the given field zone, during the Championship, and during the player’s entire career.

A heat map of the pitch will highlight data on ruck location and visually establish where a team is stealing the ball or where a team is more or less effective on the field. Previous stats only looked at the number and duration of rucks so this will bring deeper insight into how the ruck used.

Another stat will highlight dominant tackles – those tackles that put pressure on the attacking team as they lose field position and forward momentum. By mapping out locations and percentage of these actions, it’s possible to analyse a teams’ momentum at the gain line.

“We are continuing to assess the available data before we introduce it,” assesses Roger Pearce, technical director, Sport, ITV Sport Productions. “We are careful to keep stats to a level that enhances the storytelling.”

Free to air to continue?

The present broadcast deal, which began in 2016 and expires in 2021, involves the BBC having the rights to show live all home games for Wales, France and Scotland, while ITV shows England, Ireland and Italy home matches. That could change as a result of the proposal by the Six Nations to sell a 15% worth £300 million in its commercial arm to CCV Capital Partners.

The private equity firm has already bought a stake in the English Gallagher Premiership and has a similar deal with the Guinness Pro14. There is a risk that the Six Nations will move to pay-TV when the tender process begins next month [February].

CVC Partners previously ran Formula One, making a major return on their investment, but criticised for its drift toward pay-TV.

A recent report in the Daily Mail suggest that the BBC and ITV are ‘confident of retaining the rights.’

Sky Sports is expected to focus on retaining live rights to England’s autumn series, leaving the Six Nations to terrestrial channels.