BVE 2015: A New Breed Of Broadcasters (Pt 1)

One stop event: George Jarrett looks at the key issues and many product expectations as the organisers of the UK's top media show consider co-locating events to fulfill their longer term ambitions.

The BVE show (ExCel, London, February 24-26) has evolved over recent years through its free seminar program into a very enjoyable and informative 'creation to consumption' event. The 16,000 industry people that show up also get a post IBC and pre-NAB trade show at which the small and medium vendors generally demonstrate all their new technologies, and the big vendors cherry pick a few products from what they took first to Amsterdam whilst keeping any major Las Vegas unveiling plans wrapped in secrecy.

Diana Little, brand manager – technology BVE, said: "Our aim with the seminar program is always to be as all-encompassing as possible over the three days to ensure that there's something for everyone involved in the broadcast and production sectors. Our content team spent the last four months researching with the industry and liaising with our newly created (20-strong) advisory panel to come up with some great speakers.

"We were told that visitors wanted more panel sessions and more interaction with speakers so we have put more of this into the program," Little added. "In addition, we have recognised the fact that TV, film, theatre and online are merging more and more so our seminar offering is enhanced by involvement from the likes of Raindance; the Association of British Theatre Technicians; the Institute of Professional Sound; and, EVCOM (Event & Visual Communication Association)."

So the target visitor audience has widened in recognition of the changing 'broadcast' landscapes?

"Theatre capacities are broadly similar to 2014 and we shall be filming several sessions for broadcast later in the year," said Little.

There appear to be a few obvious gaps like HDR and HFR in 4K, editing issues around the impact of $50 deals for the Avid and Adobe suites of tools per month and other threats to the craft skill itself, 'invisible' VFX in movies and commercials, IP broadcasting for real, freelance news gathering, and event cinema. Does the show have enough room space to fulfill its conference ambitions?

"We are working hard to fill the gaps that you have highlighted and are very mindful of both the emergence of a new breed of broadcaster as well as the convergence of the creative industries – the growth in simulcasting of theatre productions as an example – and we have several solutions in the pipeline," said Little.

"Our ambition is to grow BVE into the one-stop event for the creative industries which may mean co-locating several events but we do not currently have plans for spin-offs," she added. "This year we also recognise the growing skills shortages in the broadcast sector and have created an afternoon of sessions for the broadcasters of the future – an ideal opportunity for graduates to explore career possibilities in this hugely important sector."

While the recession has hit travel and has cut European attendees at NAB, BVE has had the chance to grow and improve, and grab that budget strapped audience. "That is precisely our aim. We have been told by our visitors that they travel to overseas shows less and less frequently so BVE is now the best chance for our exhibitors to reach a very important and influential audience of UK broadcast professionals," said Little.

• Trotting round the aisles •

The re-energised IABM will be running a members pavilion/lounge, focusing on the benefits of its membership categories and services and the respective merits of eight of its manufacturing membership base who have taken small pods. The first confirmed were Hi Tech Systems (production, play out and control systems) and Netia (media software).

The IABM will deliver an industry update at a breakfast session on day two, and host a taster session to showcase a range of new training courses offered by its academy. Spreading the good news at the update it will highlight year on year sales growth of 7.7%, and year on year profit growth of 11.2%. Sadly only 68% of vendors are in profit, so we can expect more consolidation this year.

JVC Professional (E16) will launch a new 4KCAM camcorder line at BVE, and this is comprised of three new handheld camcorders and a remote head camera system. The JVC GY-HM170 and GY-HM200 handheld camcorders feature a 1 / 2.3-inch CMOS sensor with a 12x optical/24x dynamic zoom lens, and record 4K Ultra HD and full HD files (H.264 4:2:2) at up to 50Mbps to readily-available memory cards. Other features include built-in ND filters, stereo microphone and 3.5mm audio input, with live 4K UHD output through a built-in HDMI connector. The GY-HM200 adds dual XLR audio inputs via an integrated handle with hot shoe and microphone mount, and is also the most affordable live streaming camcorder JVC offers – streaming instantly to Ustream.

The GY-LS300CHE handheld camcorder and GW-SP100E remote head camera system – comprising camera head, a recording/playback device with foldable/detachable 7-inch HD LCD monitor and a wired camera remote control panel – each use the new JVC 4K Super 35mm CMOS sensor combined with an industry-standard MFT lens mount.

They record to non-proprietary SDHC and SDXC media cards in a variety of image formats, including 4K Ultra HD, full HD with 4:2:2 sampling, SD and web-friendly proxy formats. Variable Scan Mapping technology maintains the native angle of view for a variety of lenses, including Super 35, MFT and Super 16. One highlight will be the 3840x2160 resolution pumped out by the tiny camera on the remote head.

The latest Avid (F60) Media Composer release is all about resolution independence, the bonus coming in the rapid acquisition, management, cutting and delivery of 4K content.

This involves leveraging the new architecture for resolution independence with Avid DNxHR encoding. Users – who wanted a more robust codec – will also want to talk about background rendering and collaborative features. Editors will see a holistic, platform-centric approach that imposes no limits to the resolutions they capture, edit, and output, and at the heart of this is a new extensible media codec (DNxHR) that scales upwards from proxies to 4K. Users also get enhanced colour management (richer colour depth than HD), high frame rate support (to 60p), high-efficiency proxy workflows, and the timesaving background rendering of high-resolution media mentioned above. Better still, this mighty upgrade to older systems will cost around $299.

Gearhouse Broadcast (B12) will have its OBLite live HD production trailer to show alongside its new Hitachi SK-UHD4000 4K cameras.

OBLite is a fully equipped, live production HD trailer that easily houses a seven- to eight-people production and operation crew. Spec upgrades are easy and it gives users low power consumption. Visitors will see the production gallery, audio workstations, and an engineering control area. The production workflow has been designed using Ross Video's innovative openTruck blueprint.

Gearhouse Broadcast bought the first 50 of Hitachi's new SK-UHD4000 camera systems at IBC2014. A broadcast 4K Ultra HDTV unit, it can take the 2/3-inch B4 mount lenses used in conventional HD broadcast cameras. It outputs HD and 4K video signals separately, which means that it can be used in the current HD environment whilst capturing archive or test material in 4K. The SK-UHD4000 can seamlessly slide into new 4K workflows, as shown when used by Sky Sports during its Ryder Cup test shoot.

George's preview is also available to read in BFV online.

(IT/JP)