Dolby Laboratories To Be Honoured At IBC2017

IBC has revealed that it will award the International Honour for Excellence to Dolby Laboratories at this year's show. The award is IBC's highest accolade and reflects on over 50 years of innovation in audio by Dolby.

At the time of the first IBC in 1967, one of the big technological challenges was tape noise in professional recordings. Ray Dolby, who was part of the Ampex team which developed the first video recorders, applied his engineering knowledge to the issue and developed the Dolby® A-Type Audio Noise Reduction system. It became a de facto standard, and was instrumental in making multitrack music recording practical, leading to new creativity in the studio.

For the consumer cassette format came Dolby B. In 1971, Dolby began working to improve cinema audio, and that same year, 'A Clockwork Orange' was the first to use Dolby noise reduction on its pre-mixes. In 1977 'Star Wars' was released with a high fidelity 4-channel optical sound track.

In 1992, 'Batman Returns' was the first film to be released in Dolby Digital®, which provided practical 5.1 channel audio that co-existed with the legacy Dolby Surround optical soundtrack. Later in that decade, the Dolby Digital codec enabled television and DVD to bring 5.1 channel audio to the home. In 2012, with the release of 'Brave', Dolby delivered Dolby Atmos®; object-based audio that can precisely place individual sounds anywhere in a three-dimensional space, including overhead.

At IBC, the award will be received by Craig Todd, Senior Vice President and CTO at Dolby Laboratories, as part of the IBC2017 Awards Ceremony on Sunday 17 September. The ceremony takes place in the Dolby Vision™, Dolby Atmos equipped RAI Auditorium, and is free to IBC visitors.

Commenting on the accolade, Michael Crimp, CEO, IBC, said: "The significance of Dolby to the development of the creative electronic arts cannot be underestimated. Indeed, we honoured Ray Dolby himself with the predecessor of the International Honour for Excellence, the John Tucker Award, in 2000. In our 50th anniversary year, this is a great opportunity to reflect on how far we have come since 1967, and how IBC continues to reflect the innovative, cutting edge of our industry. Dolby's great achievements in changing the soundtrack of all our lives, over 50 years, cannot be underestimated, and I am delighted that Dolby is the recipient of the IBC2017 International Honour for Excellence."

(JP/LM)