Cover Story
Cover Story
AR applications which all can play out into our tried and tested workflows. Additionally, as the GPU within Mobiles and MR Headsets become more advanced the experiences will only get sharper and more immersive,” he predicts.
According to Ash Cowan, co-founder, VR City, with VR and 360 ° video currently only available digitally, delivering VR as a linear appointment broadcast is unlikely for now.“ But fitting into its online output is totally possible and in fact is already happening. We have just completed a week of VR coverage of the Cheltenham Festival for ITV. The content was made available via ITV’ s social media platforms but it is only a player update away from being able to broadcast the content on ITV Hub, 4OD or BBC iPlayer. Sky have already embraced VR and have released their app Sky VR which is available on mobile as an app and also on Samsung Gear VR and Google Daydream. Other broadcasters to have embraced VR are MTV, CNN, BBC, NBC, and Fox, mainly bringing news and sports coverage to viewers online or via a specialist VR app,” he reports.
Alain Nochimowski, EVP of innovation at Viaccess-Orca, advises that industry groups such as the VR Industry Forum( VRIF), a non-profit industry group that is dedicated to pushing widespread adoption of virtual reality, are helping to establish a broadcast infrastructure for VR.“ As a founding member of that group, Viaccess-Orca is working hard with other technology partners to define industry standards for an interoperable, end-toend ecosystem presenting high-quality audiovisual VR services,” he adds.
Flow
As to how storage and workflow challenges will be met, Akamai’ s Rodriguez suggests that remains to be seen.“ As you can imagine, the Internet is not VR ready, but Akamai’ s mission is always to enable our customers to do what the public Internet doesn’ t normally make easy. So, this is going to come down to faster and more efficient data transfer, as well as optimising at the device level. Viewers are going to want high resolution, seamless experiences. Our platform is ready, but we’ re working together with partners to help improve everywhere in the pipeline,” he confirms.
“ The storage challenges are similar to those of other forms of UHD content – large files and high bitrates,” says Ericsson’ s Plunkett.“ The optimal resolution of VR content, given its close proximity to the viewer’ s retina, and magnified by device optics, demands high pixel density
“ We are getting close to a place where TV and VR require similar budgets and similar time scales.” – Ash Cowan, VR City
Cloud
combined with high frame rates, pushing up storage requirements. Workflow is also complex due to a fragmented and fast changing device landscape.”
“ Storage will increase as we move to 8K types of resolution,” advises Harmonic’ s Fautier.“ The biggest challenge will be on the workflow and, especially, on the latency as we apply more interactive technology to deliver the best quality, such as tiling.”
According to Irdeto’ s Oggel, storage challenges can be met by fully embracing the benefits that the Cloud offers.“ With the right security and compliance in place, content providers can make the most of the bandwidth usage and distribution of computer power and services beyond a company’ s datacenter. Businesses will need to shift their security focus from client devices to a more holistic, multi-faceted approach where cloud, applications, devices, the data and content are secured.”
“ Even in the case of 360-degree TV, the sheer size of data is sizable enough to disrupt the current model,” advises NAGRA’ s Verbesselt.“ As a result, 360-degree TV is often still shot in relatively low resolution such a 1080p which isn’ t much if you scan across the space. Many 360-degree videos are now shot in 4K but that too needs to be spread across a very large area. This means we’ ll probably need to shoot in 8K when making videos for the mass market. The workflow isn’ t fundamentally different to our current system but studios need to overcome the challenges of working with cameras all shooting at the same time. They’ ll need to rethink the production process and work out a way to stitch the footage together smoothly. The other issue is direction. There’ s no fourth wall, so the camera has to take into account the immersive set-up that you wouldn’ t have if there was a camera man present. Overall, there are some challenges, but they can be overcome,” he asserts.
“ We see the VR workflow similar to our 4K workflow for live and on demand content,” reports NeuLion’ s Wagner.“ HEVC MPEG- DASH will play a key role in video workflow transport for VR. It provides significant enhancements and compression for live VR streams especially with live events where viewer peak currency is higher than VOD content. By using the MainConcept SDK for HEVC, we are seeing a 30 to 40 per cent reduction in broadband costs, faster project implementations and great video quality on VR devices. One thing in particular we have been working on is view point video delivery. It saves bandwidth by only sending high resolution images to the area where the user is looking and low resolution elsewhere. It auto adjusts as the user turns their head.”
Ecosystem
“ The quality of VR / 360 content needs to be exceptional, meaning UHD / 4K, and bandwidth acceptable in order for operators to monetise it.” Alain Nochimowski, Viaccess-Orca
Technicolor’ s Cooper suggests that because of the collaborative nature of the challenges( creating, distributing and rendering content that is complex and often bandwidth-intensive), he would be willing to bet that the community will harness open innovation to create solutions that work across the ecosystem.“ While past is not always prologue to the future, we do actually have some models that can be explored to find clues for resolving these issues. Today, major motion pictures that feature extensive VFX content require the kinds of solutions that may well be ported to the‘ immersive’ content arena in the broadcast environment.”
Sky’ s Nockles says that storage and workflow challenges can be likened to the implementation of Ultra HD and HDR.“ In order to deliver the high-res content there’ s more space required. Similarly, higher processing power is required to complete the visual stitching and graphics,” he notes.
“ These are already being met,” asserts VR City’ s Cowan.“ In terms of work flow, improving software and a better understanding of how to shoot VR, are contributing to much simpler and faster timelines. I would say we are getting close to a place where TV and VR require similar budgets and similar time scales. The deciding factor on cost won’ t be so much the technology, but the genre and production demands. In the main, VR is broadcast in 4K, so with a lot of TV now filmed in 4K, if not broadcast quite yet, the storage needs aren’ t too different. Also bear in mind that VR is often shorter in duration to TV, so file sizes of the deliverable file can be reduced. With new compression formats like H265, this can be further reduced.”
Creatives
How will creatives handle the opportunities and challenges? What genres will prove best suited to the medium?“ I would hesitate to say which genres are best suited and
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