[opendtv] Re: A view from the UK
- From: "Alan Roberts" <roberts.mugswell@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 17 Apr 2004 19:45:37 +0100
Thanks John,
Yes, I can be a bit more open now, but there are still NDAs and no-go areas
that I must abide by for the time being.
The cost-savings that the Beeb makes by shooting in HD are all to do with
top-end production. At the high end, the Beeb needs co-production money to
complete projects. Imagine a multi-part natural history project, say 8
1-hour episodes taking 3 years to shoot. Left to it's own devices, it would
be made on super16 and Digibeta. But to get co-production money from the US
and Japan, the shoot has to be 35mm and/or HD. So the cost-saving is in
reducing from 35mm not from super16/digi. These days, without the
co-producers' cash, the project simply couldn't happen, too expensive even
in SD, so something has to give. Blue Planet was the watershed, it showed
that well-shot SD and good film can be reversioned at HD and make
presentable HD, but native HD would have been better.
Current costings from the unit I've worked closely with for the past 18
months shows that drama costs are between 2% and 25% less in HD than
super16; NH costs are similar, because of the different shooting ratios and
the fact that many of the freelance DoPs already have film kit that won't be
earning while they're working in HD. So cost reduction for NH isn't really
significant, but the quality improvement is marked, and the co-production
money is easier to confirm.
These equations are never precise, they change as the daily rate for kit
changes, and as suppliers decide that they want to create a niche (e.g. VMI
in the UK now rents Sony HDW750 for the same price as Digibeta, they want
the trade). But, in general, HD-shooting attracts the co-production money
that reduces the makers' costs relative to SD or s16 shooting.
More on this if you want it.
----- Original Message -----
From: "John Willkie" <jmwillkie@xxxxxxx>
To: <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Saturday, April 17, 2004 2:16 AM
Subject: [opendtv] Re: A view from the UK
> Alan;
>
> Congratulations on your retirement from the Beeb, and I look forward to
your
> contributions to OpenDTV.
>
> In an email exchange we had off list several months ago, you mentioned
that
> the BBC was saving production costs by acquiring in HDTV.
>
> I subsequently learned from other list members that you had been lurking
on
> the list for some time, and that you certainly know of what you speak.
>
> Most people seem to think that HDTV increases production costs, and those
> people distribute in HDTV, unlike the BBC (for the present time.)
>
> Would you now be able to talk on list about this? Where are the savings?
> Are they current, or projected?
>
> John Willkie
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: opendtv-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> [mailto:opendtv-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of Alan Roberts
> Sent: Thursday, April 15, 2004 10:14 AM
> To: opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: [opendtv] A view from the UK
>
>
> Gents,
>
> I've been monitoring this list for some time (years) but have not yet
posted
> because I didn't want my affiliation to mar discussions. I've just retired
> from 36 years working for the BBC in R&D, much of it in developing DTV and
> HDTV.
>
> The reluctance to take up DTV in the UK is an interesting one. I was one
in
> he "not interested" group until the programme content enticed me, and that
> was the BBC4 content. Until then, there simply wasn't enough interesting
> extra programming to make me take the step. The cost was always
irrelevant,
> but the catalyst was in buying a new, 16:9 tv set 18 months ago. At that
> point, buying into a 16:9 service made sense, but not before.
>
> The reason for my reluctance was that, having worked in this field for
many
> years, I knew that the picture quality that I would get from digits is
> easily worse than I would get from DTV. I can see the top of Crystal
Palace
> mast from my home, have a good aerial, and get 21mV of signal, so no noise
> in PAL. Digits make inferior pictures for me, so the enticement had to be
> the content of the extra channels, and filling the new wide tv picture,
and
> it wasn't until we noticed that BBC4 was showing lots of non-English
> language films that we bought the new tv and box. In fact, we immediately
> bought 2 boxes so we can watch/record in 2 places.
>
> I suspect I'm typical of many of the late/never uptakers who have no
> interest in the extra channels and therefore won't go to digits until
> analogue as actually switched off. My wife's parents bought a box on my
> recommendation, and have it connected to the 16" tv in their bedroom. They
> use it about twice a week, watching the vast majority of programming on a
> 20" 4:3 tv in their lounge. They simply are not interested in the extra
> channels/programmes, I don't think they're untypical of the refuseniks.
>
> I'm not really interested in arguing any of these points, I simply state
> them as being typical of many of my contacts here in the UK.
>
> Alan Roberts
>
>
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> You can UNSUBSCRIBE from the OpenDTV list in two ways:
>
> - Using the UNSUBSCRIBE command in your user configuration settings at
> FreeLists.org
>
> - By sending a message to: opendtv-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word
> unsubscribe in the subject line.
>
>
>
>
> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
> You can UNSUBSCRIBE from the OpenDTV list in two ways:
>
> - Using the UNSUBSCRIBE command in your user configuration settings at
FreeLists.org
>
> - By sending a message to: opendtv-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word
unsubscribe in the subject line.
>
----------------------------------------------------------------------
You can UNSUBSCRIBE from the OpenDTV list in two ways:
- Using the UNSUBSCRIBE command in your user configuration settings at
FreeLists.org
- By sending a message to: opendtv-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with the word
unsubscribe in the subject line.
Other related posts:
