[opendtv] Re: News: Experts question quality of local HDTV
- From: "John Willkie" <johnwillkie@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Sat, 3 Feb 2007 11:58:22 -0800
There's something new in the mix since the 'breastgate' episode. The 5 or
six second time delay to permit near real time editing of live broadcasts.
Did your tests do double-pass encoding?
I don't know for a fact that one can do double-pass encoding in 5 seconds,
but I suspect that it can be. Nor do I know that it is done. I do know
that one can do double-pass encoding between the time a master is handed to
the network and the time the program airs.
John Willkie
EtherGuide Systems
Pricing for our standard PSIP generators is now available
www.etherguidesystems.com/systems/EmissaryATSC/default.aspx
> -----Original Message-----
> From: opendtv-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:opendtv-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]
> On Behalf Of Stephen W. Long
> Sent: Saturday, February 03, 2007 10:42 AM
> To: opendtv@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> Subject: [opendtv] Re: News: Experts question quality of local HDTV
>
> 1080i in less than 22 Mbps just does not work well. I remember in horror
> the early CBS basketball broadcasts in 1080i. Too painful to watch. I
> think I said in a speech once that the reason some people fell in love
> with
> 1080i was that they based their experience on seeing the early 1080i
> images
> on uncompressed wires (SMPTE 292) on $30,000 monitors. On a 30" or so
> $30,000 engineering monitor, the 1080i looks good. But we live in the
> real
> world, not the engineering monitor world. We live in a world of data
> compression. If you do side by side comparisons of 1080i through
> compression channels and 720/60p through a compression channel, 720/60p
> ALWAYS looks better for fast content (sports or wars). I think the little
> dark secret that CBS and NBC and others will not admit to is that they did
> not do sufficient testing of real-world signals through real world
> channels.
> My organization did do tests (through others) that verified that 720/60p
> would look better in a constrained bit channel than 1080i would look. I
> would also offer the opinion that it was the act of "praying to the
> interlace god" that drove many ATSC decisions. You had to have 19Mbps to
> do
> 1080i, so that drove everything. In our tests and I believe ABC tests,
> you
> can do outstanding 720/60p HDTV in 14Mbps. If one would make a rational
> 720/60p decision at the beginning, then ALTERNATIVE modulation systems
> could
> have been considered. I don't remember which coding technique (2VSB or
> QAM?) but you could easily pack a very robust single carrier system into a
> 14Mbps payload. Of course, one can build a very, very robust OFDM system
> that scales from 14 Mbps up to 18 Mbps or so.
>
> So now imagine a consumer universe of fast motion sports using 1080i
> signals, that are starved for bits, and displayed on a native progressive
> scan flat panel, if the modulation system works at all. This is about as
> bad as HDTV can get. The alternative could have been native progressive
> scan imaging, at 60fps, with sufficient compression bandwidth ceiling to
> not
> have blocking, over a robust modulation channel.
>
> The US DTV system as implemented today is sooo 80s'. Last time I checked,
> it is 2007.
>
> Stephen Long
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: opendtv-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
> [mailto:opendtv-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of Craig Birkmaier
> Sent: Friday, February 02, 2007 9:09 AM
> To: OpenDTV Mail List
> Subject: [opendtv] News: Experts question quality of local HDTV
>
>
> So a CBS exec says that the use of ANY sub-channel takes away from
> quality of an HD sports broadcast. DUH...
>
> Even when the full channel is used, I see significant artifacts in
> the 1080i CBS sports broadcasts. Could it bee that CBS and NBC chose
> poorly?
>
> The following article from The Syracuse Post Dispatch discusses this
> issue, and why "HD Expert" Peter Putman has singled out WSTM in
> Syracuse because its HD quality during live sports was among the
> worst he has seen.
>
> Regards
> Craig
>
>
> http://www.syracuse.com/poststandard/stories/index.ssf?/base/living-
> 3/117041
> 0694303660.xml&coll=1
>
> Experts question quality of local HDTV
>
> Friday, February 02, 2007
> By William LaRue
> Staff writer
>
> Consumer-electronics consultant Peter H. Putman was in Syracuse
> watching an HD broadcast of NBC football last September, when he
> noticed the video often had "little blocks and squiggly things."
>
> He was disappointed but not shocked. Even as consumers rush out to
> buy high-definition sets to watch Sunday's Super Bowl, Putman says,
> many U.S. stations are degrading their HD by squeezing it to make
> room for subchannels in their digital signals.
>
> Chris Geiger, general manager at NBC affiliate WSTM-TV (Channel 3)
> in Syracuse, says the station's decision to add subchannels to its
> digital signal hasn't harmed its HD, which offers super-sharp
> pictures, wide-screen video and digital sound.
>
> "We've never had any kind of complaint (from local viewers). We're
> clearly comfortable with our signal," Geiger says.
>
> Time Warner Cable spokesman Jeff Unaitis says the cable company
> hasn't detected any substandard quality to the HD signals it receives
> over the air from Syracuse stations and then retransmits to customers
> without any changes.
>
> But a CBS executive overseeing the network's HD telecast of the
> NFL's Super Bowl concedes "it's still a wild West" when it comes to
> maintaining the high quality of a high-definition broadcast once it
> leaves the network.
>
> "We do as much as we can. But when it gets to affiliates or DirecTV,
> or when it gets to some of the cable guys, it's hard to say what
> happens," says Ken Aagaard, CBS Sports senior vice president of
> operations and production services.
>
> Aagaard says engineers at CBS believe adding any subchannel to a
> digital TV signal takes away from the quality of the HD.
>
> WSTM was placed in the HD spotlight in the January issue of Sound &
> Vision magazine, which interviewed Putman about TV stations splitting
> their high-definition bandwidth so they can transmit additional
> channels and therefore sell more advertising.
>
> Putman is editor and publisher at HDTVexpert.com and president of
> Roam Consulting of Doylestown, Pa., which provides training, product
> testing and other services to manufacturers of video equipment. He
> often stops in Syracuse on his way to and from his family's summer
> home in Jefferson County.
>
> For the magazine article, he mentioned his experience tuning in
> Channel 3, which transmits HD as part of a digital signal broadcast
> at 19.39 megabits of data per second. The station also uses its
> digital bandwidth to carry three standard-definition channels: CW
> affiliate WSTQ-LP (Channel 14), weather channel Weather Plus and
> music-video channel The Tube.
>
> Using sophisticated software on his laptop to analyze over-the-air
> digital signals, Putman found that Channel 3 allocated no more than
> 13 megabits per second of data for HD - and sometimes as little as 8
> - during the NBC football game.
>
> Putman argues that Channel 3 and other stations broadcasting using
> 1080i HD need at least 16 megabits per second to deliver quality
> video during the fast action in sports.
>
> As players raced down the field on the Channel 3 telecast, Putman
> could see small objects on the screen turn to blocks. He adds that
> some moving objects appeared to have tiny bugs flying around them, a
> digital artifact known as "mosquito noise."
>
> "The system is demanding more bits than the encoder can give it. So
> it can't digitize every part of the image. So it gives up on some of
> them and they just become blocks," says Putman, who received a
> master's degree in television and radio from Syracuse University in
> 1977.
>
> The Federal Communications Commission has no rules prohibiting
> stations from splitting their digital signals, even if it causes HD
> quality to decline, Putman says.
>
> Not every viewer notices a problem, either. Pete Palmeri, 51, a
> computer technician living in Waterloo, says he's delighted with the
> quality of the HD he gets from WSTM and other Syracuse stations over
> the air on his 32-inch digital set.
>
> Even if there is a slight decrease in the video quality, Palmeri
> adds, it's worth it to him to receive the additional programming he
> gets from the subchannels.
>
> "I think it all looks great," Palmeri says.
>
> Putman concedes most viewers will find lower-quality HD video more
> pleasing than anything they received from older analog TV channels,
> which are being phased out because of the federal deadline of Feb.
> 17, 2009, for stations to transition to digital.
>
> "The argument could be put forward that this is like picking nits,
> that the average Joe doesn't care. . . . But there will be some
> people spending two grand to buy a HD set . . . who will take it home
> and hook it up and look at the signal and think, 'Yech,' especially
> if they can compare it to Discovery HD or ESPN HD," says Putman,
> adding that he singled out WSTM because its HD quality during live
> sports was among the worst he has seen.
>
> He says he didn't see similar digital artifacts from other Syracuse
> stations.
>
>
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