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EBU tests the first HEVC UHDTV live contribution encoders
30 Mar 2016
Back in March the EBU Strategic Programme – Beyond HD evaluated a set of real-time UHDTV HEVC contribution encoders. Thomson Video Networks, now acquired and integrated into Harmonic, and NTT electronics submitted their systems to a long and extensive quality test, evaluating the latencies, picture quality, resilience to cascaded encoding etc. in 4:2:2 10 bit modes.
Several HDTV HEVC contribution encoders are available today. However, barriers still exist, including real-time UHDTV encoders (NTT, Thomson Video Network, Digigram,) and even worse, the barrier for HEVC UHD real-time contribution decoders. For this test, Village Island and NTT supplied a decoder.
“This test provided us with a snapshot of the current status of the industry, which is good in terms of quality performance, but needs further work in terms of interoperability. The picture quality and encoding latencies observed are certainly appealing especially for UHDTV contribution over satellite where the H.264 quad solution is bandwidth consuming. They show that these products have already reached a certain level of maturity,” said EBU’s Beyond HD Chairman Giorgio Dimino (RAI).
HEVC / H.265 (High Efficiency Video Coding), the replacement of MPEG-4 / HEVC has been a standard since 2013 and is supported by most UHDTV screens today in 4:2:0 modes. Currently, UHDTV contribution is done using quad-H.264 systems encoding the 4K picture as separate tiles reconstructed and synchronised at the receiving side. A HEVC UHDTV encoder constitutes a viable solution as they reduce the bandwidth, avoid synchronisation issues and can be repurposed as four independent HD HEVC encoders.
Awaiting the release of the complete report of this first HEVC test, wich the EBU said will be published in April, it announced it will use the NTT encoder and decoder for the distribution of this season's motor sports events via the EBU's Eurovision network, to member and customer broadcasters/media-outlets. Testing NTT Electronics' HEVC encoder and decoder for live content transmission throughout the 2016 motor sports season.
The brand new HC11000E encoder and HC11000D decoder from NTT Electronics which uses the Cutting Edge HEVC technology will be one of the key transmission products adopted for several events during the 2016 season. Feed encoded with such equipment will be distributed over the EBU’s network. The trial is to confirm within an operational environment the capability of NTT Electronics HEVC products.
HEVC is expected to save the transmission bandwidth without losing picture quality, offering the possibility to increase the number of transmission channels within the same bandwidth. As a result, HEVC is expected to contribute higher efficiencies compared to H.264/AVC.
Graham Warren, EBU Director of Network & News stated, "The EBU continues to develop our new service platform with cutting edge HEVC technology. And by utilizing the results from the tests foreseen in real operational environment we will be able to provide a flexible next generation service portfolio to our clients."
"We thank the EBU for selecting NTT Electronics as their partner for this project." said Hisashi Ibaraki, Managing Director and Head of Digital Video Equipment Department at NTT Electronics. "We will continue to lead the market with our never ending improvement policy to satisfy broadcasters and our customers which needs to utilize the HEVC and its capability."
30 Mar 2016
Back in March the EBU Strategic Programme – Beyond HD evaluated a set of real-time UHDTV HEVC contribution encoders. Thomson Video Networks, now acquired and integrated into Harmonic, and NTT electronics submitted their systems to a long and extensive quality test, evaluating the latencies, picture quality, resilience to cascaded encoding etc. in 4:2:2 10 bit modes.
Several HDTV HEVC contribution encoders are available today. However, barriers still exist, including real-time UHDTV encoders (NTT, Thomson Video Network, Digigram,) and even worse, the barrier for HEVC UHD real-time contribution decoders. For this test, Village Island and NTT supplied a decoder.
“This test provided us with a snapshot of the current status of the industry, which is good in terms of quality performance, but needs further work in terms of interoperability. The picture quality and encoding latencies observed are certainly appealing especially for UHDTV contribution over satellite where the H.264 quad solution is bandwidth consuming. They show that these products have already reached a certain level of maturity,” said EBU’s Beyond HD Chairman Giorgio Dimino (RAI).
HEVC / H.265 (High Efficiency Video Coding), the replacement of MPEG-4 / HEVC has been a standard since 2013 and is supported by most UHDTV screens today in 4:2:0 modes. Currently, UHDTV contribution is done using quad-H.264 systems encoding the 4K picture as separate tiles reconstructed and synchronised at the receiving side. A HEVC UHDTV encoder constitutes a viable solution as they reduce the bandwidth, avoid synchronisation issues and can be repurposed as four independent HD HEVC encoders.
Awaiting the release of the complete report of this first HEVC test, wich the EBU said will be published in April, it announced it will use the NTT encoder and decoder for the distribution of this season's motor sports events via the EBU's Eurovision network, to member and customer broadcasters/media-outlets. Testing NTT Electronics' HEVC encoder and decoder for live content transmission throughout the 2016 motor sports season.
The brand new HC11000E encoder and HC11000D decoder from NTT Electronics which uses the Cutting Edge HEVC technology will be one of the key transmission products adopted for several events during the 2016 season. Feed encoded with such equipment will be distributed over the EBU’s network. The trial is to confirm within an operational environment the capability of NTT Electronics HEVC products.
HEVC is expected to save the transmission bandwidth without losing picture quality, offering the possibility to increase the number of transmission channels within the same bandwidth. As a result, HEVC is expected to contribute higher efficiencies compared to H.264/AVC.
Graham Warren, EBU Director of Network & News stated, "The EBU continues to develop our new service platform with cutting edge HEVC technology. And by utilizing the results from the tests foreseen in real operational environment we will be able to provide a flexible next generation service portfolio to our clients."
"We thank the EBU for selecting NTT Electronics as their partner for this project." said Hisashi Ibaraki, Managing Director and Head of Digital Video Equipment Department at NTT Electronics. "We will continue to lead the market with our never ending improvement policy to satisfy broadcasters and our customers which needs to utilize the HEVC and its capability."