Broadcasting, conventionally, means free to air transmission of Radio and Television programmes in terrestrial mode.

Presently, satellite TV transmission, multichannel distribution through Cable TV and Direct to Home (DTH) service have assumed bigger roles.

Micro-electronics, Material science and Space science are the Key Technologies which have brought Broadcasting to its present status. There are many developments based on these technologies. Some of the important ones are briefly presented here.

It is a Digital World. Digital in TV/Video is, however, convenient only with compression. Uncompressed video is immense data at 270 Mbps and requires large bandwidth to transmit and formidable storage space to record. Digital compression techniques take advantage of inherent content of television pictures which have repetition and redundancy both within and between frames and this repetitive and redundant data can be discarded.

DV and MPEG are the main compression types. DV compression being intra-frame is the most appropriate for video recording and postproduction. MPEG compression being inter-frame takes advantage of repetition and redundancy over a group of frames. It can have higher compression ratio, suitable for storage and transmission. Only one Analogue TV channel can be transmitted through one transponder.With compression, upto 10 TV channels can be sent on the same X-ponder.

Un-compressed D-1 and D-2, in. tape. Un-compressed D-3 and D-5, in. tape. With Motion-JPEG compression techniques, Digi-Beta. MPEG compression based, Beta-SX and IMX. Cost-effective, DV-compression based, Mini DV, DVCPRO, DVCPRO 50, DVCAM, I-MAX and Digital-S. DVCPRO-HD, HD-CAM and D-5 HD for HDTV.

Moores Law for modern electronics also true for the capacity of hard drives. Capacity doubles every two years, cost falls to half. Between 1995-2004, capacity of 3.5 inch disk increased from 4 GB to 160 GB and cost dropped from $1000 to $200. Drives getting bigger and faster but cheaper. Used for NLEs, Multi-channel transmission servers, promos, commercials, NVOD in DTH, PVR in STBs etc.,

CD-ROM, Audio CD and Video CD. Larger capacity Digital Versatile Disk (DVD) and affordable DVD players. DVD capacity 4.7 GB to 18.8 GB depending upon single layer-single side to double layerdouble side. Blue laser technology enhances the capacity five-fold from 4.7 GB to 23 GB. Suitable for Archives. Professional/Broadcast camcorders with rerecordable optical disc using blue laser (Sony) for ENG/EFP.

Flash memory storage media such as Compact Flash, Smart Media, SD card and Memory stick.(familiarly used in still cameras and handheld computers) Stamp size card having 1GB capacity. Capacity likely to increase to 16/32 GB in the next few years. New generation Professional/Broadcast Camcorders for ENG using solid state memory (P2 cards) by Panasonic.

Using neither tape nor hard disk nor optical disc this new generation digital A-V system brings higher levels of speed, reliability and economy to News Gathering. No moving mechanism in camcorder, thereby, no maintenance, no noise, low power consumption and less weight. Low cost as the SD memory card is a consumer and IT device and can be read/rewritten 100,000 times.

Random Access. Faster Editing. Data recorded on P2 cards requires no digitizing or downloading. Card recognised instantly when inserted into PCMCIA slot. Transfers data at a higher speed than optical disc or hard disk. DVCPRO compatible data. DVCPRO-HD equipment with SD memory cards will be marketed as higher capacity SD cards are available.

The P2 card

Professional
For professional use

Plug-in
Advantage of the card

Card
Memory Card

I/F Transfer Rate Reliability Transfer Rate Reliability

: PC Card (Type II) *Known as PCMCIA card : Achieving up to 640Mbps : More than 100,000 time overwrites : Achieving up to 640Mbps : More than 100,000 time overwrites

Camcorder Migration
HD SD

100M 25M/50M

P2 card

4GB

8GB

128GB

Digital techniques already deployed in films for editing and special visual effects. 35 mm film has undoubtedly the best quality as regards resolution ,Gamma i.e., dynamic range or light handling capacity(6 times of TV camera) and contrast ratio with pleasingFilm Look. Hi Res HDTV cameras now available with film camera features of 24P and variable frame rate shooting and near-film Gamma.

HDTV cameras like Panasonic Varicam being used in Hollywood, Bollywood and other places for making documentaries, commercial TV spots, music videos and low budget films. Once shot on video and edited, prints or copies are made on film and video. Projection with DLP projectors gives quality close to 35 mm film in multiplexes or small city cinema theatres.

Digital cinema delivery 70% cheaper than film print cost. Expensive and cumbersome distribution of heavy canisters of film to cinemas may be replaced with fast, high bandwidth delivery via satellite for projection with DLP projectors. In India, HDTV far in horizon for TV Xmissions, but already arrived for film making.

Revolution in Visual Image technology. Emissive flat panel technique, mere 3.5 inch thick, 65 inch dia.to hang on wall like a picture frame. High Resolution, one million pixels per frame, contrast ratio 4000:1, high brightness, natural colours, flicker free progressive scan pictures on a wide screen in high-light ambient. In TV Bcasting, used as backdrops for News and single display viewing alternative(with processor) to multi-monitor MCR and PCR situations.

Satellites for Commn., Re-Broadcasting, Direct To Home and V-SAT. More than 200 Geo-stationary satellites in Clarkes belt over the Equator. Broadband Cable networks, Fibre and Coax. Fibre Optic link around the Globe(FLAG) with under ocean fibre optic cable provide alternate/supplement to satellite connectivity.

Digital Pay-TV service through satellite on KuBand providing 100-plus TV channels. Digital compression and statistical multiplexing enables 10 TV ch. per transponder. Reception with personal 45-60cms.dish and STB without Cable TV Operator. Content, Convenience, high digital picture and sound quality and value-added services makes DTH very attractive.

Inter-activity with built-in modem in STB, telephone line and remote control unit provides pay-per-view for live sports and movies on near video on demand (NVOD) using electronic pgm. guide (EPG). STBs have built-in hard disk drive as PVR to record programmes at home and viewing the same afterwards. Encryption, conditional access(CA) and subscriber management system(SMS) ensure the DTH service provider that viewers see only the pgms. for which they have paid.

DTH service by Zee and Doordarshan already started. Service by Space TV( STARTV) expected soon. More than 100 chnls, played-out, passthrough, NVOD, EPG, data, radio chnls etc., need to be uplinked from a very large teleport to high-power Ku-Band transponders of one or more co-located satellites. Involves marketing, customer support, billing thru SMS and distn. of STBs.

Overlapping of traditionally separate markets of Telecom and Broadcasting. Increasing traffic requires increasing bandwidth. To reach millions over the internet as in broadcasting requires those many simultaneous streams of video or audio, i.e., for every customer. Comparatively, hardware for broadcast television or radio is independent of the number of users within the coverage area.

Quality of pictures and reliability in Broadcast service can not be compromised. Difficult to achieve these conditions on the Internet due to bandwidth limitations and connectivity thru telephone line. Internet supplements broadcasting by providing addl. information on programmes. Each channel has its site on the world wide web. What Internet can do, Broadcasting can also not replicate. There are more than 1600 million pages of data base on the world wide web on any conceivable topic.

Satellite digital radio, WorldSpace, has become popular in Africa and Asia. There are more than 30 channels available in India. There is thus choice between All India Radio, private FM channels and WorldSpace. In USA, XM radio and Sirius Satellite Radio services, even cater to listening in automobiles. In fact, Radio is an unspoilt media compared to Television. While performing its role to entertain, inform and educate the viewers, TV is overindulging both in entertainment/music and news channels; and often going out of codes of ethic.What TV is doing to society in general, is debatable.

 VSAT technology(1980-1990). VSAT: very small aperture terminal. Ku band (uplink 14 Ghz, downlink 12 Ghz). Both way communication capability. 1.8m-2.4m dish size. Point to point communication. Star topology. Mesh topology.

Internet

Digital Video Broadcasting Handheld (DVB-H) DVB-H transmission standards are developed to deliver high quality video for handheld devices like mobile phones and developed in June 2004. DVB-H is mainly utilizing field proven DVB-T standards with some additional modifications and improvements.

There are some inevitable issues to be resolved in DVB-H:

Efficient source encoding ( predominantly MPEG-4 part 10, also known as H.264/AVC) to achieve low bit rate ( bit rate ranging from Kbps to Mbps) Power consumption is a key issue for battery driven devices. Time slicing technique is adopted to reduce the power consumption by 90%. Time slicing is mandatory in DVB-H.

 Services offered as a result of convergence: IPTV Mobile TV Streaming Internet TV VoIP Triple Play = TV + Internet + Phone

Broadcasting

(Voice, Video and Data)

Telecom

Internet

VoIP Telephone Video

ADSL Modem IPTV Set Top Box (STB)

Landline
Copper Pair

ADSL Splitter Micro filter Voice service

Internet

Normal Telephone

Internet Protocol + Television

Closed and managed network

IPTV is a secure closed system with premium content , particularly for video Internet TV

Best effort video service

Video on demand (Push and pull)

Broadcast TV VoD Distance Learning Tele medicine Video Conferencing Many more

To Broadcasters,

IPTV is a new emerging platform for distributing digital television channels to home consumers using a TV screen IPTV is a new opportunity to take part in an attractive and dynamic media market
A new way to reach consumers and generate increased revenue and profits

To Telecom Industry,

To Content Producer,

Bandwidth efficient towards the access network

Channel switching is performed in the network Infinite number of channels Bi-directional: IP Transport anything, any time, any where, any device Time Shifted TV

Interactive (two-way)

Signal are purely digital

Compression
No Compression
SDTV HDTV

Data Rate
270 Mbps 1.5 Gbps

MPEG-2
SDTV HDTV 4-8 Mbps 12-20 Mbps

MPEG-4
SDTV HDTV 2-4 Mbps 12-15 Mbps 1.5 Mbps 8 Mbps

MPEG-4 AVC H.264/VC-1

SDTV HDTV

Live broadcasts: It's like watching live TV on your computer screen. You can NOT pause, back up or skip through parts of the broadcast that do NOT interest you. On-demand videos: Arranged like a playlist. Episodes or clips are arranged by title or channel or in categories like news, sports or music videos. You choose exactly what you want to watch, when you want to watch it.

Integrated services such as voice (Telephony), video (IPTV, broadcast TV, VoD etc.), and high speed data (Internet) over same IP network Assuming 1 SD channel (3 Mbps) and 1 HD (8 Mbps), then 24 Mbps link per Household is enough for triple play. (2 SD, 2 HD, VoIP, and data)

VIRTUAL STUDIO

blue-screen or chroma-key technology has been an essential part of daily television production. The presenter in the studio is recorded in front of a blue screen by the so-called foreground camera. The background either a video image from a VTR or an image created by a graphics designer at a computer workstation is mixed in to take the place of the blue screen in the foreground recording.