KitPlus | Articles

Feeding a world hungry for instant news and entertainment

by Lorna GarrettIssue 81 - September 2013 It might sound cliche, but it is definitely true: the news never sleeps. With a third of the year still left, 2013 has already seen a host of events that have captured the worlds attention. From the anticipation of a royal baby to the devastation of hurricanes, tornados and bombings, from encounters on the...

Submitted by Lorna Garrett

Published 01 October 2013

A year in the life of SIS LIVE

by David MeynellIssue 81 - September 2013 This time a year ago SIS LIVE was still glowing with the pride that came from working to deliver outside broadcast TV coverage and satellite connectivity for London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic events. At the time 2013 was billed as a fallow year for the live broadcasting industry which, as we will see, was...

Submitted by David Meynell

Published 01 October 2013

Dick Hobbs gets up to speed with ESOMPS

The UK communications regulator Ofcom has issued a consultation document on the prospects for a technology called Earth Stations on Mobile Platforms, or ESOMPs. My first response to the consultation is that they should get a better acronym. An ESOMP is a small communications device which is attached to a mobile platform: a train, a plane, a ship or...

Submitted by Dick Hobbs.

Published 01 October 2013

EditShare hits the back of the net for french football gi...

by James RichingsIssue 80 - August 2013 Three times winners of Ligue 1, Frances highest football division, LOSC Lille is one of the premier professional sporting clubs in the country and have a sizeable following drawn from across Northern France. Live home games are broadcast for national TV and the club creates content for its own in-house televi...

Submitted by James Richings

Published 01 September 2013

Bringing increased efficiencies to file-based workflows

by Reed HaslamIssue 80 - August 2013 Most professionals in todays broadcast and media industries can remember a time when the videotape format was ubiquitous. It was the defacto recording, storage, and playback medium for many years, and fragments of the medium still exist today. What clearly contributed to the success of tape is its compact packag...

Submitted by Reed Haslam

Published 01 September 2013

8 questions about QC and language-based tools for caption...

by KJ KandellIssue 79 - July 2013 What are Captions?Captions (also known as subtitles) are coded signals that are sent along with the video and are decoded at your television or cable box to provide the audio track of the programming as white or colored text over a background. Captions can be open or closed. Open captions are always visible while t...

Submitted by KJ Kandell

Published 01 August 2013

Helping prevent photosensitive epilepsy

by Dr Mark HodgettsIssue 79 - July 2013 Photosensitivity is sensitivity to flickering or intermittent light stimulation and visual patterns. It is a condition which affects approximately one in four thousand people. A number of young people have this sensitivity but have not yet had a seizure and therefore have not been diagnosed with the condition...

Submitted by Mark Hodgetts

Published 01 August 2013

A complete cable network out of a hat!

by Peter LampelIssue 79 - July 2013 Time-to-market a familiar buzz word for any engineer. Meeting these demands requires early concept testing where simulations have become an indispensable tool. This approach is particularly useful when developing cable TV components, which must cope with many different types of interference. Simulating complete c...

Submitted by Peter Lampel

Published 01 August 2013

The evolution of camera connectivity and the HPX600

Tape in, tape out. Cable in, video out. Card in, card out. Simpler times: productions orchestrated by an army of runners, tape op’s and engineers, with transmission to TV, ingest via a VTR and a room dedicated to storing media. Today’s production team has changed. It’s become a small elite squad, tasked with multi-channel playout, multi-resolution...

Submitted by Kieron Seth#

Published 01 July 2013

Intelligent linking - answering some key power questions

with Steve EmmettWhat makes a safe Li-Ion Battery?Recently, the Boeing Dreamliner story has added to the perception of the Li-Ion battery as a potentially dangerous item. However, the reality is that Li-Ion batteries are a safe and robust source of portable power, when they are designed and constructed by a recognised battery manufacturer that has...

Submitted by KitPlus

Published 01 July 2013

Learning to love IT with Dick Hobbs

There are three clearly defined levels of activity at NAB. There is the buzz which someone is trying to get going, there is the stuff which people are actually trying to buy, and there is the latest collection of buzzwords and catchphrases which provide endless entertainment for those with a love of language. This year, for instance, we were all to...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 June 2013

Loudness: What happens now if my work is not compliant?

Now that loudness is a mandatory requirement in the United States, Europe, and much of the rest of the world, it’s not so much a question of when organizations will begin to comply, but how?1. Now the standards are in place, what happens now if my work is not compliant?There are varying repercussions for noncompliance, depending where you work and...

Submitted by Jon Schorah

Published 01 June 2013

Planning the digital marathon

Never one for New Year's resolutions, I made the 2013 Virgin London Marathon one to finally commit to. So once I'd put in the training and mentally prepared for the greatest marathon on Earth, I started to explore new ways in which I could share my experience with friends, family and the public in a different way. It's certainly inherent within the...

Submitted by Ben Darby

Published 01 June 2013

Will Strauss captures some decent sound gear

Capturing decent location sound requires skill, experience and, as Will Strauss discovered when compiling a list of recent audio acquisition innovations, piles of expensive kit. Although some cameramen might disagree, audio is still the most important thing to get right when on location. The odd dodgy shot can, generally speaking, be sorted in post...

Submitted by Will Strauss#

Published 01 June 2013

Building a live linear streaming channel to reach multipl...

The market for live and on-demand streaming video has exploded in recent years thanks in part to broadband connections and the proliferation of connected devices. A recent survey by The Diffusion Group showed that some 50 percent of online video viewers watch some form of streaming live video at least once a month, and 64 percent said comprehensive...

Submitted by Jennifer Baisch

Published 01 May 2013