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Articles by Bob Pank#

Cloud STB with Bob Pank

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It’s like trying to get to Heathrow in time for your flight. Many of us have to go there by road and the journey will involve travelling on the UK’s busiest motorways. Even outside rush hour the journey may be quick, or not so quick or a real nightmare. This is a bit like live streaming video on the Internet. Yes, we’ve probably all used at least o...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 July 2013

The Cloud, a big hit at NAB with Bob Pank

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NAB 2013 will go down in history as the event where the broadcast industry took to the Cloud in a big way. Perhaps it was the number of smaller companies and start-ups that have been successfully operating cloud services for a year or more that persuaded the big names to join in but, more likely, these moves have been in the pipeline for a while. T...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 June 2013

Learning to love IT with Dick Hobbs

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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

4K at NAB with Bob Pank

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As we head once more to NAB you may wonder what this year’s big thing will be. I put my money on 4K. As I write there must be many exhibitors polishing up their ‘4K solution’ message, ready for their customers at the show. With the extraordinary situation of screens costing more than cameras, a viable business model clearly remains far off. But, to...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 May 2013

Bob Pank starts counting cores...

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Once again BVE hosted its one-day Cloud seminar. The new ExCel location meant that the room was away from the show floor and ideal for concentrating on the words flowing from the experts. Full-on attention was needed as squeezing in nine sessions between 10.00 and 17.45 meant that each would be short, sharp and to the point, which was certainly the...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 April 2013

Bob Pank busts the cloud!

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Too may of us can remember the Eyjafjallajokull volcano incident that stopped thousands of Europeans travelling back from NAB 2010. After a long show in the desert many were looking forward to home, real beer and green green grass. But the transport system that had always worked so well was out of commission, and suddenly it was clear that nothing...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 March 2013

Bob Pank looks at Editing and the Cloud

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By Bob PankHistorically video editing has been one of those operations shaped by technology. For decades it depended on VTRs to play and record. You had to go to an edit room, usually darkened and with loads of buttons and winking lights, to get your edit done by a video editor. It was not cheap. Then, with video stored on computer discs, editing w...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 February 2013

No more pizza for Dick Hobbs!

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A couple of months ago I used this column to talk about geeks and nerds. Our industry depends upon them, whether we like it or not. Re-reading the article, I was struck by the fact that I quoted four people in the article (five if you count Christian Louboutin). All were male. According to a recent survey just 17% of the people in the technology se...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 February 2013

Trends that could bring a much needed change to post-prod...

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In my Christmas article I made the analogy that the post-production market was like high street shopping where the superpowers – Tesco, Waitrose, Asda, Sainsbury's and Morrison’s – have become ever larger at the expense of the poor, independent, high street retailers. With American venture-vultures circling the likes of HMV and Dreams, shoppers inc...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 February 2013

To cloud, or not to cloud

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Almost ever since it began, there have been two parameters that have played a big part in shaping broadcast television – bandwidth and storage. Admittedly, storage was not an issue at the start because there was no way to do it, but Ampex changed that in 1956. Bandwidth dictates many aspects of infrastructure and broadcast picture quality, the amou...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 January 2013

Character generation today means real-time 3D graphics

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In the constantly evolving world of television, graphics departments could be the ones facing the most complicated challenges. Designers have changed from 2D stills to 3D real-time animations and many sections of the department, such as news graphics or CG specialists, had to cope with the most radical changes, both because new technologies and the...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 January 2013

3D filmmaking

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Stereographers are in demand, they have little time and the time they do have is highly valued. I first met Demetri at IBC this year during the showing of HUGO (see page XX) and we were fortunate enough to catch up with him again during a flight to LA where he was heading for the first stage of 3D post for 47 RONIN. His opinions on 3D filmmaking ar...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 January 2013

Strictly successful

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It has been hard not to spend most of my time thinking about the BBC recently. While it may be the very epitome of the public service broadcasting ethos, it is bizarre to watch one BBC programme unleash invective on another BBC programme, lashing people who probably buy each other coffee on a daily basis. How did John Humphreys feel going to work t...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 January 2013

3D for Cinema, ProAV and Events

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Over more than a century of motion picture presentations there have been periods when 3D has emerged, and each time interest has faded away. The latest 3D wave goes back to the advent of digital technology for cinemas. Digital Cinema Initiatives (DCI) was formed in 2002 and delivered its first DCI Specification in 2005, when Doremi was well ahead w...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 January 2013

Ask the Experts - 3d with BSkyB

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This month we had an exclusive opportunity to talk to Cara Cheeseman, Post Production Supervisor for all 3D content, both internally and externally, at BSkyB. The 21 questions are gathered from a variety of industry professionals with an interest, some sceptical and some fanatical, in 3DWhen it comes to 3D conversion... creating 3D images from 2D s...

Submitted by Bob Pank#

Published 01 January 2013