BSkyB Chooses Avid DNxHD Encoding for HD Post Workflow.AMSTERDAM, The Netherlands -- Avid Technology "Avid" redirects here. For the "Advancement Via Individual Determination" educational program, see AVID. Avid Technology, Inc NASDAQ: AVID is an American company specializing in video and audio production technology; specifically, digital non-linear media editing (NLE) , Inc. (NASDAQ NASDAQ in full National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations U.S. market for over-the-counter securities. Established in 1971 by the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD), NASDAQ is an automated quotation system that reports on : AVID), today announced that the leading U.K. digital broadcaster, British Sky Broadcasting British Sky Broadcasting (BSkyB — formerly two companies, Sky Television and BSB) is a company that operates Sky Digital, a subscription television service in the UK and the Republic of Ireland. It produces TV content, and owns several TV channels. (BSkyB), has adopted the Avid DNxHD(TM) mastering-quality HD codec (1) (enCOder/DECoder) A hardware circuit that performs analog-to-digital conversion (ADC) and digital-to-analog (DAC) conversion. When analog signals are entered into a computer, cellphone or other device via a microphone or video source such as VHS tape or analog TV, for postproduction in preparation for launching its SkyHD service in the U.K. and Ireland in the first half of 2006. SkyHD will offer movies, sports, general entertainment, and documentaries - all in high-definition - on several HD channels. In early 2005, BSkyB's technical and operational teams were charged with finding the most effective HD technology for all parts of the production chain. John Lennon Noun 1. John Lennon - English rock star and guitarist and songwriter who with Paul McCartney wrote most of the music for the Beatles (1940-1980) Lennon , BSkyB's head of Broadcast Strategy, and Chris Whatmore, BSkyB's head of Post Production, led the pre-selection and evaluation process of HD postproduction platforms. "We wanted a shared HD production environment because it was important for us to have the agility and benefits that we already enjoy with an SD shared workflow, particularly due to the very large volumes of material we produce," said Lennon. "However, it seemed the only choices available were HD production islands with local storage and a basic push-pull material workflow, which would have meant that resource scheduling and system flexibility would be very limited and the workflow restricted. Also, to operate at uncompressed HD at 1.4 Gb/s, the data storage costs and network overheads were huge. The Avid DNxHD codec Avid DNxHD is a high-definition video post-production codec engineered for multi-generation compositing with reduced storage and bandwidth requirements. It was developed by Avid Technology, Inc. was the right solution for our needs." Whatmore said, "BSkyB's technical team undertook a detailed evaluation of the Avid DNxHD codec, and we found the performance very impressive indeed. We tested Avid DNxHD with our own test material sequences, which we knew to be difficult to encode successfully, as well as running multi-generation tests and concatenating other codecs The following is a list of codecs. Audio codecs Non-compression formats
BSkyB will use Avid DNxHD at 185 Mb/s because it offers full HD 1920 raster The horizontal lines (scan lines) displayed on a TV or computer monitor. This is the origin of the term "raster graphics," which is the major category that all bitmapped images and video frames fall into (GIF, JPEG, MPEG, etc.). support at 10-bit colour depth. The broadcaster also purchased five Avid(R) DS Nitris(TM) systems for its editing requirements, in order to have sophisticated compositing tools and standard editing functions available in one system. The systems will be producing promo-style sports packages, studio inserts, and programme material for other HD channels. "At 185 megabits per second (unit) megabits per second - (Mbps, Mb/s) Millions of bits per second. A unit of data rate. 1 Mb/s = 1,000,000 bits per second (not 1,048,576). E.g. Ethernet can carry 10 Mbps. , the bit rate is still slightly under uncompressed SD. This means we can attach five concurrent HD clients to an Avid Unity(TM) MediaNetwork, providing around 90 hours of mirrored online HD shared storage at a cost point slightly less than standard uncompressed SD," Whatmore said. "Another key benefit of using Avid Unity is the ability to freely schedule work and editors in any suite and simply pick up a job without having to manually move media between clients." "BSkyB's adoption of Avid DNxHD is a significant event for Avid and the wider postproduction community," said Miguel Ferros, Avid's product marketing manager for Post. "In order for European Broadcasters to embrace HD, we knew we had to deliver a postproduction pipeline that was not only as smooth as that of SD but was also cost-effective, whilst maintaining the quality of HD throughout the entire postproduction process. We are very happy to see BSkyB making Avid DNxHD an integral part of their move into HD." About BSkyB British Sky Broadcasting (BSkyB) is the operator of the UK's largest digital television platform and a leading broadcaster of sports, movies, entertainment, and news. For more information visit www.sky.com About Avid Technology, Inc. Avid Technology, Inc. is a world leader in digital nonlinear media creation, management, and distribution solutions, enabling film, video, audio, animation, games, and broadcast professionals to work more efficiently, productively, and creatively. For more information about the company's Oscar(R), Grammy(R), and Emmy(R) award-winning products and services, please visit: www.avid.com. (C) 2005 Avid Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Product features, specifications, system requirements To be used efficiently, all computer software needs certain hardware components or other software resources to be present on a computer system. These pre-requisites are known as (computer) system requirements and are often used as a guideline as opposed to an absolute rule. and availability are subject to change without notice. Avid, Digidesign, Film Composer, Pro Tools, Avid Unity, Nitris, and Avid DNxHD are either registered trademarks or trademarks of Avid Technology, Inc. in the United States United States, officially United States of America, republic (2005 est. pop. 295,734,000), 3,539,227 sq mi (9,166,598 sq km), North America. The United States is the world's third largest country in population and the fourth largest country in area. and/or other countries. Avid received an Oscar statuette representing the 1998 Scientific and Technical Award for the concept, design, and engineering of the Avid Film Composer(R) system for motion picture editing. Digidesign, Avid's audio division, received an Oscar statuette representing the 2003 Scientific and Technical Award for the design, development, and implementation of its Pro Tools(R) digital audio workstation A digital audio workstation (DAW) is a system designed to record, edit and play back digital audio. A key feature of DAWs is the ability to freely manipulate recorded sounds, much like a word processor manipulates typed words. . Oscar is a trademark and service mark of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Emmy is a registered trademark of ATAS/NATAS. Grammy is a trademark of the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences The National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences, Inc. is known variously as The Recording Academy or NARAS. Established in 1957, The Recording Academy is a U.S. , Inc. All other trademarks contained herein are the property of their respective owners. |
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