IBC 2016 – meet the future today

We continue to publish materials about the trip of the winners of the International Conference "The digital and information technology in the electronic media industry" to  IBC Congress broadcasters in Amsterdam. The author of following notes is Maria Zhitina, the 3rd year student of the Faculty of Management and Media Communications

        Preparation

My participation in International Broadcasting Convention (IBC2016) actually started in April, when I began my preparation to a student conference at the university where I study. It was a challenge! The most competent students could attend IBC2016 in Amsterdam. Well, I could not miss that opportunity, so I decided to do a review of one of the last year’s convention hot topics: 8K Television. I could not hide the excitement that I felt during the conference, and nothing could compare to the euphoria, when I heard from Martin Salter, Director of the Educational Foundation of the International Association of Broadcasting Manufacturers IABM, my name among the winners. 

Frankly, it inspired me, perhaps the first time for 2 years of study, for serious conscious activities as part of my academic process and beyond. I heard many times about such contests at my university, but always thought: “That’s not for me, I have no chance”, - so I could not believe in my luck. I also was the youngest among my colleagues, and still had no particular direction, what to study for my future career. What kind of research am I mostly interested in? That’s why after sudden triumph I immediately began to explore, what actually IBC is and what it can give me.

        First impression

IBC represents mainly an exhibition and a conference, but in addition also other specialized sections, such as Rising Stars program (any student may submit absolutely free application for participation), Hackfest (where developers, designers and entrepreneurs come together for 36 hours to brainstorm and build an idea in an innovative environment) etc. Visit all the booths and events at the exhibition is not possible, so they are very reasonably divided into thematic sections: "Deliver & distribution", "Business models", "Advances in technologies", "Content & advertising". Thus, a student of any specialization, technical or humanitarian, will be able to find the most interesting and relevant to his or her studies. The most valuable thing at this event for me was the opportunity to ask any question regarding the latest technologies from around the world directly to the developers and engineers, who represent the project! It really is a rare opportunity for a student! On the first day when I arrived to RAI (exhibition complex) I was impressed by its huge size, however it wasn’t hard to find necessary area due to friendly and responsive employees of RAI.

Future now

Especially it is worth mentioning the exhibition space called Future zone, with the most recent and seemingly so far away from our daily lives novelties such as: electronics software and content for virtual reality, cameras with the viewing angle of 4 pi steradians, new displays with high dynamic range and ultra-high resolution... Being guided in the selection of the most interesting lectures was not so difficult due to the preliminary planning and especially selected by the organizers speakers. So I was lucky to hear from the producer of "Game of Thrones" about using of advanced computer animation technologies in the creation of the series, visit the world's first showing of the new movie directed by Ang Lee, that was filmed using the latest cinematographic equipment and demonstrated in a unique cinema hall. I never thought that such technologies exist, and moreover, people already use them. And what is the most important discovery, I can use them too! 

        A few words about NHK

As I did my research work about 8K Super Hi-Vision UHD Television in Japan based on the last year’s results of the Japan Broadcasting Corporation (NHK), I could not miss their stand and see, how they improved their technologies. In August they started first satellite broadcasting, even featured subtitles for viewers with auditory disabilities. The test broadcasting also included a service that uses 8K receiver to display data received through the Internet in HTML 5 format. On their stand NHK presented their screen sign language interpreter technology, 8K HDR screens and televisions with 22.2 audio channels support. So they have been doing great job from the last year.

        What I got from IBC

IBC helped me a lot, first of all, was to understand, what’s happening in media industry now. I found out about a huge potential of virtual reality technologies (it can be used not only in computer games industry, but also in educational process, preparation for some special activities and even in broadcasting to provide full immersion) and it’s actual issues (low resolution of content, lack of unified standards for both content and technologies etc.). I understood, that in the future of content production we would see not only enhanced resolution and high dynamic range, but also more tools to create 360° content. The first session, that I attended, was about metadata - one of the hot topics of this year’s convention. I found out, that there would be necessary to collect and keep more metadata of video and audio content for commercial needs – I never thought about this sphere of activity.

        On the verge of art and technology

        (Pic.3) I suppose, the most valuable thing happens when engineering genius meets artistic creativity, because nobody needs modern technique if it has no application in our lives. IBC is the event where I watched them both acting together – for example – super-high resolution (4K-8K) of new cameras allows shootings with big zoom, what can capture all emotions of actors during battle scenes. That expands abilities of cinematographers. Or another example: Bjork, a famous Icelandic singer, releases her next album with VR 360 interactive content for every song, and I had a chance to try one song with VR glasses… It was brand new experience, that I did not expect to have in 2016!

        Free time in Amsterdam

        And also I won’t forget to mention my impressions about Amsterdam! I’ve seen many lovely cities around the Europe and there were no place as inspiring as my native Saint-Petersburg, but I avow, that Amsterdam, which got quite similar landscapes, is more beautiful. It’s architecture, as old as modern, is stunning. What impressed me mostly is the living space solution – there are houses located right on the surface of numerous canals and rivers. There are numerous cyclists, from small kids to old ladies and gentlemen, because bicycle is the most comfortable and democratic vehicle there. The public transport work like clockwork, and people are extremely nice and helpful. It’s a pleasure, I think, returning in Amsterdam on IBC every year, not only because of useful information but also magic atmosphere of the autumn city.

        In conclusion

        When you see something revolutionary new already existing, what are the burning issues of the media sphere, your own ideas and motivation to implement them appear. For me it is the most valuable lessons I learned. And I sincerely thank IABM for providing me the possibility to inspire myself to future and current studies, and especially Martin Salter and Andy Jones for their support during the convention!

Mariia Zhitina

the 3rd year student

of the Faculty of Management and Media Communications