White Plains, NY – Executives from Paramount Studios and Microsoft drew standing-room only audiences to discuss anti piracy and leading work on IPTV at the 2010 annual conference and exposition produced by the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE), the world leader in motion-imaging standards. The event, held late last month in Hollywood, also drew strong attendance at more than 80 technical presentations ranging from stereoscopic 3D, cloud computing for media, and file-based workflows to next-generation TV station infrastructures and UHDTV.
“SMPTE continues to be the trusted source for industry standards, education, and leading-edge research – as well as the facilitator of important conversations around common business and technology challenges facing the communications, media, and entertainment industry,” said SMPTE president, Ken Fuller.
The four-day event kicked off with a pre-conference Seminar focused on creating efficient, future-proof media workflows within the evolving digital media ecosystem, with a focus on new tools and technologies to keep pace with emerging business models. “This part of the SMPTE event examined the architectures and business systems behind these new distribution channels – and that is key. Our focus must remain on the experience for the consumer by creating seamless, transparent delivery, no matter how complex the system.” said Clyde Smith, SVP, Global Broadcast Technology and Standards, Turner Broadcasting System, Inc.
The conference featured keynote addresses from Chris Carey, executive VP of worldwide technical operations at Paramount Pictures, about the staggering impact of film piracy, and James A. Baldwin, CTO of the Microsoft Media Platforms Business, about the lessons learned and opportunities identified in the rollout of his company’s Mediaroom IPTV solution. Clyde Smith, who also spoke during the event, highlighted the global explosion of mobile and digital content and the need to address key technologies to upgrade current storage and infrastructure systems so that they can scale with this growth.
“This conference is unique in its ability to provide both deep technology insights and a venue for critical dialogue – I can tell you that the conversations about these topics lasted well after the presentations had concluded,” said SMPTE Executive Vice-President, and incoming President, Pete Lude.
Standards Updates Across the Ecosystem
SMPTE provided several standards updates during the conference, including that of the 3D Home Master – which will be key to enabling 3D feature films and other programming to be played on home TV and computers regardless of delivery channels – as well as those related to accessibility in the broadcast, production, and broadband environments and captioning for cinema and stereoscopic 3D applications.
SMPTE Executive Director Barbara Lange characterized the conference as a great success and expressed the organization’s thanks to its local volunteer support as well as its sponsors, including Paramount Pictures, Warner Bros., Universal, 20th Century Fox, Sony, Christie, Mann Theatres, realD, Modern Videofilm, Calibre, DKP 70MM, Dolby, Harmonic, The Walt Disney Studio, Panasonic, Fixstars, and Video Equipment Rentals.
Lange also cited for appreciation Christie and Warner Bros., for hosting a special screening of a recently restored version of Alfred Hitchcock’s classic film, North by Northwest.
Resources
Papers from the 2010 SMPTE Technical Conference & Expo are available to attendees now through 10 December 2010. For access, please contact: mroldan@smpte.org. Papers will be made available for sale to the public after 10 December 2010.
To learn more about the 2010 SMPTE Technical Conference & Expo, please visit:
• Conference Blog: http://smpteconnect.blogspot.com
• Conference Program: http://www.smpte2010.org/program-guide