TSC: Digital Cinema Standards Update

John Hurst, CTO, CineCert highlighted a number of current SMPTE activities in standards for Digital Cinema, during the NAB's Technology Summit on Cinema co-produced with SMPTE. These efforts included a revision to the subtitling standard ST-4287 to accommodate stereoscopic titles during exhibition which will go to ballot this summer; and the compilation of a more detailed labelling standard for audio channels and soundfield groups in ST-428-12.

In addition, said Hurst, a study group into High Frame Rates had just wrapped and thrown up some interesting points for discussion.

“HFR is a very popular topic just now and we want to make way for the exhibition of HFR production but we discovered that there isn’t yet a consensus on what to focus on. When you talk about the principal of HFR to different people you get a different set of answers."

He explained: “We found there are two goals pursued by those interested in HFR. The first is for less motion blur and therefore more picture. The second is for more bits, which is not always coincidental with supporting more picture.”

The group is preparing a report which will assess the current environment for HFR but Hurst said he was confident that productions now will be able to survive without a lot of standards support.