HDR Discussion Thread

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Lots of HDR and HFR related papers will be presented at the upcoming 2016 SMPTE Annual Technical Conference & Exhibition in October.

As we move to next week with the Annual SMPTE Technical Conference and Exhibition event in Hollywood, Ca., the report from the September meeting hosted by EBU in Geneva is now available for public purview….
https://www.smpte.org/standards/meeting-reports

I’ll add a few details for clarification and expansion which are not included in the report, so the following is not redundant info -

With regards to the “project to amend ST 2084 High Dynamic Range Electro-Optical Transfer Function of Mastering Reference Displays is about to begin”. What participants are mainly talking about here is that the digital representation in ST 2084 is not normative so there is really no standard for how to encode the values. The result has been inconsistent encodings outside SMPTE. So the plan is to update the Annex A to provide normative encodings.

With regards to ST 2086 being considered for revision, what the group is talking about here basically is to consider resolving the ambiguity over the meaning of value 0; unknown or 0 cd/m2

With regards to the ST 2094 document suite, you’ll notice that all documents with the exception of ST 2094-2 have now published (and are available for purchase). As to what’s up with 2094-2....

The DG is preparing info on how details of SEI messages for each of the four application formats can be found. Patent statements for Parts 1,10, and 30 have been received. There was a suggestion that a Part for use with IMF is needed, but nothing has progressed on that front. The DG is anxious to publicize this work and aid the user community to understand how it can be used. There has been considerable interest by other industry bodies.

[Richard Paul]

The Main 10 still picture profile just got approved so given time it will be seen in consumer products. With AOMedia releasing their free format early next year that might cause some trouble but companies generally avoid free formats due to litigation worries. With patent law you are guilty until proven innocent.

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

With regards to the “project to amend ST 2084 High Dynamic Range Electro-Optical Transfer Function of Mastering Reference Displays is about to begin”. What participants are mainly talking about here is that the digital representation in ST 2084 is not normative so there is really no standard for how to encode the values. The result has been inconsistent encodings outside SMPTE. So the plan is to update the Annex A to provide normative encodings.

I heard that the revision was mostly because BT.2100 allows for both limited range and full range values.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Richard Paul

The Main 10 still picture profile just got approved so given time it will be seen in consumer products. With AOMedia releasing their free format early next year that might cause some trouble but companies generally avoid free formats due to litigation worries. With patent law you are guilty until proven innocent.

Since Jack Holm’s liaison from the ICC to SC29 about HLG issues fizzled at the HEVC meeting down in San Diego earlier this year, I’m sort of interested in what he has to present on Tuesday…
http://www.cvent.com/events/smpte-20...5c86da862.aspx

Originally Posted by Richard Paul

I heard that the revision was mostly because BT.2100 allows for both limited range and full range values.

I was trying to be diplomatic to all parties involved by saying “outside SMPTE” and ending the sentence at that point. Yes, the ITU in ITU –R BT. 2100 specified an unexpected full-range encoding.

Another cause for revision. although I didn’t mention it above because it’s rather esoteric to folks here because they don’t pay much attention to SDI is to remove the bit about SDI encoding.

[Richard Paul]

The content color volume SEI message looks like it is going to become an odyssey. What should have been a simple SEI message with five values (three color primaries, min brightness, and max brightness) is getting some very complex proposals.

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Another cause for revision. although I didn’t mention it above because it’s rather esoteric to folks here because they don’t pay much attention to SDI is to remove the bit about SDI encoding.

It is rather impressive that SDI is still relevant after 25+ years and that SMPTE is releasing new versions of it that can handle 4K/HDR/WCG.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Richard Paul

The content color volume SEI message looks like it is going to become an odyssey.....

It aint for the faint of heart, that’s for sure.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by ray0414

Dolby

SoCal Locals:
If all work continues to progress accordingly and there is no unforeseen delay(s), the opening for the Dolby Cinema auditorium at the AMC Orange (across from the UCI Medical Center) is on for Nov. 11.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

for revision

Though, please keep in mind that revisions and updates to published Standards documents and practice recommendations are not exclusive to SMPTE, as they do occur with working parties from other Standards bodies too, for example ITU….

https://www.itu.int/md/R15-WP6C-C-0125/en
https://www.itu.int/md/R15-WP6C-C-0109/en

At the very least, it keeps the Chair and 3 Vice-Chairs busy.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Richard Paul

Not that many proposals at this meeting.

At the time I'm typing this post, the ad hoc group report on HDR/WCG visual testing is not yet available for download purview by the public-at-large, so until then, I can inform readers that particular report summarizes the activities that took place between the prior to (and partly at) the JCT-VC meeting in Chengdu

As to the later, with participation from ~ 10-15 expert observers on Oct. 19th, there was viewing of nearly 50 minutes of Netflix test material which was divided into 3 clips:

Meridian, 4K, 60fps (background info – https://forum.blu-ray.com/showthread...4#post12752084 )
Chimera, 4K, 60fps
Cosmo Laundromat, HD (2084x850, 24fps)

A large number of candidate 10 sec. sub clips were suggested. Further work is required to down select a reasonable number of test sequences. Thanks goes out to Netflix for supplying the test material and to Samsung for supplying the display upon which to view it.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

At the time I'm typing this post, the ad hoc group report on HDR/WCG visual testing is not yet available for download purview by the public-at-large,....

But today it is.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

the Annual SMPTE Technical Conference and Exhibition event in Hollywood, Ca.,...

Other than wondering this while driving cautiously on the SoCal freeways to the event…

Who Will Stop The Rain - Creedence Clearwater Revival -cover- - YouTube

Monday's presentations mostly belonged to the archivists whom I get the impression are feeling underappreciated as to their worth these days, e.g. the introduction to one of the symposiums - “They all say we don’t go to theaters, we don’t buy disks we don’t even watch movies on TV – so why should anybody bother restoring films anymore?....”

[Penton-Man]

For those not attending or late to the show due to traffic or what not, streaming live now, with Doug speaking….

SMPTE 2016 Opening Keynote: Past, Present, and Future of Broadcast and Cinema - YouTube

[Penton-Man]

^ Some of yuz guys miss the unlocked live stream of this morning’s SMPTE opening keynote by Doug Trumbull and Robert Seidel which I linked above? Well , just goes to show, you’ve got to keep closer tabs on this thread for stuff that's breaking.

Note: the Q&A with the audience had to end rather abruptly as the distinguished speakers were already running overtime.

[Penton-Man]

For those not attending and totally unfamiliar, a little background on the SMPTE Annual Technical Conference & Exhibition in Hollywood….

Robert Seidel, President of SMPTE at #SMPTE2016 - YouTube

[slickkeng]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

This critic gets it - "record this moment", but warning, so as to avoid ruining the plot of the movie before you get a chance to see it, perhaps best to just read the first and last paragraphs of the review….
http://variety.com/2016/film/reviews...al-1201889270/

Just forecasting a bit here but the best we can expect on bluray is 4k 60 fps in 2d. How far out do you think a new bluray revision will happen to support 4k 3d HDR 120 fps (hfr)? Most modern TVs have this capability at least when it comes to the 4k and 120fps and 3d capability so it doesn't seem to far out there in terms of the technology. Will they have to come out with a quad layer ultra hd disc or does the bandwidth demand a newer technology beyond blurays capabilities? It seems the home theater side of the equation is now outpacing the theatrical side in terms of display technologies, but I suspect part of that equation is the Hollywood production pipeline needing to change and update.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Closer to home, at last month’s (August 2016) ASC Tech Committee meeting (which consists of various subcommittees other than the UHDTV, like for instance the NGCD, there was a demo of PQ to HLG conversion for attendees, as pictured….





Folks think that HLG can successfully (in terms of quality) be used for movie distribution if converted from a greater than 10 bit PQ master, meaning for example, from 16 bit PQ master TIFF files used as the source.

Speaking of conversions, but in this case going from your acquisition (camera) transfer function (such as S-Log3 as your OETF, or others) to ST. 2084 or HLG, whatever be the content provider’s preferred HDR distribution format of choice, a new box is coming forth….

Gary Mandle of SONY at #SMPTE2016 - YouTube

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by slickkeng

Just forecasting a bit here but the best we can expect on bluray is 4k 60 fps in 2d. How far out do you think a new bluray revision will happen to support 4k 3d HDR 120 fps (hfr)?

A big hurdle to that is that consumer television manufacturers are not so keen on 3D these days.

As to revisions, any revision to the spec and hardware or software tools to implement it depends on the degree of motivation by the board members of the BDA to aggressively champion the continued development of physical media in the future. Everyone’s mind and energy seems more directed to what Walt (the Director of Image Technologies at Dolby Labs) will be speaking about tomorrow afternoon, namely internet delivery of HDR content.

Just in terms of what we have now, as I mentioned to the OP, bruceames. months ago during which I posted the the MaxCLL histogram of a popular feature film, currently, probably the greatest handicap of the Ultra HD Blu-ray spec for colorists when mastering a movie is the lack of specification for a diffuse white luminance level thusly causing an inconsistent quality HDR 10 product (movies). I don’t envision rectifying that happening anytime soon.

Gotta run to beat the traffic as good stuff is starting at 1:30 and after that ….http://www.cvent.com/events/smpte-20...x?RefID=Travel

[Penton-Man]

Nobody Understands the Cloud - YouTube

If you need help in understanding, it’s not a mystery to those here at booth 12 (next to the beer garden in Centennial Hall) ->




Thanks goes to the vendor above ^ as well as Dalet Digital Media for sponsoring Oktoberfest last night.

[Richard Paul]

The group working on UHD-1 Phase 2 has announced that the specification has been completed and will support both HLG and PQ. The specification will be voted on by the DVB steering board next month.

[Penton-Man]

Originally Posted by Richard Paul

The group working on UHD-1 Phase 2 has announced that the specification has been completed and will support both HLG and PQ. The specification will be voted on by the DVB steering board next month.

Apparently the new spec approved by the technical module of the DVB also defines higher frame rates (>50/60 Hz). SoC makers, get busy.

As to HDR, already on a competitive note, at the Dolby booth at SMPTE, there was a demo differentiating….

David Brooks of Dolby Laboratories at #SMPTE2016 - YouTube

Despite thee ^ marketing, SES ( http://www.ses.com/4232583/en ) prefers HLG and has already thrown its support behind it (e.g. http://www.ses.com/22387025/andrew-cotton ).

[PeterTHX]

Originally Posted by Penton-Man

Apparently the new spec approved by the technical module of the DVB also defines higher frame rates (>50/60 Hz). SoC makers, get busy.

As to HDR, already on a competitive note, at the Dolby booth at SMPTE, there was a demo differentiating….

Despite thee ^ marketing, SES ( http://www.ses.com/4232583/en ) prefers HLG and has already thrown its support behind it (e.g. http://www.ses.com/22387025/andrew-cotton ).

Like on the audio side (AC-4 & MPEG-H) video will more than likely be DV for North America and HLG for Europe.