Opinion by David I. Winter

Digital Video enthusiast, computer expert and analyst David Winter predicts the course of digital video for the next year in this extensive road map into the new century.

Up to today, with a limited exception of some web-resolution devices, all pro-sumer videography has been held captive to national TV standards. With the advent of HDTV, DTB and the major push by PC vendors to establish the Internet as a core home entertainment medium, this grip of the national TV standards must be weakening.

Also, with the convergence of technologies arises some interesting possibilities. Let’s take a look at what the next 12-18 months might hold….

First – what do we know about?
Well, Hitachi has been announcing DVD-RAM based camcorders for a number of years. Digital recording to VHS tape is being standardized with D-VHS, but no MPEG-2 digital connection standard has been announced. D-VHS uses 4:2:2 color sampling with the MPEG-2 CODEC. Digital video recording to 8mm tape is into its second generation with Sony’s Digital 8 TRVx20 series. At the industrial and broadcast levels, we have 4:2:2 acquisition and transfer using one or other implementation of SDI. Included here is Digital-S, digital recording on S-VHS tape. MPEG-2 based editing is now becoming widespread.

HDDs have been in use in laptops and notebook for many years. HDDs are rapidly getting larger. Where 9G was big in 1997, 37G is big in 1999 and ??? is big in 2000. IDE with IDE RAID is displacing SCSI for video editing. Firewire hard drives are entering the market early in 2000, mainly as IDE drive adapters.

DVD-RAM hasn’t replaced the floppy disk, yet. DVD media is mainly single sided and has reached a production standard of 4.7G a side.

Internet set-top units for TVs are now available.

Hard disk based time shift recording for TV, especially pay-TV, is now available – some products come with ad-removal software and catch up capabilities. Hard disk capacity densities are well above DVD, due mainly to multi-platter technology.

With the Internet, market expectations are now global, not regional. The DVD region scheme has been broken, in at least 2 places: resetting the zone on DVD-ROM drives, and the encryption key..

While MPEG-2 has gained popularity as a superior CODEC standard to M-JPEG for capture of analog source into NLE, also as the CODEC of choice for D-VHS and the CODEC used with DVD movies, no doubt research into compression systems is continuing. At present, a lot of effort seems to be placed into getting a useable form of video for dial-up Internet (36-56k) connections.

The DV CODEC is an early attempt, a compromise providing for linear digital editing as well as NLE. It is also the product of companies with broadcast interests. It has inherent limitations and can be lossy. It does not do blue chromakey well. It will be progressively replaced by devices that have MPEG-2 among a range of CODEC choices.

We also know that light sensitivity of consumer digital camcorders has been much poorer than the preceding crop of consumer Hi8s. Depth of field has suffered. 37mm front elements suit small footprint devices, but do not gather as much light as the larger pro lenses. Also, longer zooms are offered to the domestic market, with consequent loss of lens “speed” (light transmitting ability), but better glass to “prosumers”.

LCDs and color viewfinders have been of limited resolution, and unsuited to fine manual focussing. The trend has been to progressive increases in pixel count. 16:9 format will need support as we move towards the HDTV environment.

Consumer camcorders increasingly emphasize dual roles – with megapixel stills capability alongside ITU-R601 format video.

So what can we conclude?

1.      Hard disk recording for video is firmly established.

2.      4:2:2 is the color sampling of choice

3.      Interlaced TV standards are now an historical legacy with probably a limited life

4.      Digital distribution by DVD, DTB and HDTV is beginning to replace analog TV and VHS

5.      We don’t have a digital connection standard for MPEG-2, eg for DVD to D-VHS to MPEG-2 NLEs

6.      Hard disks are robust enough for use in laptops and notebooks – a similar environment to camcorders

7.      Global expectations render national TV standards irrelevant and counterproductive for video acquisition

8.      SVGA and HDTV compatibility is highly desirable – and fits with stills capability expectations.

9.      LCDs and color viewfinders becoming sharper, and larger (to support 16:9)

Next Page

Camcorders
Docking Stations
NLEs
Protection of Content
Tape Formats