THE EVOLUTION OF TECHNOLOGY IN VIRTUAL PRODUCTION: UNLEASHING NEW POSSIBILITIES
In almost every hall at NAB 2023, one could see offerings related to virtual production, virtual sets and real-time performance capture mapped to real-time animation—all at a fraction of the price of the year earlier and the year before that. And while a physical matte painting may be a thing of the past, those images, landscapes and worlds (and the artists now working in digital) have no boundaries. It would be a disservice to attempt to capture how much of this was at NAB 2023.
But what is clear is the continual evolution of compute, networking, storage, visualization and incorporation of data types necessary for virtual production resulting in creating believable and economically achievable content. Those technology factors, again, represent an evolution that has been playing out for decades.
HOW CAN VIRTUAL PRODUCTION CREATE COST-EFFECTIVE CONTENT?
Virtual production, massive LED walls and the ability to track and render very quickly (real-time in many cases) without a physical building full of hardware results in expanding the visual look of a production without the usual associated increases in costs. Do you cut a scene because you can't travel to a distant location due to budget constraints? This is the question that has always plagued the content production team. Not only has this not been the case for a long time (think really great "green screen") but the difference is that the post-production stage (removing the green screen, tracking the actors, adding 3D elements, adding set extensions, etc.) all can be done live, "in camera" and changed digitally. For example, an actor is interacting with a 3D element that needs to be slightly altered. That is now an easy action to call for and implement during the actual shooting stage.
WHAT ROLE DOES THE CLOUD PLAY IN VIRTUAL PRODUCTION?
At NAB 2023, almost all of the hyperscalers were in attendance, each hosting the myriad of independent software vendors (ISVs) whose applications are running in some form of bare metal, cloud-ready or cloud-native. Similar infrastructures that enable viewers to consume streaming video services over-the-top are being utilized to re-create and transform the live-to-cloud broadcast experience.
THE EVOLUTION OF BROADCAST FACILITIES: FROM PURPOSE-BUILT WORKSTATIONS TO THE CLOUD
The broadcast facility of the future is here now, and all of the evolutionary aspects of technology, which have been cited above, combine to take the workflows and processes that used to only occur within a purpose-built, bespoke, four-wall facility and make them available worldwide, as long as you have the right amount of compute, network, storage, applications, acceptable latency, licensing, etc.
Let's put this into practical perspective. You can have REMI (remote integration model) by connecting from the remote location to a centralized broadcast facility. This was how it was done in the "old days" of 2012. Today, to do REMI at scale, distributed cloud is the way to go. Reliability, redundancy, acceptable tolerances of latency and cost-effectiveness are the benefits of utilizing the cloud. Further, we will experience more Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS), Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) and Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) offerings that are broadcast specific. Do I personally think we'll see what is within the four walls of the bespoke broadcast facility offered in some form of PaaS, IaaS and SaaS? Absolutely. I think this is inevitable, and in many but not all cases, it makes a lot of sense.
In an earlier entry, I outlined how the broadcast industry has moved from purpose-built workstations to appliances to software running on common-off-the-shelf (COTS) hardware. As more of the applications that are used within broadcast and other production and post-production workflows are offered as SaaS, it is clearly within reason that the infrastructure, platform and applications will be offered as a set of services.
BUILDING A CLOUD-BASED ENVIRONMENT HELPS IMPROVE PERFORMANCE AND INTERACTIVITY
In many cases, we are basically at the stage where you can say, "I am going to need 10 workstations running this editing software with this guaranteed throughput, with this amount of storage and I am going to need it for 10 people for 10 days." Infrastructure is built, software is loaded, links are created and sent to the buyer who, in turn, sends them to the 10 people who need access. Footage is sent directly from the remote location to the cloud, notices are received that are available and work ensues. This all works—today—and it will grow in usage as the applications and infrastructure are required to move to the cloud and are rewritten to be cloud-native.
There are things that don't necessarily fit into this equation. It is essential that the performance and interactivity that users have today in an on-premise environment be available in a distributed, cloud-based environment. By this, we must acknowledge that scalability implies a public cloud environment. Building and interacting with large 3D animation models presents very challenging real-time interactivity issues but are gradually being addressed.
But, inexorably, we will experience a time where a content rights holder will "rent" IaaS, PaaS and SaaS, pay for what is used, "disconnect" and then move on to the event. Investments in fixed infrastructure and real estate will be part of the calculation on what makes sense to hold and what makes sense to transition.
NEXT ENTRY: WHAT IS ATSC 3.0?
The next generation of broadcast television technology is now here with the introduction of ATSC 3.0, also known as NextGen TV, offering viewers higher video quality, better sound and innovative new features. In my next entry, I will uncover the nature of NextGen TV, its advantages and disadvantages, and its potentials in IP transmission.
Originally published 17 May 2023.
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