The MPEG-H Audio technology, substantially developed by Fraunhofer IIS, has again expanded its availability in professional broadcast equipment: It is now integrated into BBright’s UHD-Play, an uncompressed Ultra HD source, which is on display at the Fraunhofer IIS booth SU4816 at NAB Show in Las Vegas.
BBright UHD-Play is an easy-to-use and largely deployed solution for professional broadcast applications, labs, tests and proofs of concept. Accepting a large variety of file formats for uncompressed playback, it offers potential for linear broadcast channels, IPTV networks and broadcast equipment manufacturers.
In an efficient technical collaboration, Fraunhofer IIS and BBright have enabled support for MPEG-H Audio in the UHD-Play baseband player. Already authored MPEG-H content can now be ingested into the playback server, where the MPEG-H metadata is detected, interpreted and displayed to the user. All MPEG-H features are visible in the UHD-Play GUI during playback and in the content tab, including for instance all available presets and languages, multilingual labels, and the MPEG-H stream’s advanced interactivity and accessibility features. The UHD-Play GUI also provides information about the channel configuration, plus the number and type of available audio objects together with their loudness information.
This design enables enhanced quality control: the content creator has a complete overview of all Next Generation Audio features authored in the MPEG-H metadata for each part of their content, and can easily detect any potential errors in the authoring.
UHD-Play outputs uncompressed A/V content, including the MPEG-H metadata control track, and delivers it over SDI to a live encoder, which is fully controlled by the MPEG-H metadata control track.
BBright’s Marketing Director Laurent Appercel said: “We started working with Fraunhofer IIS only a few months back, and now our market-leading Ultra HD player is already capable of supporting the MPEG-H NGA Codec with the full range of features. This will allow end consumers to enjoy a truly immersive and user‑adaptive sound, thanks to this object-based audio technology for broadcast.”
Stefan Meltzer, Chief Business Development Manager in the Fraunhofer IIS Audio and Media Technologies Division, adds: “The BBright UHD-Play is a very innovative and successful product in the market, and therefore it was an exciting opportunity for us to enhance it with MPEG‑H capabilities. It adds another element to the MPEG-H Audio ecosystem covering the complete broadcast chain, and consolidates MPEG-H Audio’s position as the only Next Generation Audio system supported by multiple third-party products.”
Visitors to NAB Show 2019 in Las Vegas, which runs through April 11, can take a look at the MPEG-H-enabled BBright UHD-Play device at the Fraunhofer booth (SU4816). Further information about the BBright UHD-Play solution with MPEG-H support is available here: http://www.bbright.com/product-details/uhd-play
To learn more about MPEG-H Audio, please visit https://www.iis.fraunhofer.de/mpeg-h and www.mpegh.com
Header image © BBright/Fraunhofer IIS