SMPTE at the 2024 NAB Show

The NAB Show is one of the biggest media technology events in the world. Tech companies from all over the world come to this event to share technology, insights, and solutions. SMPTE was one of those organizations, and hosted many educational sessions that shined a light on innovative solutions and revelations happening in the industry.

"SMPTE came to the 2024 NAB Show with the goal of educating industry leaders and beginners on who SMPTE is, what we have accomplished, and what we aim to do in the coming years," said SMPTE Education VP and Home Entertainment Strategic Technical Partnerships for LG Electronics, Michael Zink. "We are thrilled that attendance for our programs significantly increased, especially during Future of Cinema, who received a total of 560 visitors. We humbly thank NAB for providing us with a platform and look forward to the industry's bright future."

SMPTE held three categories of sessions: The Future of Cinema, Rapid Industry Solutions (RiS), and special SMPTE sessions.

Future of Cinema

SMPTE's NAB journey began with Saturday's Future of Cinema sessions, specifically, "Emerging Technologies and the Role of Standards Supporting Technological Advancements." This session featured some of SMPTE's brightest stars including SMPTE President, Renard T. Jenkins, Executive Director, David Grindle, Vice President, Richard Welsh, and Education Vice President, Mike Zink among others. Discussing SMPTE Standards like ST 429, this session was a great way to remind the world of SMPTE's influence on the media tech world.

"SMPTE Education had a remarkable presence at this year's NAB Show with a robust and extensive lineup of floor sessions and the highly anticipated Future of Cinema Conference," said Maja Davidovic, SMPTE's Director of Education. "We are thrilled to share that our sessions resulted in significant turnout, promoting invaluable interactions among our members, colleagues, and friends. Throughout the event, we had the opportunity to not only reconnect with familiar faces but also to forge new connections, laying the groundwork for fruitful collaborations on future endeavors."

SMPTE has voices in all realms of media technology, including live events. The session, "How Capturing a Musical Event for Global Audiences Enhances the Immersive Experience and Breaks Traditional Barriers," showcased the tools used to capture and distribute live events, making them more accessible to the public. Moderated by Senior Entertainment Technology & Crafts Editor at Variety VIP+, Carolyn Giardina, the session revealed a bright future for live event distribution.

Immersive experiences are something SMPTE is very interested in, which is why the session, "The Art and Science of IMAX," was extremely popular. Moderated by VP of Post-Production, Original Content, and Image Capture at the IMAX Corporation, Greg Ciaccio led a riveting conversation on how IMAX works and enhances the viewing experience.

The final Future of Cinema session, "Behind the Scenes of the Sphere," showcased the technology and workflows required to make the largest LED screen in the world function. The MSG Sphere in Las Vegas, Nevada is an innovative, immersive live event space, and requires a ton of work to maintain. It was a fascinating way to end the first day of the 2024 NAB Show.

"It was encouraging to witness the enthusiasm and engagement surrounding SMPTE's initiatives, particularly those centered around advancing education within our industry," remarked Davidovic. "We extend our heartfelt gratitude to everyone who contributed to the success of SMPTE's program at NAB Show 2024."

Rapid Industry Solutions

SMPTE's RiS initiative has done incredible work since its inception, particularly in the realms of camera lens metadata and virtual production.

"NAB was a phenomenal success for the RIS-OSVP Advisory Group, featuring three dynamic panel discussions," said Dr. Ryan Hendricks, Sr. Manager, RIS Initiative, On-Set Virtual Production at SMPTE. "Snehal Patel led a discussion on Camera Metadata and Tracking for ICVFX/VP, Gary Adcock shared insights in our OSVP overview panel, and Chaitanya Chinchlikar presented a Case Study on Problem-Solving VP Workflow. The event also included an exclusive RIS-OSA panel led by Chris Lennon, all culminating in the highly anticipated annual RIS-OSVP Afterparty at Vu Studios."

Indeed, the final SMPTE session on Saturday, "SMPTE Virtual Production Panel," dealt with the tools and strategies for working with LED volumes. Some of the biggest names in virtual production, including Principal Engineer of Imaging Applications at Aputure, Tim Kang, and Global Leader M&E Film/TV & GameTech Partners at Amazon/AWS, Jack Wenzinger, gave valuable insight into the ins and out of virtual production.

The next RiS session, "SMPTE Camera Metadata and Tracking for VFX / VP - The Missing Link," took place on Sunday, and dealt with the latest breakthroughs of the RiS On-Set Virtual Production (OSVP) Interoperability Workstream committee for Camera Lens Metadata & Camera Tracking, including the creation of CAMDKIT, a software that helps track important metadata fields provided by cinema cameras and lenses for Visual Effects.

Monday had an RiS event as well! "A Case Study on Problem-Solving Innovations in Virtual Production Workflows," was a masterclass in virtual production workflows, and featured the brilliant minds of Virtual Production Course Lead, Vivek Kandasamy, and Vice President & Chief Technology Officer, Chaitanya Chinchlikar, of Whistling Woods International.

The final RiS session occurred on Tuesday. "SMPTE RiS-OSA: Tackling the Control Plane and Live Streaming," addressed the lack of consistency across cloud systems and live streaming platforms. RiS-OSA's own Chris Lennon, moderated the event, and discussed how SMPTE and OSA were tackling this issue by creating standardized control mechanisms.

RiS ended their NAB journey with a huge party at Vu Studios. Sponsored by Planar, Megapixel, QST-LED, MOD Tech Labs, The Studio B&H, and Pixotope, this event provided a chance to mix and mingle with the RIS-OSVP community. The party consisted of several sponsor testimonies and a special message from David Grindle. With a huge 40,000 square foot studio, featuring 2 stages and a one-of-a-kind LED Dome, Vū Vegas was the perfect place for media engineers to let loose.

"The Afterparty attracted over 125 attendees and featured four compelling testimonial presentations from sponsor speakers," said Dr. Hendricks about the event. "This event not only

highlighted the industry's keen interest in RIS-OSVP but also drew a remarkable 3/4 of attendees who were non-members, demonstrating the program's broad appeal and influence."

Special SMPTE Sessions

SMPTE had a number of special sessions starting Sunday with, "Elevate Your Career with SMPTE: Unveiling Enhanced Member Benefits and Future SMPTE Initiatives." This session was hosted by Renard T. Jenkins and David Grindle, and they wowed the audience with all the exciting SMPTE projects coming down the pipeline, like all of the new educational offerings and the expanded membership benefits. It's truly an exciting time to be a SMPTE member!

"Engaging with the individuals and helping them see how SMPTE is working to be an important part of their career growth is always exciting," said SMPTE Executive Director, David Grindle. "From our newest members to our longest committed members, we were able to continue to hear what people are seeking from their Society so that we can continue to evolve to meet the needs of a changing industry."

Speaking of SMPTE Developments, the IMF User Group (IMF UG) has returned home to SMPTE and hosted another special session on Sunday. "Mastering QC Efficiency - Leveraging IMF to Prevent Repeated Failures," showcased the features of IMF, and how the stellar standard can transform the industry by reducing the number of failures in QC workflows.

SMPTE kicked off Monday at NAB with the special session, "Exploring AI's Impact on Film and TV: SMPTE Student Insights into the Creative and Technical Evolution." Four incredible SMPTE Students, Terrlyn Byrd, Maxwell Schaefer, Anna Steele, and Myles Stelling, all of the Rochester Institute of Technology, gave an amazing presentation of how AI will transform the industry, and how their generation will responsibly usher in this new era.

The following SMPTE session on Monday also dealt with AI. "Unleashing Generative AI: Transforming Creativity in the Cloud," informed the audience of the potential benefits generative AI in different cloud systems, specifically in developing workflows, assisting with post-production, and even streamline the design process of various projects.

The final SMPTE special session at NAB dealt with SMPTE Standards. SMPTE's own Standard Director Thomas Bause Mason lead, "Empowering Innovation: Navigating SMPTE Standards - Why, How, When, and Who," which updated the audience on the current state of various Technology Committees. The session highlighted a bright future for SMPTE, as well as the entire Standards community.

Member Awards and Accolades

NAB awards are some of the most prestigious accolades the industry bestows on its leaders, and many SMPTE Corporate members were honored for their contributions. Xperi Inc. won the NAB Technology Innovation Award for showcasing in-vehicle gaming features for DTS AutoStageTM. Ross Video was awarded an Excellence in Sustainability Award for the Ultrix Hyperconverged Platform. The Platform combines routing, multi-viewer capabilities, and signal processing.

"Ross has been very focused on playing our part to be responsible global citizens when it comes to sustainability," says Ross Video's Director of Product Management for Hyperconverged Solutions, Todd Riggs. "This shows in the design of our new factory, as well as in products like Ultrix. Winning the Large

Company Sustainability Award at this year's NAB was very gratifying and validated this approach. The design around Ultrix has always been very intentional. It's something that we internally refer to as 'pragmatic stewardship.' To us that means building highly efficient, powerful, and flexible products that improve the lives of our customers with a more compact equipment footprint."

Many SMPTE Corporate Members also won Product of the Year Awards, including:

• Lawo
• Cobalt Digital
• Black Magic Design
• Grass Valley
• Fujifilm
• RED Digital Cinema
• Sony Electronics
• Canon
• NEP Group
• Panasonic
• Black Magic Design
• Disguise Systems Limited
• Telos Alliance
• Cobalt Digital
• TSL
• AWS
• swXtch.io
• Techex
• Telestream
• Appear
• Megapixel
• Riedel Communications
• Seagate Technology
• Rohde & Schwarz
• IMAX
• TAG Video Systems
• Vu Technologies
• IHSE USA
• NEP Group
• NBCUniversal and Fincons Group
• Synamedia
• Eluvio, Inc.

Conclusion

The 2024 NAB Show featured incredible sessions from some of the biggest names in the media technology industry. SMPTE reminded the world that we are part of that elite group, innovating technology and standards and shaping the careers of current and future leaders. NAB attendees flocked to these sessions to learn, network, and experience positive change.

"SMPTE volunteer leaders and staff continue to share the energy and work that is going on within the Society and that was evident at NAB," said David Grindle. "I was particularly pleased to see our sessions full, often to capacity, as we discussed projects that are ongoing and the results to be shared."

SMPTE also wants to acknowledge all the other organizations that made this event great, including the generous host, NAB. Without these participants, events like these wouldn't be possible, and SMPTE appreciates all the innovations and insights shared by their peers. Overall, this event was a tremendous success, and SMPTE couldn't be more proud to stand among the great leaders of media technology. We look forward to seeing everyone here next year!

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