AV Products With Church Promise From NAB 2019

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Church.Design

Considering the strong and enduring relationship between religion and broadcasting, the NAB Show 2019 had few overt references to the house-of-worship market. That, however, is perhaps as much a commendation as it might be a slight. Even the most cursory perusal of a cable company’s channel lineup reflects how deeply religious broadcasting is embedded in the industry. Church might get overlooked at the television and radio industry’s biggest annual confab simply because it’s so profoundly woven into its fabric.

Another reason is that this particular NAB Show — its 91,460 registered attendees numbered roughly the same as last year’s 92,912, though an updated attendance number is likely forthcoming — had a lot of new things to talk about. It didn’t follow the recent trends in which many “new” products consist simply of an operating system version one decimal point higher than last year’s model. This year actually witnessed a substantial number of new products, driven by the need to replace wireless-audio systems made redundant by the loss of the 600-MHz band to mobile wireless operators and to meet the demand for new IP-based systems to move and process audio and video, among other things.

-Cameras

Cameras continue to undergo an evolutionary path that makes them smaller, smarter and sharper. For instance, Hitachi demonstrated the latest firmware updates to two of its HD compact box camera models, the DK-H200 and DK-Z50, which provide HDR support to the DK-H200 1080p camera, while also boosting the quality of the 1080i DK-Z50.

The new update brings HDR benefits for the DK-H20: increased contrast, expanded mid-tones and greater detail in dark and bright picture regions. The firmware supports HDR specifications including Hybrid Log-Gamma and HPR, which is compatible with the HDR10 open standard. The DK-Z50 got a boost in image quality from the firmware update, enabling closer picture matching with Hitachi’s Z-HD5000 broadcast studio and field production camera. With the firmware, the DK-Z50’s signal-to-noise ratio rises to more than 60dB while also enhancing its detail functions and characteristics. Expect release of the new versions of the DK-H200 and DK-Z50 in the second quarter of 2019.

-Wireless audio

... companies like Sennheiser, Shure and Audio-Technica have created entirely new wireless product lines, which will offer HOW users increased versatility and speech intelligibility and with more ease of operation.

Wireless audio has largely shuffled off the yoke of the 2017 RF reallocation. Since then, companies like Sennheiser, Shure and Audio-Technica have created entirely new wireless product lines, which will offer HOW users increased versatility and speech intelligibility and with more ease of operation.

They include Shure’s new TwinPlex line of premium subminiature (5-mm) omnidirectional lavalier and headset microphones. Alteros showed its new GTX FX8 direct-to-fiber breakout box, which mates with the company’s GTX 3224F series 6.5-GHz Ultra-Wideband (UWB) wireless platform, reflecting how far and wide wireless is reaching for in the newly constricted spectrum.

-Podcasting

Perhaps the newest major category at NAB 2019 was podcasting.

Perhaps the newest major category at NAB 2019 was podcasting. The audio-centric format, which gained popularity with the advent of Apple’s iPod over 15 years ago, faded a bit in the last decade but has come roaring back as streaming has become dominant. At the show, Focusrite announced a step-by-step tutorial for recording audio for podcasts, while Audio-Technica introduced bundles catering to the pod crowd, including two bundles with USB outputs to directly connect with computers, and two with XLR outputs to connect with professional mixers or digital interfaces.

All bundles feature a microphone with mount, ATH-M20x headphones and a new custom boom arm with desk mount. Religious broadcasters have embraced podcasting, and this show indicates that they’ll have a lot of new options to choose from for recording, editing, mixing and streaming them.

-Display technology

Crystal LED technology allows Sony to use multiple panels together seamlessly as if they were one because the panels themselves do not have visible borders.

Display technology is always a broad category for this show, but especially this year, where rubrics including 4K, 8K, digital signage (hardware and software), TV sets, video monitors, tablets and mobile devices, and other types of video displays were, well, on display. Crowning them all was Sony’s massive 63-by-17-foot 16K Crystal LED wall at its stand. The wall (or should we say The Wall) isn’t one single display. Rather, Crystal LED technology allows Sony to use multiple panels together seamlessly as if they were one because the panels themselves do not have visible borders. The panels offer high brightness and can support a maximum refresh rate of 120 fps, so it remains coherent no matter what angle it’s viewed at. 16K may be a tease at the moment, but Sony’s grand gesture underscores the fact that 4K is here now and 8K — Sharp exhibited an entire 8K ecosystem featuring a small 8K camera, 8K camcorder, 8K editing equipment, and 8K monitor at the show — is right around the corner, and house-of-worship video will be forever changed.

-IP-based signal transport

Finally, IP-based signal transport, which will continue to help multisite churches project their media, was in abundance at NAB 2019, from consoles to intercoms. Calrec had three new virtual products this year, the RP-1, VP-2 and Type-R, all IP based. Clear-Com showed its new IP- V-Series Iris intercom panel, which provides low-latency AES67 AoIP audio for Eclipse HX users. The Telos Alliance showed the next generation of Telos Infinity IP Intercom solutions featuring the new Infinity Link for site-to-site connectivity over WAN and the Linear Acoustic UPMAX ISC, a SMPTE ST 2110-30-compliant dedicated hardware upmixer supporting the immersive audio capabilities of ATSC 3.0. Lawo’s Power Core RP is a fully featured remote production solution for the company’s mc² audio consoles with integrated modular I/O, DSP and IP streaming capabilities, and with high density DSP functionality in a WAN-capable IP node.

The NAB Show 2019 gave us plenty to think about, probably a year’s worth. More than enough until we get hit with the next round of combined innovation and complication at the NAB Show 2020, Apr. 18-22 at the Los Vegas Convention Center.