TE AM FL Y
CREATING DIGITAL CONTENT
JOHN RICE BRIAN McKERNAN
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CONTENTS Introduction THROW ANOTHER ANALOG ON THE DIGITAL FIRE: CONFESSIONS OF A DIGITAL CONTENT CREATOR Peter Bergman WHAT HAPPENED TO CONVERGENCE? Nobuyuki Idei, Chairman and Chief, Executive Officer, Sony Corporation
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CHAPTER 1: A DIGITAL PRIMER, SCHUBIN-STYLE Mark Schubin
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CHAPTER 2: ANY CONTENT, ANYWHERE, ANYTIME Craig Birkmaier
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CHAPTER 3: CONVERGENCE PROGRAMMING IN SPORTS Michael Shapiro 47 CHAPTER 4: THE NEW DIGITAL CONTENT CONSUMER The Accenture Media & Entertainment Industry Group 53 CHAPTER 5: TOOLS AND THE TRADE David Leathers
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CHAPTER 6: THE NONLINEAR AGE Bob Turner
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CHAPTER 7: DIGITAL RECORDING John Rice
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CHAPTER 8: CGI AND DIGITAL CONTENT CREATION Brian McKernan and Randy Cates 115 CHAPTER 9: AUDIO: MORE THAN HALF THE PICTURE Tim Tully 131 iii
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CHAPTER 10: THE CASE FOR PROFESSIONAL COMMUNICATORS IN A DIGITAL AGE Cameron Sanders
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CHAPTER 11: THE PRACTITIONER’S VIEW George Avgerakis
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CHAPTER 12: OPENING ONLINE DOORS FOR RICH MEDIA Jon Leland
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CHAPTER 13: RICH MEDIA AND LIVE STREAMING MEDIA Al Kovalick
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CHAPTER 14: THE IMPORTANCE OF WEB-SITE DESIGN Nicola Godwin
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CHAPTER 15: DATACASTING Rick Ducey, SpectraRep, Inc.
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CHAPTER 16: THE VIDEO “PRINTING PRESS” Larry Jaffee
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CHAPTER 17: THE DTV TRANSITION Michael Grotticelli
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CHAPTER 18: FORGET HDTV; GET HDTV! Mark Schubin
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CHAPTER 19: THE PROMISE OF DIGITAL INTERACTIVE TELEVISION Jerry C. Whitaker, Editor
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CHAPTER 20: 2000: INTERACTIVE ENHANCED TELEVISION—A HISTORICAL AND CRITICAL PERSPECTIVE Tracy Swedlow, Interactive TV Today, American Film Institute–Intel Enhanced Television Workshop
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CHAPTER 21: DIGITAL CENTRALCASTING
Lowell Moulton, Senior Technology Consultant Systems Integration, Sony Electronics Inc.
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CHAPTER 22: PRODUCTION AND POSTPRODUCTION FOR 4:3 AND 16:9
John Rice
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CHAPTER 23: TELEVISION: THE “HIGH DEFINITION”
Bob Allen and Duncan Kennedy
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CHAPTER 24: IN SEARCH OF THE NEW VIEWING EXPERIENCE
Jerry Whitaker
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CHAPTER 25: COMING TO A THEATRE NEAR YOU: DIGITAL CINEMA
Brian McKernan
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CHAPTER 26: USING 1080/24P OR 1080/60I FOR DIVERSE PRODUCTION APPLICATIONS
Laurence Thorpe
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CHAPTER 27: LOW-REZ
Scott Billups
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CHAPTER 28: INTERVIEW WITH GEORGE LUCAS: BREAKING THE CELLULOID CEILING
John Rice and Brian McKernan
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CHAPTER 29: INTERVIEW WITH JAMES CAMERON: 3D DIGITAL HD
Brian McKernan, Editor
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Glossary Index
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INTRODUCTION umans have been making pictures for millennia. Roughly a century ago they learned how to make them move. As the decades progressed, movies, television, and—more recently—home video and the Internet have enhanced communication and defined human experience as never before. Color, sound, and other innovations continually improved the moving image, and today it is a global lingua franca that transcends international borders, cultures, and traditional languages by being visual. As the twenty-first century begins, humankind’s other major information technology—the computer—is revolutionizing the moving image. The technologies of computers and television have been on a collision course for some time, sharing a purpose that includes the precise capture, storage, manipulation, transmission, and presentation of information. Both even use cathode-ray tubes (CRTs) for display. Computers, however, process information digitally—as a series of 0s and 1s—an efficiency that provides many advantages when applied to movingimage technology. And as computer microprocessors and related components become ubiquitous in everything from cars to toasters to toys, they grow in power and decrease in price. The digitization of moving-image technology is by no means complete; broadcast television’s transition to digital is moving slowly, but it is already having a major impact. Video and film production are going digital, and in the process gaining improved tools for creative expression and affordability. New computer-based storage, playback, and display devices are expanding uses for moving-image content. And the Internet is providing an instant, global means of content distribution. In such a digital environment, distinctions between specific forms of moving-image media begin to blur or disappear altogether. A stream of digital data comprising moving images and their accompanying audio can be scaled for multiple uses, depending on how much picture and sound information is necessary. Movies, TV shows, videos, and even simple computer
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presentations become, in truth, a quantity of data existing as binary digits, or bits. The moving images that have traditionally been defined according to the technologies used to create and display them are now liberated for multipurposing; they have become, in reality, “digital content.” This new world that moving-image creatives find themselves in at the dawn of the twenty-first century is what this collection, Creating Digital Content, is all about. The impact of the digital content creation age is only just starting to be felt. This book is intended to introduce the reader to a broad range of existing areas that are being affected, and, in so doing, enhance understanding of this fundamental industrial transition, business opportunity, and communications revolution. Although we do not anticipate that the many areas encompassed by digital content creation will see overnight change (e.g., feature filmmakers won’t suddenly become indistinguishable from corporate video professionals), we do feel it’s imperative that those in the video, motion-picture, broadcast, news, entertainment, Internet, and education sectors understand the nature of the changes wrought by digital content creation revolution. First and foremost is that program production is being democratized, with increasingly more affordable—and yet powerful—technologies. And whether for entertainment, education, business, or other purposes, digital content can be consumed via a growing array of devices. This situation opens up potentially rich new possibilities for content creators, but it also increases competitive pressures. Ultimately, it will be creative talent and innovative thinking that will determine success. Digital is a great equalizer that reduces the cost of entry, but we should remember that Shakespeare did quite well without a laptop. Digital content creation technology has many intriguing possibilities. Assuming there is sufficient data, content can be repurposed for multiple displays: theatrical movie screens, consumer televisions, small computer windows, or even hand-held devices and cell phones. As data, moving and still images are assets that can be managed—stored, cataloged, indexed, and repurposed with minimal or no loss in quality. Archived news footage can be retrieved instantly for broadcast. Images or por-
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tions of images can be digitally “cut and pasted” for economical repurposing in alternate versions or to customize advertising for different demographics. A high-resolution three-dimensional computer graphic can be used to mold a solid object; a two-dimensional image from a digital movie or TV show can be output in printed form as a billboard, a book, or even a t-shirt. The uses applied to digital content creation tools will be determined by the creative talents using them and by current and future market forces. As time goes on, HDTV, interactive cable, and greater Internet bandwidth will present further challenges and opportunities to moving-image professionals. We have assembled a collection of essays by a broad array of uniquely qualified experts who have graciously provided the background, tutorials, and analysis necessary for understanding many of the changes brought about by the digital content creation age. We are grateful to these contributors, all of whom tackled topics worthy of separate books in their own right. It is our hope that this edition will enable moving-image professionals to adapt and prosper in these changing times, and to participate in the evolution of what is, in the end, storytelling, one of humanity’s oldest and most important forms of communication, welcome to the Age of Digital Content Creation. John Rice, Brian McKernan August 2001
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FOREWORD THROW ANOTHER ANALOG ON THE DIGITAL FIRE: CONFESSIONS OF A DIGITAL CONTENT CREATOR PETER BERGMAN
or 25 years I had no trouble describing what I did or who I was. I was a comedian, an artist turning out high-end comedy on records and stage with my band of brothers, The Firesign Theatre. But those halcyon days are over thanks to the advent of the digital revolution. Ah, the digital revolution, operating at 800 million clock cycles a second, processing 11 trillion machine decisions every 20 minutes, and producing four ex-billionaires every six months. I should have seen it all coming with the arrival of Bill Gates, the Kubla Khan of the Nerds. He does possess the perfect digital name. Think about it: Microchips are nothing but millions and millions of little gates opening and closing, and he’s billing us for it. In this strange new cyber landscape, peopled with the Princes of Packet-share, the Esquires of E-Commerce, the Browser Barons, and the Dukes of URL, I could no longer
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compete as a simple artist; I’ve had to reinvent myself as a “digital content creator.” Me digital? How could I, the last baby born before the boom—how could I, the youngest member of the generation whose oldest member is Bob Dole, ever hope to be digital? I certainly didn’t grow up digital. The only computer I encountered as a schoolboy was a picture of the Univac on the front page of Life magazine. It looked like a giant black toaster that took up three rooms. In college I was never in the same room with a computer, which explains why I failed to grasp Shakespeare’s underlying inherent interactive message when I studied him in freshman English: 2B~
