During the IBC Awards ceremony on Sunday 14 September, the team behind the Super Hi-Vision demonstrations was rewarded with an IBC Special Award.
Dr Kubota, the director-general of NHK's research laboratories, received the price on behalf of the Broadcast Technology Futures (BTF) Group and the commercial partners involved in the Super Hi-Vision showcases.
Broadcast Technology Futures group
The BTF group is a collaboration of the BBC, IRT and RAI laboratories supported by the EBU. This group worked together with Cable and Wireless, Eutelsat, Siemens and SIS to provide the very first international transmissions of live Super Hi-Vision video. Two feeds were provided: one from London and one from Turin in Italy. The first consisted of live shots from a camera in London, coming to Amsterdam via a fibre connection. At the same time pre-recorded content was played out in Turin and contributed via two satellite transponders to the EBU Village at IBC 2008. There the signal was decoded, shown in the Village and provided to the NHK Theatre elsewhere in the RAI complex.
International collaboration
With these demonstrations, Super HI-Vision has now become an international project. The recognition from the IBC judges underlines the value of future-oriented research and international collaboration. That was also stressed during the Monday conference session "Images of tomorrow'", which discussed the future of Television Technology. Collaboraiton accros boundaries helps all to learn what technology we may be using in the future.