This is all fine and dandy for the professional community, but the big television manufacturers are heavily marketing UHD to you and me, and it’s high time we had some content in native 4K resolution (3840 x 2160). As of this writing, there are a few 4K streaming services available plus a few proprietary solutions — but by and large, those fortunate consumers owning gorgeous 4K displays are typically up-scaling their HD content to 4K.
However, a shining light for the emerging 4K “content” industry is just around the corner. The Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) has announced that 4K Blu-Ray discs are on the horizon for 2015.
The BDA Community
The Blu-ray Disc Association is a consortium of more than 100 companies that represent a Who’s Who in the video, film, computer, IT and electronics manufacturing communities. There are 17 board member companies, and together, the BDA develops business opportunities for Blu-Ray discs and sets standards for next-generation disc technology.
To learn more about 4K Blu-Rays and what the consumer might expect in the coming year, I spoke at length with Victor Matsuda, global promotions committee chair for the BDA. Having attended the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in 2012, and witnessing firsthand the grand introduction of 4K, I wondered about the spark that started the BDA down the path to a 4K Blu-Ray disc.
“If you look closely, the displays themselves often lead things in our industry,” said Matsuda, “and it’s the same situation here for UHD and the Blu-Ray. We saw this with the introduction of HD, and in the case of the 4K Blu-Ray, the display-related companies initiated things. Now, we’re seeing the efforts by content owners and service providers to keep the momentum going, along with groups like the BDA.”
4K Disc Development
Getting things done inside one company is challenging enough, but how can a consortium of companies collaborate to create new 4K technologies with efficiency?
“Compatibility is one of the key factors,” explained Matsuda. “All of these companies have come together to build to the specifications that the BDA has developed, in order to ensure disc and player compatibility. The BDA is a voluntary organization, and that’s the beauty of it. Each participating company has set aside resources for the different projects that the BDA undertakes. So, especially with the 4K UHD specification, it is spearheaded by working groups in each member company. Because there are many different aspects of 4K UHD, each company contributes according to their specific area of expertise — and it’s a good balance.”
Nuts and Bolts
Two types of 4K Blu-Ray discs are being studied at this time. The dual-layer 4K Blu-Ray disc would have a capacity of up to 66 gigabytes, while a three layer 4K Blu-Ray could actually take capacity into the triple digit range. Depending on the length of a film, plus all of the extra content often found on Blu-Ray discs, this increase in capacity would certainly be sufficient to store a feature-length 4K film or multiple episodes of a television program that was mastered in 4K.
One other factor in this equation is critical, and that’s compression. If you thought that the amount of data required for a feature-length HD film is massive, then the data inherent in a 4K film is four times as great — and far beyond the capacity for storage in an uncompressed format.
For a viable 4K Blu-Ray disc, serious amounts of compression will be required to lower the data rate and increase storage capacity — and that’s where H.265 enters the mix.
H.265, also known as High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) is the successor to the ubiquitous H.264, the compression scheme currently used in everything from HD Blu-Ray discs to YouTube. “Yes,” noted Matsuda, “the anticipation is that the next generation format will support H.265.”
The Timeline
I asked Matsuda when we might expect to see 4K Blu-Ray players on the shelf, along with accompanying films mastered in 4K. “The current anticipation is that licensing will start in the spring or summer of 2015,” said Matsuda. “That provides the possibility, as early as the 2015 holiday season in the U.S., for the first products coming to market. This allows the more aggressive manufacturers, and especially Hollywood, to have content on the market.”
Much More than Pixels
My industry focus has typically been pixels and resolutions, but one of the key messages of the BDA goes much farther. It highlights a wealth of “extras” that will be built in to a 4K Blu-Ray disc. “For the BDA, it is a whole lot more than the number of pixels,” explained Matsuda. “The key topics we are looking at include frame rate, bit depth, extended dynamic range and color gamut. For the consumer electronics community and Hollywood, those topics are the differentiator that enables the Blu-Ray to maintain its status as the best-of-the-best in terms of available content — far more than just pixels. With these added dimensions, it offers something very special for the Blu-Ray, and that’s a big part of our future.”
Whether or not consumers understand the physics of dynamic range and color gamut, consumers will understand that a wider dynamic range means that what is viewed in the living room more closely resembles that which the film director sees in the screening room. In addition, these extra factors will take full advantage of the advanced technology built into their 4K display, and enhance the overall viewing experience.
Matsuda notes that the next Blu-Ray disc milestone occurs at CES Las Vegas, January 2015, when the BDA will provide a project update to the industry.
And to those owners of 4K displays, a little patience is requested. The 2015 holiday season will be worth the wait.
