NABA’s Technical Committee (NABA-TC) plays a key role in ensuring that the technical needs and goals of our members are addressed in the complex, rapidly-changing technical environment of broadcasting and content distribution. NABA’s TC works to ensure that North American broadcasting interests are represented well in key international forums. A delegation representing NABA positions participates in Working Group meetings and World Radio Conferences (WRC) of the International Telecommunication Union’s Radiocommunication Sector (ITU-R), the UN agency with legal authority over world radio spectrum allocations and recommendations.
Active sub-committees are created as needed. Currently, NABA-TC members are working on: File Formats and Media Interoperability which includes the NABA/DPP Common File Format group, High Dynamic Range (HDR), Media-over-IP (MoIP), Cyber Security, and the Spectrum and ITU Sub-Committees dealing with matters leading to the WRC-23.
The NABA-TC Chair represents NABA in the World Broadcasting Unions’ Technical Committee (WBU-TC), where positions, best practices and collaborative projects of importance to the world broadcasting community are undertaken.
To read the NABA Statement on Recommendations Associated with Networked Media Open Interoperability, click here.
CYBERSECURITY SUB-COMMITTEE
This Sub-Committee’s objectives are to: establish base cybersecurity recommendations for vendor systems, software and services, establish a base cyber “hygiene” level for the information of members, exchange information on threats and mitigation best practices, and finally to provide input to technical standards.
COMMON METADATA STANDARDIZATION FOR FILE FORMATS & MEDIA INTEROPERABILITY
This Task Force’s work is based on the collective partnership of NABA, the Advanced Media Workflow Association (AMWA), the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE), the International Association of Broadcast Manufacturers (IABM), the American Association of Advertising Agencies (4A’s), and the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) as sponsors, and with the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) participating as an observer.
Bringing together manufacturers, broadcasters, advertisers, ad agencies, and industry organizations (standards bodies and trade associations) serving the professional media market, the Task Force has an ultimate goal to create greater efficiencies and cost savings for exchange of file-based content. The group’s focus is to gather and analyze requirements for a machine-generated and readable file interchange and delivery specification – including standardized and common structured metadata – for the professional media industry. Use case examples include promo, spot and program delivery from a provider to a broadcaster.
The NABA – DPP Common File Format Specification was created as a result of a survey NABA conducted on the needs and issues that challenged its members in North America. A further survey of the industry was conducted by a joint initiative of NABA, SMPTE, AMWA, AAAA, Ad-ID, IABM, ANA and the EBU, confirming the ongoing challenges in program delivery as file-based media. For more on the specifications, click here.
NABA achieved the Air-Ready Master specifications and held educational seminars in New York, Los Angeles, Atlanta, and Toronto. Find the presentations from those seminars here. NABA and DPP members in conjunction with the SMPTE have also completed work on a specification for a High Definition and an Ultra High Definition Library Master format.
MEDIA-OVER-IP SUB-COMMITTEE
The NABA Media-over-IP (MoIP) Sub-Committee was established to address the issue of live streaming production video over Professional Media Networks (PMN). This includes usage for broadcast facility internal infrastructure such as TV studio control rooms, broadcast trucks, and remote production. The NABA MoIP Sub-Committee believes that MoIP can provide significant advantages for live video workflows. These include increased density of signals, easy transmission of media signals of different formats and timing, intercom, and control over a single network infrastructure. This also facilitates the alignment of media transmission with commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) servers and Ethernet switches which may lead to virtualized, software-based video processing that provides high levels of flexibility and agility in the broadcast plant. The MoIP Sub-Committee also provides a forum and opportunity for best practices as member companies establish new streaming and OTT services.
NABA hosted a MoIP workshop, find out more here.
CHAIR
Shawn Kelly
EVP, Technology
Corus
VICE-CHAIR
Winston Caldwell
VP, Spectrum Engineering, Advanced Engineering
Fox
Clarence Hau
VP, Advanced Technology and Strategy
NBCUniversal
NABA members, please contact the Secretariat if you ever need members-only material (meeting documents, member contacts, committee documents, etc.).
CALENDAR
EBU 8th International Broadcasting Assembly
June 1, 2023 - June 2, 2023 @
Paris, France
- Intergovernmental Committee on Intellectual Property and Genetic Resources, Traditional Knowledge and Folklore (47th session) June 5, 2023 - June 9, 2023 @ Geneva, Switzerland See more details
- Radiodays North America June 8, 2023 - June 9, 2023 @ The Westin Harbour Castle, Toronto, 1 Harbour Square, Toronto, ON M5J 1A6, Canada See more details