In technological terms, a trend can have several different interpretations or even stages. It can be applied to an emerging audio technology that is not yet fully mature or adopted. Once uptake is underway a trend becomes current, as an increasing number of broadcasters begin to follow the initial adopters until that particular technology is firmly established in the market.
This does not happen immediately, which means an innovation can keep appearing at NAB Show for several years and seem like it is not that new at all anymore.
The reality is that implementation often takes a long time, as broadcasters’ replacement cycles or plans for new facilities come around and they get ready to install what are still the latest systems. This point is illustrated by Costa Nikols, strategy adviser for media and entertainment at Telos Alliance, who quotes Devoncroft Associates research showing that upgrading the audio infrastructure, which had been well outside the “Top 10” of broadcast priorities, was now in the “Top 5.”
Changing Priorities
“There’s a lot of investment going into improving audio quality, incorporating Next Generation Audio [NGA],” he says, referring to an umbrella term to define immersive and personalized audio experiences. “That also brings all these immersive experiences and customization and personalization features to the table, but how long is that going to take?
“I think we’re just at the beginning of something that’s going to be exciting and wonderful,” Nikols adds. “But if you look at the early adopters, it’s generally the national broadcasters that have adopted SMPTE ST 2110 and 2022-6 initially. Slowly, it will make its way out to the station groups and Tier 2 and Tier 3 broadcasters.”
The most visible NGA system is Dolby Atmos immersive audio. Atmos is specified by many of the leading streaming platforms, including Netflix and Amazon Prime Video, but it’s not yet a standard part of linear broadcast transmissions. But, as Nikols points out, there is a growing market for enhanced sound that goes beyond TV and into mobile and other areas.
“Around the time of last year’s NAB Show, the number of devices that supported Dolby Atmos was 1.5 billion,” he says. “The most recent figure is over 3 billion, so it pretty much doubled by the beginning of this year. But the market, as far as the content providers are concerned, is not really delivering on the capabilities of the consumer electronics that are already deployed.”
Forward-Looking Feature
Professional equipment is also ready for the wider rollout of NGA and immersive systems, with all leading mixing console manufacturers accommodating technologies such as Dolby Atmos on their new and current desks.
“Global events often incorporate NGA formats like Atmos as they tend to push the technological boundaries,” Christian Struck, senior product manager for audio infrastructure at Lawo, says. “NGA has been a topic of interest for over a decade and we have integrated these capabilities into our systems, both physical and virtual. There is a gradual increase in demand for immersive audio and it remains a forward-looking feature for people exploring advanced audio workflows. Real-time metadata transport as defined in SMPTE 2110-41 will also help push this.”
Henry Goodman, director of product management at Calrec Audio, agrees most audio consoles now on the market enable immersive mixing, but does not see it as a priority for many viewers.
“Whether the public is taking advantage [of what immersive programming is available] is still quite a big question,” he says. “And the vast majority of distributed content is still not immersive.”
A parallel situation exists with the adoption of Audio Over IP (AoIP), Goodman adds, noting that Calrec is still selling consoles that are not SMPTE ST 2110-compliant.
“AoIP is getting towards being the norm, but it’s not across the board yet,” he says. “And you’ve also got different types of AoIP. On smaller systems, people are using Dante for connectivity and while it’s IP, it’s not a 2110 infrastructure.
“For larger, major investments people are certainly building AoIP infrastructures, but there’s still some way to go [because] if you’ve got a lot of investment in baseband audio and video, it’s not a slam dunk that when you upgrade one of those studios you would necessarily choose to go IP because of the impact it has on the rest of the system,” Goodman says.
The Importance of Having an IP Backbone
Phil Owens, senior sales engineer for Wheatstone, agrees that although old technologies continue to play a part in audio installations, there is now more of a swing towards newer formats.
“While legacy equipment still needs to be incorporated, the backbone of pretty much all new systems will be IP,” he says. “The flexibility of an IP network is the primary driver for this. As full 2110 networks become more widespread, stations are adapting the IP approach even if they don’t implement 2110 right away. Having a basic IP infrastructure keeps that door open.”
IP also plays a key role in remote and distributed production, which, again, have been a consideration for over five years and, after getting a boost during the pandemic, are growing in scope and reach.
“Distributed production is not just about saving costs, it’s about utilizing the facilities that you’ve got more effectively and more efficiently,” Calrec’s Goodman observes. “And we’ve had quite a lot of discussions with broadcasters about them widening their content offering with more niche-type sports because, by looking at doing things with remote production in a more distributed way, they can then justify covering sports that they would never have been able to justify covering before.”
Lawo’s Struck agrees that the rise of remote production—or REMI (remote integration)—models are another significant trend. “These centralize resources while enabling distributed production across multiple locations,” he says. “This approach offers flexibility in how equipment is bundled and deployed. Automated productions also remain a consistent focus. They are particularly well-suited for news programs and scripted productions, though they are not applicable to more complex, dynamic productions.”
Of all current trends, artificial intelligence (AI) will have a high profile at NAB Show, with initiatives such as the PropelME startup hub, showcasing companies using the technology to change how the broadcast, media and entertainment market operates. While most on the audio side of broadcasting agree AI will make an impact on sound, the view is that—like other technologies before it—this is not happening quite yet.
“When we talk about AI, sometimes it’s just confused with automation,” Nikols says. “Automation technologies have been around for a while and they allow you to have complex workflows with lots of ‘if-then’ decisions.
“And for the most part AI is that,” he added. “But Generative AI coming into the game allows some really cool stuff to happen with auto-mixing and can determine what content really needs to come up and how to adjust for all the other different channels that don’t necessarily need to be part of the main audio all the time.”
As familiar as some—or all—of this year’s audio trends are, they are playing an important role in shaping the future of broadcasting, even if their full implementation is not happening just yet.
