BERLIN—Panasonic and Samsung are teaming up with 20th Century Fox to create an open, royalty-free dynamic metadata platform for high dynamic range (HDR) through a certification and logo program, tentatively called HDR10+.
The three companies intend to form a licensing entity that will begin licensing the HDR10+ platform in January. The entity will license the metadata broadly to content companies; manufacturers of Ultra HD TVs, Blu-ray Disc players/recorders, and set-top boxes; and SoC vendors. Licensing will be royalty-free with a nominal administrative fee. Further details will be announced at CES 2018 in Las Vegas.
Partners who wish to adopt the platform for HDR10+-compliant products will benefit from system flexibility, said the companies in a press release, allowing a variety of partners, including content creators, content distributors, TV manufacturers and device makers, to incorporate this platform and improve the viewing experience for audiences.
“As leaders in home entertainment content and hardware, the three companies are ideal partners for bringing HDR10+ into the homes of consumers everywhere,” said Jongsuk Chu, senior VP of Samsung’s visual display business. “We are committed to making the latest technology available in our TVs and are confident that HDR10+ will deliver premium quality content and enhance the way you experience television programs and movies in the home.”
“Panasonic has a long history of working with industry leaders to develop lasting technical formats. We are delighted to work together with 20th Century Fox and Samsung to develop a new HDR format, which will bring consumers so many benefits,” said Yuki Kusumi, Executive Officer at Panasonic. “By offering considerable HDR picture quality improvements across a wider range of TVs while accelerating the amount of premium HDR content available, we expect HDR10+ to quickly become the de-facto HDR format.”
“HDR10+ is a technological step forward that optimizes picture quality for next-generation displays,” said Danny Kaye, executive VP at 20th Century Fox and managing director of the Fox Innovation Lab. “HDR10+ provides dynamic metadata, which precisely describes every scene to deliver unprecedented picture quality. Working in partnership with Panasonic and Samsung through the Fox Innovation Lab, we are able to bring new platforms like HDR10+ to the market that more accurately realize the vision of our filmmakers beyond the theater.”
This story first appeared on TVT's sister publication TWICE.
