International organisation for standardisation organisation internationale de normalisation

Additional discussion (Thu 11:00 – 12:00)

This additional joint meeting explored audio codec behaviour with respect to the DASH formalisms SAP1 through SAP6. The actions items from the previous joint meeting were affirmed, but expanded to encompass the SAP concept. This information will be available as a contribution to the next MPEG meeting.

4.1.3MPEG-H 3D Audio Workshop (Wed 14:00-18:00)

At the 99^th MPEG meeting in San Jose, CA, MPEG hosted a workshop to discuss its newest suite of standards under development that aims to provide technical solutions to the emerging challenges facing multimedia industries. The new standard, MPEG-H -- “High Efficiency Media Coding and Dynamic Media Delivery,” will include standards for System, Video and Audio and will grow to further accommodate industry needs. On-going activities such as MPEG Media Transport (MMT) and High Efficiency Video Coding (HEVC) will become Part 1 and Part 2, respectively, of this standard suite. The focus of the workshop was on Part 3, 3D Audio.

It is envisioned that MPEG-H 3D Audio will provide a highly immersive audio experience using either a large number of loudspeakers or headphones with binauralization, with the aim of rendering a realistic and compelling 3D audio scene. Key issues to be addressed are a compact and bit-efficient representation of multi-channel audio programs and the ability to flexibly render an audio program to an arbitrary number of loudspeakers with arbitrary configurations or to headphones via binauralization.

The workshop was held on Wednesday February 8, 2012, 2PM to 6PM at the same venue as the 99^th MPEG meeting. There were an estimated 100 attendees.

The workshop began with an overview of MPEG-H, presented by the MPEG Chairs. The remaining presentations were divided into three parts: first, Mark Richer, President of ATSC spoke on ATSC 3.0 and FoBTV. The next section focused on content providers, with Akio Ando, NHK, speaking on 22.2 multichannel sound for UHDTV, Jim Kutzner, PBS and Chair of ATSC 3.0, speaking on Next Generation Broadcast Television, and Brian Vessa, Sony Pictures Entertainment, speaking on New Heights in Multichannel Sound: Explorations and Considerations. The final section featured technology experts, with Jeongil Seo, ETRI, speaking on Realistic audio representation technologies for UHDTV, Jean-Marc Jot, DTS, speaking on Backward-compatible 3D audio coding Christophe Chabanne, Dolby, speaking on Innovating beyond 5.1

A copy of the speakers presentations will be made available in the zip archive of this output from the 99^th MPEG meeting: