Filling the gaps in video transcoder deployment in the cloud

Cloud-based deployment of content production and broadcast workflows has continued to disrupt the industry after the pandemic. The key tools required for unlocking cloud workflows, e.g., transcoding, metadata parsing, and streaming playback, are increasingly commoditized. However, as video traffic continues to increase there is a need to consider tools which offer opportunities for further bitrate/quality gains as well as those which facilitate cloud deployment. In this paper we consider preprocessing, rate/distortion optimisation and cloud cost prediction tools which are only just emerging from the research community. These tools are posed as part of the per-clip optimisation approach to transcoding which has been adopted by large streaming media processing entities but has yet to be made more widely available for the industry.Comment: Camera-ready version of BEIT Conference at NAB 202

Direct Optimisation of λ\boldsymbol\lambda for HDR Content Adaptive Transcoding in AV1

Since the adoption of VP9 by Netflix in 2016, royalty-free coding standards continued to gain prominence through the activities of the AOMedia consortium. AV1, the latest open source standard, is now widely supported. In the early years after standardisation, HDR video tends to be under served in open source encoders for a variety of reasons including the relatively small amount of true HDR content being broadcast and the challenges in RD optimisation with that material. AV1 codec optimisation has been ongoing since 2020 including consideration of the computational load. In this paper, we explore the idea of direct optimisation of the Lagrangian $\lambda$ parameter used in the rate control of the encoders to estimate the optimal Rate-Distortion trade-off achievable for a High Dynamic Range signalled video clip. We show that by adjusting the Lagrange multiplier in the RD optimisation process on a frame-hierarchy basis, we are able to increase the Bjontegaard difference rate gains by more than 3.98$\times$ on average without visually affecting the quality.Comment: SPIE2022:Applications of Digital Image Processing XLV accepted manuscrip

Late Quaternary stratigraphy and sedimentology of the inner part of south-west Joseph Bonaparte Gulf.

Joseph Bonaparte Gulf is a large embayment on the northwestern continental margin of Australia. It is approximately 300 km east-west and 120 km north-south with a broad continental shelf to seaward. Maximum width from the southernmost shore of Joseph Bonaparte Gulf to the edge of the continental shelf is 560 km. Several large rivers enter the gulf along its shores. The climate is monsoonal, sub-humid, and cyclone-prone during the December-March wet season. A bedrock high (Sahul Rise) rims the shelf margin. The sediments within the gulf are carbonates to seaward, grading into clastics inshore. A seaward-thinning wedge of highstand muds dominates the sediments of the inner shelf of Joseph Bonaparte Gulf. Mud banks up to 15 m thick have developed inshore. Coarse-grained sand ridges up to 15 m high are found off the mouth of the Ord River. These overlie an Upper Pleistocene transgressive lag of mixed carbonate and gravelly siliclastic sand. Four drowned strandlines are present on the inner shelf at depths of 20, 25, 28 and 30 m below datum. These are interpreted as having formed during stillstands in the Late Pleistocene transgression. Older strandlines at great depths are inferred as having formed during the fall in sea-level following the last highstand. For the most part the Upper Pleistocene-Holocene marine sediments overlie an erosion surface cut into older Pleistocene sediments. Incised valleys cut into this erosion surface are up to 5 km wide and have a relief of at least 20 m. The largest valley is that cut by the Ord River. Upper Pleistocene sediments deposited in the incised valleys include interpreted lowstand fluvial gravels, early transgressive channel sands and floodplain silts, and late transgressive estuarine sands and gravels. Older Pleistocene sediments are inferred to have been deposited before and during the 120 ka highstand (isotope stage 5). They consist of sandy calcarenites deposited in high-energy tide-dominated shelf environments. Still older shelf and valley-fill sediments underlie these. The contrast between the Holocene muddy clastic sediments and the sandy carbonates deposited by the 120 ka highstand suggests that either the climate was more arid in the past, with less fluvial transport, or that mud was more effectively trapped in estuaries, allowing development of carbonate depositional environment inshore

Low-cost monocular pseudo 3D reconstruction of batsman strokes for motion analysis

Engineering of Sport 15 - Proceedings from the 15th International Conference on the Engineering of Sport (ISEA 2024) Sports broadcasts today are detailed and immersive third-person experiences, allowing spectators to share first-hand experiences of athletes in real time as a result. One sport for which technology has had a significant impact is cricket. Broadcasters currently employ technologies such as the Hawkeye, Snickometer, Hot Spot, Zing Wicket system, Umpire cam, Stump cam, Spider Cam, Super Slow-Motion cam, and Speed Gun to give spectators rich information at their fingertips. They are continuously developing more advanced platforms to enhance every aspect of the game. Some of these technologies aid in accurate decision-making at key points by employing complex multi-physics modeling upon state-of-the-art acquisition equipment provided by broadcasters. However, 3D rendering technologies are expensive and require specialized crews to operate. The aim of this paper is to leverage this data to produce an automated pseudo 3D Representation of batsman motion for visual aids, motion analysis and decision making. </p