Developing technologies for TV and film industry

Over the years there has been many developments in TV's from black and white to colour. Here are some of the devlopments.



3DTV



3DTV is one of the new developments in TV here is a video on how it works. You film 2 HD cameras, one for the right eye and one for the left you then merge the images together. You then put glasses on which make whatever your watching feel like if something is coming at you see it coming at you.

Satellite
When satellite television first hit the market home dishes were expensive metal units that took up a huge chunk of yard space. Satellite TV offers many solutions to broadcast and cable TV problems. Though satellite TV technology is still evolving, it has already become a popular choice for many TV viewers. It works by satellites in space recieving and sending signals.
Sky provide satellite viewing as a example.
Cable
The earliest cable systems were, in effect, strategically placed antennas with very long cables connecting them to subscribers' television sets. Because the signal from the antenna became weaker as it traveled through the length of cable, cable providers had to insert amplifiers at regular intervals to boost the strength of the signal and make it acceptable for viewing. Virgin media is a cable network.
Analog and Digital TV
In analog technology, a wave is recorded or used in its original form. A analog signal is simple but can get more disturbstances because it uses only two codes, 1 or 0. In digital technology, the analog wave is sampled at some interval, and then turned into numbers that are stored in the digital device. On a CD, the sampling rate is 44,000 samples per second. So on a CD, there are 44,000 numbers stored per second of music. To hear the music, the numbers are turned into a voltage wave that approximates the original wave.


Interactive TV
Interactive TV is using methods to interact with your TV from your remote like when you use the red button to vote for something on sky for something like the X-factor.
HDTV
High-definition television (HDTV) is video that has resolution substantially higher than that of traditional television systems (standard-definition television). HDTV has one or two million pixels per frame, roughly five times that of SD.  Early HDTV broadcasting used analog techniques, but today HDTV is digitally broadcast using video compression.


Streaming Media and Internet Television/on-demand viewing
Internet television (otherwise known as Internet TV, or Online TV) is the digital distribution of television content via the Internet. Some Internet television is known as catch-up TV. Internet Television is a general term that covers the delivery of television shows and other video content over the internet, typically by major traditional television broadcasters. It does not describe a technology used to deliver content (see Internet protocol television). Internet television has become very popular through services such as RTÉ Player in Ireland; BBC iPlayer, 4oD, ITV Player (also STV Player and UTV Player) and Demand Five in the United Kingdom; Hulu in the United States; Nederland 24 in the Netherlands; ABC iview and Australia Live TV in Australia; and Tivibu in Turkey.



Digital Recorders
Digital recorders let you record live TV to watch at a later date they also let you pause and rewind live tv. The Sky HD box can record up to 60 Gigabytes of programming, record entire series through series link and record up to 2 programmes simultanously and more.



Pay-per-view
Pay-per-view (PPV) provides a service by which a television audience can purchase events to view via private telecast. The broadcaster shows the event at the same time to everyone ordering it (as opposed to video-on-demand systems, which allow viewers to see recorded broadcasts at any time). Events can be purchased using an on-screen guide, an automated telephone system, or through a live customer service representative. Events often include feature films, sporting events and entertainment.
Sky in the UK have the channel SkyBoxOffice for their pay per view options.



CGI



Computer-generated imagery (CGI) is the application of the field of computer graphics or, more specifically, 3D computer graphics to special effects in art, video games, films, television programs, commercials, simulators and simulation generally, and printed media. The visual scenes may be either dynamic or static.



An article on CGI can be found here http://www.buzzle.com/articles/what-is-cgi-animation.html

Regulation of the Media Sector

Regulatory and professional bodies:

British Board of Film Classification (BBFC)are a group of people that classify film and games to make sure they are suitable for a type of audience like making sure theres no swearing in kids films. The BBFC either rate films U, 12, 15 or 18 so people know which type of audience they are suitable for.

British Video Association a video home entertainment organisation established in 1980.

Film Distributors Association  is the trade body for theatrical film distributors in the UK

Video Standards Council (VSC) was established to oversee and develop the code of practice designed to promote high standard in the video industry

Television, Radio and Telecommunications Office for Communication (Ofcom) they make sure that everything shown to the public is okay to be shown to the public and also have guidelines for the producers on how to handle certain situations like racism in programmes

Trading Standards Central is the professional association which represents trading standards professionals in the UK and overseas.

Trading Standards Nets

Press Complaints Commission (PCC) is a voluntary regulatory body for British printed newspapers and magazines, consisting of representatives of the major publishers.

Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) is the self-regulatory organisation (SRO) of the advertising industry in the United Kingdom. Its role is to "regulate the content of advertisements, sales promotions and direct marketing in the UK

The Mobile Entertainment Forum (MEF) MEF is the global community for mobile content and commerce

The Independent Games Developers Association (IGDA) TIGA is the trade association representing the UK's games industry which intend to make the UK the best for video games industry

British Academy of Film and Television Arts (BAFTA)  The British Academy of Film and Television Arts supports, develops and promotes the art forms of the moving image, by identifying and rewarding excellence, inspiring practitioners and benefiting the public.

Commercial Radio Companies Association (CRCA)

 The Commercial Radio Companies Association is the trade body for commercial radio companies in the United Kingdom. It is a voluntary, non profit making body, incorporated as a company limited by guarantee, and was formed by the first radio companies when Independent Radio began in 1973.

The International Visual Communication Association (IVCA) is a non-profit academic association founded in 1950. The Association maintains an active membership of more than 4,300 individuals in 70 countries, approximately two-thirds of whom are academic scholars, professors, and graduate students. Other members are in government, the media, communication technology, business law, medicine and other professions

Worldwide Web Consortium (W3C) The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is an international community where Member organizations, a full-time staff, and the public work together to develop Web standards

British Web Design and Marketing Association The UK Web Design Association was established in 2001 to encourage and promote industry standards within the British web design and new media sector.

British Interactive Multimedia Association (BIMA) Support and promote the British digital industry they also share knowledge and best practice and reward great work and encourage the next generation.

I agree with these rules because it makes people know what they should and shouldn't watch and gives protection to parents for what their kids watch.

Regulatory issues:

Ownership Ofcom are a example of ownership in media as they make all the rules and regulations
Monopoly is when one company owns everything
Access is when a certain amount of the population need to access something.
Consumer choice is when consumers have a choice of what they want and not bombarded with the same thing and they can choose something different
Freedom of information
Censorship is when stuff is censored from public
Taste and decency

Ethical and Legal constraints within the media sector

Ethical

social issues and sensitivities, eg representation of gender, representation of religious beliefs, linguistic usages, accessibility; professional body codes of practice, eg BBC producers’ guidelines, Worldwide Web Consortium (W3C) accessibility standards

Legal
People who work in the creative and media industries have alot of rules and regulitions that they must abide by. Some of the legal issues are listed below;

Broadcasting Act 1990 (and later amendments) is a british law which replaced  the independant television commission and radio authority e.g broadcast that makes smoking good but doesn't list the bad effects is a break of this law

Official Secrets Act 1989 which stopped made film people giving to much information about secrets to the public e.g national secreats broadcast to the public would be a breach of this

Obscene Publications Act 1959 (and later amendments) which created a new law for publishing obscene material e.g nude stuff on a childrens show

Films Act 1985 made further provision with financing to films and connected purposes

Video Recordings Act 1984 which made video recordings for sale or hire carry a classification by the home office e.g selling a film without a classification

Race Relations Act 1976 (and later amendments) which stopped dicrimination against different races e.g not giving someone a job because of their colour

Human Rights Act 1998 was made to make sure everyone is treated fairly like every human being has the right to be free e.g being used as a slave and not being free

Licensing Act 2003 (and later amendments) to make sure licenced premises don't show non licenced stuff and breach the copyright rules like pubs showing sport from sky sports but with a foreign satelitte reciever, this breaches the british privacy law but not the european ;

privacy law so personal information is dealt with sensitivly and protect peoples privacy e.g peoples personal life being put in the paper

copyright and intellectual property law gives people the right to which their products is sold e.g someone using a song for their own profiet without the writers permission would be a breach of this

libel law was made to make sure no hatred is exposed to a person that injures their reputation e.g Wayne Rooney's sex life being released in the paper

A major breach of these law was the privacy law which News Of The World breached. Employers of NOTW hacked phones of many celebrities including Prince William to listen in on phone conversations like Prince Williams arrangements which he investigated into and found out they NOTW were hacking into voicemails and using code names for payments to cover up there tracks. This later forced the worlds longest and greatest newspaper to stop and apoligies were made to everyone involved in the scandel and police procautions were taken to the employes involved.

I thought this scandel made me think about how it would effect me, I wouldn't like all my private life known to the public and posted in newspapers.

The BBFC (British Board of Film Classification) are a group of people that classify film and games to make sure they are suitable for a type of audience like making sure theres no swearing in kids films.

OFCOM (Office Of Communications) they make sure that everything shown to the public is okay to be shown to the public and also have guidelines for the producers on how to handle certain situations like racism in programmes

Code of practice
All members of the press have a duty to maintain a high professional standard which includes preamable and public expectations below. It is a set of writers rules which explain how people working in a paticular profession should behave.For example one of the codes is the press must not identify victims of sexual assualt or publish material likely to contribute to such identificatin unless there is adequate justification and they are legally free to do so.

Representation
Representation in media refers to place, people and cultures which are represented in different parts of the media.
Stereotypes of different people are represented in different ways on tv shows. On family guy which talks about a american family it makes men look like the dumb ones and women look like the smart one and in films black ameircans are made to look like gangsters.

TV financing

TV financing

Commercial Broadcasters

ITV and channel get there financing by things such as Advertisement, syndication, phone ins and competitons and merchandising. For example X-factor on ITV have phone ins where it is a £1 a minute to answer a simple question and because millions watch it generate lots of money, also advertising can be a much higher cost because lots more people watch the programme then any other and ITV also syndicate programs like Corrination Street.

Public Service Broadcaster

The licence fee, syndication, phone ins and comepetitions and merchandising. The licence fee is £145.50(£12.13 per month) and is split into different parts like TV, Radio, Online and other costs like investment in new technolgy. They also syndicate programs like Doctor Who to BBC America whilst channel 4 is also a part public serivice broadcaster and uses the same methods of BBC to finance but instead also use advertisement.

BBC licence fee

Subscriber Broadcasters

Sky and Virgin are funded through subscriptions, advertising, syndication, selling the rights of their licencesed programmes, competions and merchandising. You can get different types of subscriptions with Sky and Virgin like choosing what subscription like whether you want the movie channels or kids channels ect. They also sell the rights of their licenesed programmes from their channels SKY 1 and other channels.

Film Financing

Film Financing

Government Grants

A number of governments run programs to subsidise the cost of film making, the UK film council provides funding provided certain conditions are met. They are willing to provide these subsidise it will attract tourists to their territory also a film shot in a particular location can gain international advertisement for that area. Also the government expect no financial return.

Tax Schemes

A number of countries have introduced tax deduction schemes for film owners or producers. These schemes work by sell the enhanced tax deductions to wealthy individuals with large tax liabilities; individuals pay the producer a fee in order to obtain the tax deductions. The individual will often become the legal owner of the film, but the producer will in substance continue as the real owner of the economic rights to exploit the film worldwide.

Private Equity Financing

Private Equity Financing is generally tax-advantaged theatrical film and television investment which comes with little risk. The cost of producting is created by a combination of federal and state tax incentives.

Private Investors

This is one of the hardest types of film financing to obtain which is a individual looking to risk his investment in filming. Boston Financial Trust has become a catalyst for many of these type of investors and is one of the strongest film financiars in the northeast.

Pixar

Pixar

Pixar was first founded as the graphics group, one third of the Computer Division of Lucasfilm that was launched in 1979. The team began working on film sequences produced by Lucasfilm or worked collectively with Industrial light and magic on special effects. The group was then purchased by Steve Jobs shortly after he left Apple Computers and paid $5 million to George Lucas and put $5 million as capital into the company.

At first Pixar was a high-end computer hardware company whose core product was the Pixar Image Computer, a system primarily sold to government agencies and the medical community. One of the buyers of Pixar Image Computers was Disney Studios.

Pixar had a $26 million deal to produce 3 animated films one of which was toy story, Jobs almost sold Pixar to Microsoft it was only until Toy Story would be released in the summer holidays of 1995 did he decide not too which went on to gross more than $350 million.

Pixar and Disney then had their disagreements but in 2006 Disney announced the acquisition of Pixar for $7.6 billion.

Financing

Pixar gets its financing from different companies to make and produce the films and at first had a deal with Disney to produce 3 animated films and split the profits 50/50 but when Disney bought Pixar in 2006 they now both work together to finance and produce the films and have grossed $2.5 billion over the years.

Some of the films Pixar have produced and how much they grossed

Pixar logo

Sky

Sky

Sky is one of the largest subscriber broadcasters in the world. They are a subsidiary company owned 40% by News Cooperation recently News Cooperation wanted to buy the other 60%  to have total control of Sky but due to the phone hacking scandal government and public pressure forced them to back down there offer. In 1990 British Sky Broadcasting was formed by the equal merger of Sky Television and British Satellite Broadcasting. The merger of both companies saved Sky financially because in the beginning, Sky Television had very few major advertisers, acquiring British Satellite Broadcasting's healthier advertising contracts and equipment solved the companies' problems.

Financing

Sky has partnerships with Comedy Central (UK), DTV service LTD and NGC Network International LLC and NGC Network Latin America LLC.

Subsidiaries

British Sky Broadcasting Ltd Operating company for the Sky pay-television service.

Sky Subscriber Services Ltd The original Sky Television plc, now a holding company

Sports Internet Group Ltd Sports content and online betting services.

British Interactive Broadcasting Holdings Ltd Interactive television services, formerly an alliance of BSkyB, BT Group, HSBC and Matsushita.

Mykindaplace.com Being both an agency and a media owner run many successful sites. – Now defunct

Aura Sports Ltd Media Sales Agency, sells advertising on the majority of premiership football club websites, as well as other major sports. Living TV Group A British television content arm, operating a number of channels They also get income through syndication which is selling other TV shows to be shown abroad and merchandising.

The Walt Disney Company

Disney

Walt Disney is the largest media conglomerate in the world. Founded October 16^th 1923 by Walt Disney. The company is most known for its film studio Walt Disney Picture Group. It established itself as a leader in the American animation industry before doing live-action film production, television, and travel. Taking on its current name in 1986, The Walt Disney Company expanded its company into theatre, radio, publishing, and online media. Disney also owns and operates the ABC broadcast television network; cable television networks such as Disney Channel, ESPN, and ABCFamily; publishing, merchandising and licenses 14 theme parks around the world. Mickey Mouse is the official mascot of The Walt Disney Company.

History

In 1940 the company went public and 1954 SAW Disneyland TV program begin on ABC then in 1965 the Disney news began publication.  In 1981 plans for a cable network are announced then in 1963 the Disney Channel began. In 1986 The Company’s name is changed from Walt Disney Productions to The Walt Disney Company. In 1990 the Disney Adventures Magazine began publication and 1993 acquires independent film distributor Miramax Films. In Disney purchases DIC Entertainment, and acquires the rights to its shows then 1996 The Company takes on the Disney Enterprises name and acquires the Capital Cities/ABC group, renaming it ABC. 2001 saw Disney buys Fox Family Network for $3 billion in July, giving Disney programming and cable network reaching 81 million homes. Disney changes Fox Family Network to ABC Family. In 2006 Disney acquired Pixar Animation Studios and in 2009 Disney twenty-three magazine begins publication.

I think The Walt Disney Company is a huge and successful media company and will have a bright future for many years to come.

BBC

BBC

The BBC is one of the biggest public service broadcasters in the world. It is a public service broadcaster it was established by royal charter and is funded by UK household licence fees. It was the world’s first national broadcasting organisation founded on 18^th October 1922. The BBC uses the money to provide services including 8 national TV channels, 10 national radio stations, 40 local radio stations and an extensive website for the public. The annual cost of a colour TV licence is £145.50 and £45 for a black and white TV licence.

History of BBC

In 1922 BBC is formed where John Reith was first general manager. Its first outside broadcast was in 1923 and first issue of radio times was published in 1924 it had its first relay to America then in 1927 the BBC was established by the royal charter. In 1932 the construction of broadcasting house began, the first purpose built broadcasting centre in the UK and then in 1936 the worlds first ever TV service was launched. In 1946 the first television for children began and in 1949 was the first TV weather forecast. In 1950 they did the first television broadcast from the air then in 1955 the first TV soap launched ‘The grove family’ and in 1958 the world’s longest running children’s programme ‘Blue Peter’ begins. In 1960 the construction of the Television centre began, the first ever purpose built TV centre in the world. In 1963 Doctor Who began the longest ever running sci-fi show and then in 1967 Radio 1 began and BBC launches colour TV in the UK. In 1974 CEEFAX service started then in 1985 Eastenders began to become the BBC’S most watched programme ever. In 1994 the first national lottery draw began and in 1997 was the launch of news 24 then in 1998 BBC choice begins the first BBC digital TV channel. In 2005 Doctor Who was re-launched and then in 2007 BBC iplayer was launched.

How the licence fee is spent

Licence fee

I think the licence fee is fair because the money is being used to provide new programmes and TV shows for the public, providing people with jobs and opportunities to be creative with the use of the money however I also think it is unfair as some people may only want to watch a few TV shows yet you have to pay just to even watch telly.

introduction

This is where I blog about all my progress and work assignmants for my course creative media. For my first assignment I will be talking about two media companys and how they work.