The increase of the dynamic range (HDR – High Dynamic Range), that is ideally close to the performance of the human eye, plays a decisive role in the realization of an immersive television experience. Thanks to the tremendous technical developments of camera sensors, the dynamic range of high-quality moving image cameras can reach values that can be referred to as HDR. Even though today’s displays are incapable of reproducing this increased dynamic range, a dynamic compression is essential.
The goal of this collaboration project called live immersive adaptive High Dynamic Range (liaHDR) is to find an overall solution that will enable an immersive HDR from recording to playback, from glass to glass, such as for high-end live broadcasting. With a new type of 360° camera that compared to today’s cameras, has a clearly extended dynamic range, a real-time and a backward compatible process for the automatic dynamic adaptation, and a high-quality HDR – display; this overall solution allows the viewer to have a new, close to reality, immersive visual experience.
The live immersive adaptive High Dynamic Range (liaHDR) project that will take place from 2016 to 2018 is a collaboration between three partners: The department of Engineering of the University Rhine Main, Solextrix GmbH from Nuremberg and sonoVTS GmbH from Feldkirchen near Munich. The project is being co-funded by the Federal Ministry of Economy and Energy (Bundesministerium für Wirtschaft und Energie – BMWi) in line with the Central Innovation Program (ZIM).
First results of algorithms developed within this project will be demonstrated during IBC 2016 at the sonoVTS stand B68 in hall 8.