SVG Europe Sit-Down: AMP Visual’s Stéphane Dery discusses company developments, IP and HDR

Stéphane Dery, deputy managing director, AMP Visual

Founded in 1986 as a specialist in TV coverage, AMP Visual TV provides services throughout the production process for live programmes and those produced under live conditions. It has at its disposal one of the most extensive European fleets of OB vans for filming on location, as well as around 40 studios in the Paris region.

In addition, more than 500 employees assist clients in devising, designing and carrying out filming, transmission and broadcasting of programmes destined for every screen format. As Stéphane Dery, deputy managing director, explains, there are plenty of new developments taking place…

At the FEI World Cup Finals 2018 in Paris, the Fédération Equestre Internationale used your system to publish exclusive near-live footage on Facebook and Twitter. Can you tell us more about this project?

AMP Visual TV is always looking for innovations in its technical approach. Regarding the various solutions existing on the Digital World, we decided to select the best players as partners instead of trying to be the best in all domains. These new offerings are distributed under the name “Letsee”.

For near-live footage, we have a unique offering that we operate with our partner Telequid and called “Yuzz.it”. 

Without giving too many details, the main advantage of this solution is to combine ergonomics, power and easy to use approach. 

These were the three main motivations from our customer to select AMP Visual TV as a supplier – in addition to the quality of the broadcast services offered in the last 10 years. 

What do you see as your biggest challenge for the next twelve months?

As explained earlier, we recently decided to focus on new areas of production, especially through innovative digital solutions. This includes remote production, VR360, Augmented Reality, Virtual Studio, and all second screen solutions in general.

These activities have been regrouped in a new building located in the 15th district of Paris – close to all broadcasters’ offices. We decided to split this activity from the AMP Visual TV core business – Broadcast and Studio, as we think it requires a totally different approach. This new set-up includes the name we are using for the distribution of these new services, ‘Letsee’.

As a summary, we have to maintain our leading position in our traditional outside broadcast segment and develop new areas for digital applications where we have now considerable experience, but need to be more clearly identified.

What do you anticipate will be the next innovation when it comes to IP technology for broadcast?

For outside broadcast applications we do not consider that the IP technology has already reached the maturity stage. Of course, we can see lots of improvement from manufacturers, but end-users do not yet see clearly the benefits that this technology can bring. We must not forget that the main expectation of broadcasters is to find solutions that simplify their workflow and brings a cost reduction advantage.

At this stage, it is not completely accepted as a change that can enhance the daily lives of our customers. In addition, as we still are in a transition period, it is not that easy to make the good choice.

Where do you think the industry will be with regards HDR by the middle of next year?

HDR is becoming more and more popular, especially for high-end productions. The real success of HDR technology will come through a good and compliant integration in the customers’ TV ecosystem. What we can see clearly is that the HDR brings lots of value in the picture quality perception, often more than the simple increase of definition brought by UHD. If we compare to last year, we can see that more and more live events are requiring this technology, where it was originally mainly used on post-production for non-live productions. With the development of UHD Channels in France, we can easily anticipate HDR as the next step for 2019.

What are your thoughts about 12G?

We are really at the beginning phase of the 12G technology. It makes sense to use a classical coaxial wiring in a small system. We are watching the growth of new products built with this technology, but today not all suppliers provide this offer. There is a real lack of solutions in that domain, which may strongly improve at NAB next year

Do you have a sports related case study that you can share?

We have been involved during 2018 in the two major international sports events, but our contract with our customers does not allow us to share detailed information about the service provided.