h.264 has been a boon to video producers and consumers. It allows high quality video content to be compressed, decompressed, and stored very efficiently. Well, everything comes to an end, and it looks like MPEG is moving forward on their next generation video spec that delivers the same quality content in half the space.
Ericsson:
‘There’s a lot of industry interest in this because it means you can halve the bit rate and still achieve the same visual quality, or double the number of television channels with the same bandwidth, which will have an enormous impact on the industry,’ says Per Fröjdh, Manager for Visual Technology at Ericsson Research, Group Function Technology, who organized the event as Chairman of the Swedish MPEG delegation. The availability of a new compression format to reduce bandwidth, particularly in mobile networks where spectrum is expensive, paves the way for service providers to launch more video services with the currently available spectrum.
Provided we see similar rates of implementation, this could mean really big things for the industry. As we move towards bigger formats like 4K and 8K, it is important that we have the most efficient compression available. In just a few years, this tech will allow us to keep video on our devices that is so high resolution, our eyes can’t distinguish pixels even a few feet away from a billboard-sized screen. Surely, Apple will be among the first to jump onto the next-gen bandwagon.
So, are you excited about this new format? Can’t wait to stream some HD movies over cellular without blowing through your caps? Sound off in the comment section below this post.
Source: Ericsson
