OT: video delivery requiremnet help

Patryk Rebisz wrote on 9/2/2009, 12:51 PM
Anyone can point me to Vegas template that would comply with the standards i was sent by one of my clients?



VIDEO DELIVERY REQUIREMENTS

Standard Definition Digital File Delivery Requirements

Video on digital file must be in the NTSC (525) standard.
Files must be transferred to MTV using file transfer accelerator technology, such as Aspera, over a secure network.

Digital File Specifications:

MPEG 2 @ 50Mbps, I-Frame, Program Stream, .MXF file 
 Essence Container: SMPTE D10 (Sony IMX 50)
Operational Pattern: OP1A
4:2:2 @Main Level
720 x 512
Frame rate: 29.97
Audio: PCM 24 bit @ 48Khz (4 discrete tracks: L, R , SAP, Descriptive)

Video Specifications:
NTSC component digital video blanking and synchronization signals shall comply with SMPTE 259M.
NTSC analog video blanking and synchronization signals shall comply with SMPTE 170M-2004.
Tapes will only be accepted in NTSC 525 (59.94Hz) standard)
Luminance level should not exceed 100 IRE units.
Chrominance level should not exceed 100 IRE units in bars and 120 IRE units in program
Set up level should not exceed zero IRE units (digital), 7.5ire (analog).

Audio Specifications:
Tape audio shall be delivered without static, dropouts, distortion, heavy dynamic
compression or heavy limiting.
In bars, Test Tone audio levels should be –20Dbfs or 0Vu.
In bars, Test Tone should be on all audio channels which program audio is present.
Digital Audio shall comply with AES3-2003 standard.
Digital Audio shall comply SMPTE 155-2004 for reference level and headroom.
Headroom should achieve 20dB above nominal.
Sampling Frequency should be 48kHz.
Quantization should be 20 bit/sample.
Audio should average –15dBfs and not exceed –10dBfs
There should be no discernible aberration in the lip sync
Audio sync relative to video frame shall not deviate by more than -15ms or +15ms.
All multiple track recordings must be properly phased and separation shall correspond
properly with visual separation

Time Code:
Time code must be continuous DROP FRAME-LTC from beginning of tape at 00:58:00:00 to at least 1:00 post program.
SOP (Start of Program) should be at 01:00:00:00.
Continuous SMPTE drop frame time code (DFTC) as specified in SMPTE 12M shall be recorded as longitudinal time code (LTC) on all delivered videotape.
The time code shall be synchronous to the recorded video.
If the videotape contains vertical interval time code (VITC) it shall contain the same time and be synchronous to the longitudinal time code (LTC).

Comments

epirb wrote on 9/2/2009, 1:08 PM
isn't that the same std as You Tube ?! ;-) ...
just kiddin..... way out of my league !
im sure theres plenty guys here w the answer.
rmack350 wrote on 9/2/2009, 2:09 PM
I don't have answers for you but my first question would be whether they expect you to deliver it digitally, or on tape, or both?

Mastering to tape might cover quite a bit of this.
Patryk Rebisz wrote on 9/2/2009, 2:58 PM
I think it would be easiest to find out someone who's done it before and simply encode the file.
rmack350 wrote on 9/2/2009, 3:16 PM
I was thinking that you could take an hdd to a post facility and output a file to tape, if tape-only is acceptable. It's good to build up those sorts of relationships anyway.

Rob

mudsmith wrote on 9/2/2009, 6:25 PM
These are, in fact, standard broadcast delivery specs for Standard Def NTSC TV....It does seem like they are implying digital as preferred delivery, and delivery over a secure server as the preferred conduit....

However, they do give specs for analogue delivery as well, and my experience in broadcast as an engineer (10 years ago now) leads me to believe that most broadcast operations give you maximum preferred specs, then will accept something different if you contact them and ask about it, which, I think, is highly recommended.


The general specs, including the -20 audio reference standard and the potential use of 4 audio tracks, are pretty much what you would see for Sony DigiBeta tapes, which are still more or less the gold standard for professional NTSC (standard def) broadcast, so, if using tape, I would recommend that as your first choice.....If going analogue, you should use BetaSP. The specs indicate that they would NOT be happy with DV delivery.......But you should call and ask. I'm sure they will appreciate the call, and may actually be just fine with a MiniDV or some such.

If they really do require delivery via server, you might contact a post production facility in your area and see what they would charge.

Increasingly, I find that no one is using tape at all. In my region, most editors have no tape machines. With the multitude of different tape formats now available, no one wants to invest in the decks. This leaves the one, fully equipped dub house in the area with the job of putting everyone's material on hard drives.

Let us know what you find out.
mudsmith wrote on 9/2/2009, 6:37 PM
.....and the bulk of the specs do actually exist in Vegas. I am a new user, but you can certainly set up your tone, bars and lead in sequence exactly as indicated. The audio levels indicated, which are all listed in digital format, are pretty easy to set in Vegas, and very important for broadcast:

Tone is at -20
Maximum signal level around -10.

When you print to tape in Vegas, you can make everything start at 00:58:00:00 (the standard start time for tape, in order to have program start at 01:00:00:00.

If you choose 29.97 as your frame rate, you will be operating at 59.94 as specified.

The bars in Vegas should conform to the IRE standards specified.

I haven't used Vegas enough to know if it has a Vector scope or waveform monitor built in. If it does, you should be able to watch these and make sure you do not exceed any of the IRE limits inside the program. If not, you can take your material to the same post house to find out.

Essentially, however, if the material looks good, and the audio stays within those digital limits, and the delivery medium is acceptable to the recipient, everything is fine. Just make sure you watch all the way through, both for picture quality (drop outs, oversaturation, etc.) and for audio level, and you should be good.

mudsmith wrote on 9/2/2009, 6:49 PM
Lasty, I would add that these specs, as always, contain a lot of legacy information. Every time I have made deliveries to networks, the specs have large amounts of legacy data- i.e., dealing, in part, with formats and technical specs that are not as generally applicable as they used to be.

The point here being that they may very well be willing to accept media and setups that were not available at the point the specs were originally written.

That being said, everything listed is still relevant in one way or another.....and they do talk about MP2 encoding, which was not very widespread 10 years ago, so..........

Give them a call...