Video Quality Issues in File-Based Broadcasting

The media industry is rapidly migrating from tape-based media acquisition and broadcast to filebased workflows. This migration has resulted in many different dimensions of impact on the media content. The transformation of media content occurs at several stages in the flow. The transformation could start from conversion of analog to digital media and be affected by various systems involved in processing and delivery of media. The digitization of content has led to several changes in compression standards, editing, and transmission technologies. There are various options to create, edit, and repurpose the content. Additionally, the industry has to deal with evolving media compression technologies, container and delivery formats. There are several transmission methods based on delivery needs, such as IPTV, DTH, cable, and VOD. All these dimensions of impact on media content have increased complexities in a file-based broadcast workflow. Hence, there is increasing uncertainty in the quality of content that reaches the consumer. The consumer expectation of HD video and the increasing competition in media industry further add to the quality requirements of media content. Therefore, file-based broadcasting has to deal with constantly evolving technical complexities on one hand and expectations of quality by the consumers on the other. In this scenario, the legacy methods of quality control are inadequate. Manual checks become inconsistent, subjective, and difficult to scale in a globally accessible media workflow. This paper discusses the types and causes of issues that affect the quality of media in various stages during broadcast workflow. The paper looks at the adoption of automated tools for accurate detection of issues in media content to improve the content quality & consumer experience. Video Quality Issues in File-Based Broadcasting