LONDON: The Wimbledon Championships 2018 will be streamed in 4K resolution and high dynamic range colour (HDR) for the first time in its 150-year history in the United Kingdom by the tournament’s official broadcaster, British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC).
The term 4K means that an image contains four times as many pixels as a 1080p high definition (HD) picture.
BBC is trying out the path-breaking resolution while broadcasting the FIFA World Cup matches in the country courtesy its iPlayer app using the next-generation TV technologies.
Reportedly, the BBC plans to make select matches available in 4K and not HDR. The technology has not come without glitches on the screen.
“The World Cup streams have suffered a few technical teething problems – stuttering and buffering with some devices,” John Archer, an expert TV reviewer for Forbes said.
“[There have also been] a few issues with adapting effectively to broadband speeds that are close to the BBC’s 40Mbps and 20Mbps streaming quality ‘tiers’.
“When the streams have worked well, though, the results have been spectacular.”
The 4K resolution can reveal the smallest of details, which works for judging close-call shots and identifying people in the crowd for instance at a tennis match.
While HDR provides a greater dynamic range in modern TVs by helping to magnify detail in the shadows and prevent highlights from “blowing out”. It has a “wider colour space” which signifies that more colours can be shown if the screen used is classed as “10-bit” or above.
In the case of late-day games, HDR’s handling of contrast mitigates the problem of shadows creeping across courts that can create exposure problems when other parts are still basking in sunlight.
