At the 4K HDR Summit, Appear discovers a whole world of possibilities with the JPEG XS standard

The JPEG XS standard, a lightweight, low-latency compression algorithm that maintains visually transparent compression, promises to revolutionize remote production.

David Mitchinson, Solutions manager en Appear Tv, has addressed in the 4K HDR Summit the possibilities offered by the standard JPEG XS on ST-2110 to achieve the highest quality in remote productions.

In his opinion, the objective of this algorithm is “to achieve the distribution of uncompressed signals, achieving the unique characteristics of uncompressed video and using the same bit rates.”

At the same time, it will allow offering the benefits of SMPTE 2110 encapsulation for those who need it as well as a alternative encapsulation (MPEG_TS) for applications where the ST2110 is too complex or provides no benefit.

The JPEG XS will support a range of advanced applications such as remote production (even in 4K HDR) or video-assisted refereeing (VAR) (with ultra-low latency).

If the uncompressed video distribution became a tangible reality for SD, the same will happen with 4K, Mitchinson said.

“For the price of 270 Mb/s transmission per video service, the benefits with JPEG

This technological development is based on the concept that we no longer live in an SD world. Now 3 Gb/s 1080p is the norm with 12 Gb/s in UHD rapidly gaining popularity. Therefore, "we need a solution that offers uncompressed performance but with realistic and affordable bit rates. The bit rate associated with the delivery of modern uncompressed high-resolution formats is not sustainable," he stressed.

There are a range of codec options that can be applied, but JPEG2K, AVC and HEVC have a mix of complexity, latency and video performance challenges that degrade performance compared to uncompressed ones.

Now it is possible transport 12Gb/s UHD over 3Gb/s infrastructure and forget that a codec is being used. The new JPEG XS standard is based on TICO (Tiny Codec) as the encoded baseline to provide uncompressed performance with greater operational flexibility

For consistency, the new standard ISO/IEC29170-2 It is often used to evaluate near-lossless encoders. Measured against this standard, JPEG

In terms of appearance, it supports compression ratios from 5:1 to 36:1, while
The latency will depend on the encoding mode but will be a minimum of 32 video lines.

David Mitchinson acknowledges that “we want to enjoy all of these benefits by leveraging the latest IP delivery standard (ST-2110) for flexibility and efficiency.
“We want to enjoy all of these benefits while maintaining simple MPEG_TS workflows since distribution, redundancy protection and ingest are currently based on MPEG_TS.”

“For UHD and HDR services and remote production, JPEG XS is an option to take into account,” he concluded.