Linear Acoustic Builds on Olympic Successes

The Sports Video Group is pleased to welcome Linear Acoustic as a premier sponsor. An authority in digital television-audio loudness metering, monitoring, and control from production to transmission, Linear Acoustic designs and manufactures the AERO range of real-time and file-based loudness managers, UPMAX upmixing and downmixing solutions, and the LQTM series of loudness-metering products. It also licenses and OEMs key technologies to premier manufacturers.

The company is actively involved in standards and practices creation as a member of the ATSC (Advanced Television Systems Committee), as a sustaining member of SMPTE (Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers), and as a founding member of SVG’s DTV Audio Group.

In 2008, Linear Acoustic became part of the Telos Alliance, which manufactures the Telos series of multi-line and broadcast telephone systems and hybrids, the Axia line of consoles and networking solutions for radio stations, and the Omnia family of AM, FM, HD, and streaming broadcast-audio processors.

Based in Lancaster, PA, Linear Acoustic provided upmixing, loudness metering, encoding products, and technical services for NBC’s coverage of the 2008 Beijing Summer Games, the 2010 Vancouver Winter Games, and the 2012 London Summer Games and is the recipient of a 62nd-annual Technology and Engineering Emmy Award.

Throughout the 2012 London Olympics, the audio heard by viewers was monitored through or processed by a Linear Acoustic product. The company supplied NBC Olympics with 31 AERO.qc units, four LA-5269 Dolby Digital/Plus transcoders, four LAMBDA digital audio and metadata monitors, and several advance copies of the soon-to-be-released Avid Media Composer 6 plug-in.

Mix engineers at each of the remote venues used the AERO.qc as a meter to ensure an average loudness level of -24 LKFS for audio delivered to the International Broadcast Center for distribution. AERO.qc provides multiple ITU-R BS.1770 meters on its display, so engineers could simultaneously monitor loudness with short, medium, and long integration times while also having the overall loudness target displayed as a large numeric value.