Dolby Exec: Metadata Can Help Overcome Today’s TV Audio Challenges

MESalliance.org reports that metadata can be used to provide more consistent audio quality for video content amid the growing shift away from linear TV viewing on televisions to the viewing of TV content across many different mobile devices, according to Scott Norcross, senior manager-office of the CTO at Dolby Laboratories.

Incorporating metadata into content provides a device with extra information so that it can determine how loud any piece of content will get and adjust the volume properly to “optimize the playback, depending on the environment,” he told the DTV Audio Group (DTVAG) Audio Engineering Society (AES) Forum during the AES Convention Oct. 20. The use of metadata also enables the use of dynamic range control (DRC) profiles, enabling DRC management of mobile content, he said.

“Some codecs today actually have full native metadata support,” including the next-generation codecs MPEG-H and Dolby AC-4, he said, adding metadata was “starting to be implemented” by some companies. But he pointed out that “it works best when it’s a closed system – when they have full control over the encoder and obviously the decoder in the devices.”

There has been an “incredible explosion of digital devices and different platforms,” Roger Charlesworth, executive director of the DTV Audio Group, said during the AES Forum.

Read more at http://www.mesalliance.org/2017/10/24/dolby-exec-metadata-can-help-overcome-todays-tv-audio-challenges/