MELVILLE, N.Y.—Larry Thorpe, one of the most influential figures in the field of broadcast and film technology for the past half century, has announced his retirement as senior fellow from Canon USA, where he served nearly 20 years, developing and promoting the company’s line of professional lenses and digital cameras. 

Thorpe is retiring April 30, 60 years to the day he began in this business, starting with the BBC in 1961. His career spanned a period of rapid development of cameras and related imaging technologies for both broadcast and film—from the RCA TK 47 to Canon EOS digital cinema cameras—and he has received numerous industry honors and awards, including the Charles F. Jenkins EMMY Lifetime Achievement Award in 2014. 

A summary of his many accomplishments can be found here.  

TV Tech sat down with Larry this week to discuss his career and his thoughts about how broadcasting and film have evolved over the years. 

TV Tech: Congratulations on your well-deserved retirement, Larry! First off, can you share with us what prompted you to get into this business in the first place? 

Larry Thorpe: I studied electronic engineering at the College of Technology in Ireland, in Dublin. And in my final year I went over to the U.K., seeking future employment as an engineer as there wasn't much in Ireland back in the early 60s. One of my interviews was with the BBC, and I liked what they said and what they offered. So I jumped into the BBC, and I've been in broadcasting ever since 1961. 

TVT: What did you do at the BBC?

LT: I was in the BBC designs department; they had a place right in central London where they had many labs, a lot of engineers designing our own equipment for the many facilities of BBC. Color was big at that time so we were immersed in all sorts of early color equipment. If they were a hit, some of that development would be handed over to one of the U.K. manufacturers and become a product, but a lot of it was custom designed. I did learn my design capabilities while I was there for five years.

TVT: Did you always plan to go into imaging and image acquisition?

LT: Well, RCA came to London on a recruiting campaign in 1965 and was looking for broadcast engineers, because at that time all the Americans were going into aerospace and not into broadcasting,  so they hired a lot of Europeans at that time and I was one of a wave that went over—my wife and I were newly married—and we decided to have a one- or two-year adventure in America, and here we are in 2021. At RCA, I went straight into camera development. 

TVT: Who are your biggest inspirations?

LT: One of the greatest mentors I had was Neville Watson, who headed up the BBC designs department. He was tremendous at nurturing me, encouraging me and we stayed friends for many many years when we would meet at Montreux and IBC over the years. 

Then when I came to RCA, my mentor there was the famous Henry Kozlowski, who ended up in advanced development. He spent a lot of time with me while I was developing cameras for RCA. At Sony, it was a number of people, including the founder of the broadcast company Masahiko Morizono, who was the guy who decided they were going to go into HD full steam. And the fact that I was enthusiastic about it, he liked me for that and he spent quite a bit of time encouraging me. And then I came to Canon and of course I had Mr. Yamasaki who hired me and Ken Ito who's still with us, he was one of my mentors, still, still is. And more recently Scott Antaya.

TVT: What was your mission when you were brought on board to Canon nearly 20 years ago? 

LT: Mr. Yamasaki said “I need help in marketing of broadcast lenses,” and he asked if I'd come aboard for a couple of years to do that because I had retired from Sony in 2003. So I came in for a couple of years and here we are 17 years later, I'm still with Canon. 

And it was somewhere in the middle of that period there that Canon elected to enter the digital cinematography world. I was part of a planning group that was looking into that and recommending to Japan that we do that, and then they did it and the rest is history. I got back to my love of cameras, with all of the cinema EOS products.

TVT: So you kind of divided your time between the lens and the camera side.

LT: Yes, right up to today, I’ve been dividing my time between broadcast lenses, which we now have many 4K long zooms, and cinema EOS lenses and optics and reference displays.

TVT: As a long-time veteran of this industry, what has surprised you the most over the years in regards to this business and how it has evolved?

LT: Well, there's always surprises, but one particular surprise is the durability of the 2/3-inch image format. I was at RCA when we gave birth to that image format, with a small pickup tube that later became CCDs. Forty years later it's still pretty well the center of the universe for live broadcasting, because you can make gigantic 100:1 zoom lenses in that small format and it's still reasonably sized, etc. 

And because the 2/3-inch was born in standard definition, we wondered about high definition television 2/3-inch sensors and optics and we made that too, I mean, collectively the industry made it. And then, here we are 4K and 2/3-inch makes beautiful 4K in optics and image sensors. 

And it's flexible in that there's been tremendous technological advances you couldn't have done 20-30 years ago, or today, that can be done with powerful computer-aided design etc.

TVT: What project or initiative that you've worked on has been the most challenging?

LT: Among my biggest challenges was my “swan song” at RCA, when I was made the leader of the group that developed the TK 47, the world's first fully automatic studio camera in the latter part of the 1970’s. The microprocessor had just been born, software was emerging, and we worked with some scientists at the Princeton research labs of RCA, and they helped us develop that, but that was a huge project, huge. And for three years I was just buried in that and the last two years we were working shifts to try and get that finished in time. 

And that was one of the biggest. Also challenging was dealing with all of the recording formats, all the way through HDTV, while I was promoting during my time at Sony. I was immersed in the standardization of HDTV, and then at Canon, it's been HDTV and 4K cinema. 

I’m leaving at a time where it's still incredibly exciting, which is a small regret but I still think it's the right thing to do.

TVT: Tell us about your experience working with film director George Lucas

LT: That was back in the 90’s. One of our sales people at Sony brought the Digital Betacam to Lucasfilm and they were intrigued at digital camcorders and digital recording. They were very impressed with the quality of standard definition. 

And they said to us, “you know, if you could elevate the resolution, move it towards HD, think about 24 frame, we might get really interested.” So a year later we brought an HD camcorder to Lucas, and that really ignited their interest and they said, “now that we’ve got it, you’ve got to do it 24 frame.” 

And that took a big discussion, because that involved the entire system, including the editing and post production. So we formed an alliance with some entities, including Panavision and Lucasfilm Light, and ultimately ended up with a 24-frame system, and almost as soon as we handed that over to Lucas for the “Star Wars” films. 

In 2000, James Cameron asked for a meeting, and in 2001, I brought him to NAB to see a 24-frame high-definition system. He was looking at that for 3D. We took him to Japan, formed a working group with him and he ended up working with Vince Pace, and they made the 3D system that did “Avatar.” And then Francis Ford Coppola as well, he was one of the first actually into like high definition.

These were all mavericks—they weren't the Hollywood community, they lived outside Hollywood, which at that time was still resisting HD; they said “no films!” But the mavericks said, “man, we need to try something different,” and they made it happen.

TVT: You played a huge part in the transition to HDTV. Did the transition to high definition pan out the way you expected? What was the biggest surprise there?

LT: How long it took! But there's a simple reason for that. Before HD, production standards were developed by the broadcast industry, and largely, the film industry worked on production standards for television and movies. 

But when HD came along, the computer industry said, “oh, we’ve got to be part of this, this is too important.” And the Department of Defense says “we’ve got to be part of this, it's too important,” and academia as well. So suddenly the SMPTE working groups were just loaded with all of these entities who were somewhat strangers to us. And there were fierce battles.

So we ended up with two standards for HD because we couldn't come to a singular agreement—60 frame, less resolution and 60-frame, interlace, higher resolution. But it worked. 

TVT: Are you satisfied with the way things turned out and are there areas of improvement you could see with the move to 4K?

LT: While there was a surge of interest in 4K among consumers, broadcasters backed off because of the almost parallel emergence of HDR and wide color gamut. So they said, “you know, that's much more visible across the living room, that is higher resolution like 4K on a small screen.” 

So they said, “let's stay with 1080P, but layer in HDR and wide color gamut,” and that's the way a lot of the major sporting events have been done. But at the same time, broadcasters are shooting more 4K, downconverting, but getting used to 4K and investing in 4K lenses and cameras that are switchable to HD. So there's a slower transition to 4K in broadcast, live broadcasting and television production. For the high-end episodic programs, 4K is almost universal, and it's full frame or super 35, etc. And of course, 8K is looming.

TVT: These days, most viewers are not viewing 4K in true resolution, but with advances in compression and processing within the displays, what impact have those developments had on the future of imaging and resolution?

LT: It’s sold a lot of 4K sets! 4K TV sets have been the most popular selling sets for the last couple of years, but most of the material has been upscaled inside the sets, because the broadcast is in 1080 or 720P. But the upscalers are very good, they're very sophisticated, and they work on screens that are not too big. They seem to work very well up to like, say the 65 inch, maybe 70. But if you go much bigger than that perhaps you might see something, because the viewing distance hasn't changed, in the living room it's around 10 feet, average. But screens get bigger and bigger. And suddenly, the 4K, wow factor may not be there on an upscaled 1080, right, but it's working well with the sets that are selling today.

TVT: What do you plan to do now? 

LT: I am finishing precisely to the day I started in this industry exactly 60 years ago. My wife and I are in good health and we want to go out now and enjoy life and travel. I mean, there's going to be a problem I have to confront, because I stopped suddenly and I was immersed in all this technology, I love it. What am I going to do to satisfy that? I've yet to find out.

From the mid-1970s to today, the television and video technical community have wrestled with how to best increase the overall quality of moving pictures. This work moved slowly over the extended era of analog video, sped up with digital “standard definition” video (SDTV) and made a significant leap with todays’ digital “high definition” video (HDTV). More recently, the upstart HDR technology nudged aside the preoccupation with advancing resolution and has slowly garnered the attention of both the theatrical motion picture industry and the multi-service television industry.     

Achieving High Dynamic Range lies in the understanding of how three key elements—displays at one extreme and camera sensors, lenses at the other—cooperate to create what is ultimately delivered to screens and audiences. Control and mastery of these elements are imperative in capturing and maintaining the full dynamic range of your content, helping unlock the full beauty and potency of HDR. 

DRIVEN BY DISPLAYS

The initial impetus for HDR was driven from the display end of the system. A decade ago, it was the striking advances in diverse display technologies that triggered worldwide interest in flanking the march to 4K and 8K standards for television production with considerations of wider color gamuts and higher dynamic range. LCD, plasma and OLED technologies were all expanding these imaging capabilities beyond that of the long-established CRT. 

The first footprint in HDR image capture is the glass. Optics are not always understood as the gateway to HDR, but it all starts with lens art and science. Optical designers are researching and iterating on lens science now that HDR is fully embraced and here to stay. They are working on inherent challenges that lenses bring to the format, such as achieving the desired deep, rich blacks while simultaneously doing justice to scene speculars. 

Adding to the complexity, but offering many opportunities, is the fact that filmmakers now have more lens options to choose from than ever before. And this choice should be deeply considered if achieving true HDR is the goal. At Canon, we realized that we needed to double down on our efforts to help ensure that our lenses were on the same trajectory as our cameras in terms of capture. Now that international standards for HDR have been established by the ITU, we will continue to innovate. 

The sensor is perhaps the first thought and highest area of focus when shooting HDR. Significant technological advances in recent years continue to drive the prevalence of HDR. Canon recently introduced the Dual-Gain Output sensor in the EOS C300 Mark III and EOS C70 cameras, offering more than 16+ stops of dynamic range. The dual gain nature reflects the bi-directional nature of HDR. One gain prioritizes saturation—protecting detail in highlight areas—while the other exposes important detail in the shadows while also suppressing noise.

AGILITY AND FLEXIBILITY

With HDR TV units expected to top 12.8 million by 2021, momentum for HDR among consumers will continue. But what about for cinematographers? 

While HDR standards for production are firmly in place, the challenge for cinematographers and colorists is that HDR standards for home displays are disparate, so agility and flexibility need to be baked directly into the tools. 

That brings us to displays. In the past, LCD displays have not been preferred by colorists because they lacked the deep rich black reproduction of other display technologies. However, recent technological developments in LCD displays have been nothing short of remarkable. In Canon’s 4K reference displays, we have incorporated multiple electronic tools to aid the optimum exposure settings in the cameras. Modern panels come equipped with engineering toolsets and functions designed specifically for HDR image review and user flexibility such as waveform and vector scopes, as well as legacy camera functions such as focus peaking, zooming, timecode, audio metering and histogram display. Recent features that have made their debut on modern reference displays include scalable false color monitoring, SDR/HDR compare view, pixel-level value checking, screen capture directly to USB and remote display operation via LAN or Wi-Fi.

Lastly, the elephant in the room is the current state of the world. It has made us all into remote workers, and we can expect continued delays in getting everyone back into studios and professional spaces where HDR workflows are possible. We anticipate that this will accelerate the introduction of even more tools to help make HDR content easier, cheaper and faster to produce from home in the near future.

Larry Thorpe is Senior Fellow, Imaging Technologies and Communications Group, Professional Engineering and Solutions Division for Canon USA.

To get a more in-depth perspective on HDR, click here to read Larry’s white paper on the subject.

Extraordinary technological advances are taking place in digital video imaging. Both professional and consumer image-capture systems are now widely available in 4K, raising audience expectations for more immersive experiences. Other critical dimensions of imaging beyond resolution are now vying with the ongoing elevations in image sharpness. Higher dynamic ranges, wider color gamuts and higher picture capture rates have all gained global attention by virtue of the impressive enhancements they each impart to imagery.

4K has almost become a byword and 8K resolution is looming, but close examination reveals somewhat uncoordinated movements in 4K image capture adoption and very little movement towards 8K.

SPORTS AND ‘OVER THE TOP’ SERVICES ARE DRIVING 4K ADOPTION

4K TV shipment value grew by 6% in 2018. The global market is expected to reach more than 380 billion by 2025. HD TV shipments have plummeted as global TV manufacturers drive 4K TV sets into the world’s disparate markets.

However, paradoxically, most viewers are watching HD program material upscaled to 4K on all of these displays. Broadcasters and cable operators in the Americas and Europe have largely shunned investing in 4K delivery services, largely on the basis that they see little return on investment in the very significant new broadcast infrastructure costs required. Yet, most feel it is only a matter of time before competitive dynamics usher in the inevitable arrival of 4K. It is for this reason that manufacturers are presently selling multiformat cameras that are able to switch between HD and 4K resolution capture, supporting an easy transition. Increasingly, professionals are choosing 4K lenses because they can originate higher HD image quality today, while being future-proofed for downstream 4K services.

This adoption is especially pronounced in the case of high-profile outside broadcasts—particularly sports coverage. The anticipated renewal of major sports broadcast rights over the next three years is likely to spur new investments in lenses and cameras.

In addition to sports broadcasters, the quickly growing new world of “Over The Top” (OTT) services has seen major players quickly adopting 4K content creation and distribution.

While many broadcasters study transition scenarios, sports and OTT are spurring brisk growth in the adoption of 4K lenses, cameras and reference displays.

HIGH-END IMAGING ON THE BIG SCREEN

Quite different from broadcast television, digital 4K and higher resolution origination continues to grow in moviemaking, with more and more movies across genres being shot using this technology each year. In recent years 5K, 6K and 8K have appeared in digital cinematography and are stimulating exciting advances in lenses and cameras that will continue in the years ahead.

The large screens in digital cinemas directly benefit from the substantial increase in resolution. Beyond that, mastering high-end entertainment materials in 4K extends the shelf life of those masters, while downsampled versions from the 4K master produce higher HD sharpness for today’s home distribution and enhanced 2K for the majority of digital cinemas.

THERE IS A MODEST BUT GROWING ROLE FOR 8K BROADCAST TELEVISION

At this early stage, from my observation, no U.S. broadcaster, cable or satellite operator has shown much interest in offering 8K delivery services. However, the 8K imaging system is finding an important niche application in U.S. sports broadcasting, supporting the extraction of 1080p segments from wide-angle 8K images, which has opened important new degrees of image clarity in replays.

Elsewhere in the world, however, 8K is gaining even higher visibility. A major sporting event in Japan next year will be broadcast in 8K UHD. Hundreds of thousands of 8K TV units have been sold in Japan, Korea and China in 2019, and by 2023 the Asian market is predicted to see 130% growth.

In anticipation of this increased adoption, Canon has been working intensively over the past decade on 8K optical developments. We recently announced the first two 8K UHD broadcast television lenses to be released based on the 8K UHD 1.25-inch image format: One is an 8K box field lens with a groundbreaking 51x zoom range and a 10.7mm wide-angle portable 8K lens with a 7x zoom range. Canon’s research and development in Super 35mm 8K optics have also significantly contributed to the high optical performance of the 4K Cinema EOS lenses.

THE FUTURE IS NOW

The evolution of video-capture technology is happening, with some early adopters seeing advantages in creating truly immersive viewing experiences. With 4K and 8K video capture lenses becoming more prevalent and driving the high image quality that consumers increasingly expect, the future is bright for today’s HDTV image quality, while familiarity with 4K production steadily grows. 

Larry Thorpe is Senior Fellow at Canon U.S.A, a Lifetime Achievement Emmy Award winner, holder of 10 patents in the field of broadcast development, and publisher more than sixty papers on camera technology and the topic of HDTV imaging.

While the 2019 NAB Show was no world stage, there were indeed the industry men and women from around the globe in attendance. In addition, they were actively engaged in a diverse range of debates centered around a multiplicity of contemporary industry movements. Arguably, there were simply too many options in play—largely driven by multiple disparate technologies—that were consuming all of the players within content creation teams, broadcasters, technologists, system integrators and business management.

A looming backdrop were recent seismic convulsions among the media giants as they continued to pivot in their grappling with the still-growing tech giants—in both content creation and content distribution. Within this industry maelstrom, related technologies (and associated debates) were being unleashed on many fronts—4K UHD, HDR, cloud production, IP production, 5G, esports, AR/VR, and the hot new topic of AI and ML supporting content creation.

CONTENT CREATION, THE STUFF DREAMS ARE MADE OF

In content creation—1080P fortified with HDR and WCG—emerged in the mainstream of at least near-term live productions in the United States, propelled by the ongoing caution among broadcasters and cable operators about any plunge into 4K UHD distribution services. That said, 4K UHD was indisputably being more positively spoken about as an inevitable transition in the mid to long-term. The overwhelming dominance of 4K products at this show, and their steadily declining price points, added an air of inevitability to the acceptance that at least content masters should be in 4K, regardless of short to mid-term distribution strategies.

Over the past few years, the promise of 4K imagery on larger screens had increasingly spurred sports and concert producers to seek greater framing options in lenses—and this propelled the debut of second-generation 2/3-inch long zoom 4K UHD lenses having greater focal reach and a wider angle of view. Traditionally, the simultaneous extension of focal range at both extremes has eluded the optical manufacturers for decades—an inherent optical conflict conspiring to thwart this—but this NAB saw new long zoom field lenses that broke that barrier.

The early experiences of the first generation 4K UHD lenses also had led to industry exhortations on tightening specifications on 4K UHD sharpness and chromatic aberrations at picture extremes as well as significantly improving image stabilization. Here too, impressive improvements were demonstrated at NAB. Additionally, the solution to a longstanding nemesis of long zoom broadcast lenses—namely, “lens ramping” (the drop in light transmission through the lens when zooming reaches a critical focal length) which has vexed sports directors and camera operators for decades—was demonstrated at the show. This, in the form of the novel collaboration between Canon and Sony and termed ARIA (Automatic Restoration of Illumination Attenuation), should play well on the world stage of sports and concerts.

ALL THAT GLITTERS IS NOT GOLD: 8K UHD

Paradoxically, at CES and NAB, the high visibility of 8K UHD hung like a Sword of Damocles over the many TV transition scenarios being explored, sparking new debates among the industry’s engineers, production teams and business managers. 8K cameras were sprinkled throughout the show floor and 8K displays were ubiquitous. A newly formed U.S.-based 8K Association held an all-day seminar during NAB—with one notable presentation arguing that 8K is virtually unstoppable.

Technologically, there is little question that it is advancing rapidly, but sadly absent was any clear messaging on how the technical prowess of 8K imagery can ever be expressed in the living room; that is, the continuing avoidance of any discussion on requisite screen sizes. Seems indeed to be that all the men and women are mere players within this technological tsunami. Nevertheless, 8K imaging will surely do wonders for the future of large screen cinema and multiple other large screen venues such as museums, art galleries and digital signage.

THE GAME IS AFOOT: LARGE FORMAT IMAGING

Large format lenses and cameras have continued their brisk expansion in both product developments as well as their widening penetration of most genres of entertainment production. Full-frame 35mm digital cameras are now more firmly established for high-end television and theatrical motion picture production than they were a year ago—and they are flanked by fast-moving developments in associated zoom and prime lenses from multiple global optical manufacturers. Indeed, many commented that optics seemed to be the central theme of NAB. Meanwhile, a large image format (larger than the established 2/3-inch) has entered the television production arena—the 1.0- inch single sensor camcorder has moved to center stage with highly innovative new products being offered by most of the major manufacturers at NAB—and they are all 4K. The imaging advantages of this larger format are flanked by disparate high-performance recording codecs used in these new products and has sparked broad-ranging debate and comparative evaluations.

MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING: SMARTPHONE IMAGING IN BROADCAST TV

The upstart smartphone continued nudging its way onto the world stage of imaging in numerous manifestations. Smartphones bristling with 4K OLED displays, cinematic displays, multiple cameras within one device (to offer ultra wide to telephoto shooting options), were very visible. Discussions abounded on the possibilities of such devices for broadcast newsgathering—possibly furthering the winter of discontent for professional broadcast camera and lens manufacturers. Given the number of significant movies shot over the past year on smartphones that have gained unusual visibility, the specter of broadcast television adopting this maverick imaging medium cannot be ignored.

THOUGH IT’S MADNESS, THERE IS A METHOD: A WORLD BEYOND SDI

IP infrastructures dominate a great deal of contemporary industry discussion and activities. Confidence in the SMPTE 2110 standard has grown substantially, but is tempered by multiple hard lessons in implementation by those who have undertaken major IP projects over the past couple of years. This was a topic of much discussion throughout Las Vegas. This also encompasses the experiences of those who have built the first IP television mobile production trucks. But, the multiple exhibits, and the many presentations and panel discussions at NAB left little doubt that the broadcast television industry migration to IP infrastructures and workflows is now in full swing—it squarely preoccupies the many men and women on the world broadcast stage.

Infrastructure discussions have expanded among major industry players as many contemplate the deployment of software defined networks (SDN) for moving many production applications into the cloud. Successful multiple worldwide project implementations, contemplation of possible projects by many, and firm rejection by some of any consideration of broadcast television infrastructures in the cloud—were all fodder for this broadening industry discussion.

Notwithstanding this brave new world, the proliferation of 12G SDI on multiple products at the show appeared to have injected new life into the world of SDI.

IN A BETTER WORLD THAN THIS: ESPORTS

Esports has literally exploded over the past year. More players, more dedicated studios and rapidly escalating technological developments abound. The adaptation of existing venues like cinemas for esports is now being overtaken by purpose-built venues of extraordinary sophistication. Production studios, production control rooms, and large high-resolution displays are central to these installations and are creating a new A/V system integration business. Esports has surely morphed into a global stage where many men and women play.

BE-ALL AND END-ALL: DIRECT VIEW CINEMA

Over the past year, direct view digital cinema has leapt to the forefront of discussion within the global cinema communities—propelled by dazzling demonstrations by Sony, Samsung, and others (Sony’s 8K direct view Crystal LED cinema screen drew particularly large crowds). Last year, the Digital Cinema Initiatives published its draft “Direct View Display-D-Cinema Addendum” document reflecting the consensus of some in the international digital cinema industry that might ultimately lead to formal standardization. Following the first installations of such displays in disparate regions of the world stage, it seems however, that the industry has paused slightly—as if to absorb the success (or not) of these first installations.

ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL: 5G

Meanwhile, 5G hovers over the global stage—and here the players become even more numerous with all of the technical, business and political considerations now under intense global debate. Perhaps the central theme of these discussions was just how real 5G is at this juncture, and how rapidly will it in fact advance over the next couple of years. But, the promise is surely huge.

Larry Thorpe is Senior Fellow, Imaging Technologies & Communications Group at Canon U.S.A.

Larry Thorpe, Canon

ALEXANDRIA, VA.—Larry Thorpe has a long industry background in imaging. A senior fellow of the imaging technologies and communications group (in the professional engineering and solutions division) of Canon U.S.A., Thorpe is a renowned expert in the field of video acquisition.

A visionary who spent more than 20 years at Sony pioneering the development of HD and digital production technologies in the U.S. broadcast and motion picture industries, Thorpe holds 10 patents in the field of broadcast development. He has also authored or co-authored a variety of papers on camera technology, HDTV imaging, HD lenses and optics.

As a result of his leadership, contributions and achievements, Thorpe received the NAB 2000 Television Engineering Achievement Award, the Montreux 2000 Gold Medal Award for Digital Cinematography, and in 2004, the Broadcasting & Cable Technical Leadership Award in 2004 and the Television Academy’s Charles F. Jenkins Lifetime Achievement Award in 2014. Thorpe has also held senior positions at RCA, and in 1981 was awarded the David Sarnoff Award for his innovations in automatic studio color cameras.

Thorpe is an IEE graduate (1961) of the College of Technology in Dublin, Ireland, and received his Chartered Engineer (C. Eng.) and MIEE distinction in 1965 from the Institute of Electrical Engineers in London. He is a Life Fellow of SMPTE.

Thorpe graciously agreed to answer some questions for Broadcast Engineering Extra about camera sensor sizes and their effect on production.

This is what it looks like when you attach a $1,300 large-sensor camera to a 55x box lens.

In the meantime, a video tinkerer with time and money decided to see if an expensive high-quality studio/sports box lens could be attached to a relatively inexpensive large-format sensor camera. A YouTube user called SirJonnyCargo fitted a $60,000 55x Fujinon lens with a $1,300 Panasonic Lumix DMC-GH4 camera and got surprisingly good results.

Back to Larry Thorpe:

BE Extra: In terms of sensor size and configuration, what type of camera do you recommend for episodic TV production? Why?

Thorpe: Super 35mm large-format lens and single-sensor camera are recommended for your typical episodic. This is because episodics were for many years shot on 35mm film and that cinematic look is strongly established. A broad range of S35mm lenses—both zooms and primes—are readily available, and their unique optical characteristics are also a significant contributor to that look.

BE Extra: Are there certain kinds of scenes when a different type of camera will give better results? If so, what’s an example?

Thorpe: There can be many scenes where a deep depth-of-field may be desirable, and here a small image format camera can be beneficial. There can be fast-action scenes and scenes entailing high mobility that can exploit the small physical attributes of some of the available small-format cameras.

BE Extra: What are the benefits of using multiple sensors (such as a three-chip camera) instead of a single sensor?

Thorpe: Tri-sensor cameras offer high sensitivity and excellent colorimetry. They are available in 2/3-inch image format size, and 1/2-inch and 1/3-inch—thus offering flexible options for increasingly deep depth-of-fields. They also directly originate full-bandwidth RGB 4:4:4 (no de-bayering algorithms being required), which certainly in the case of HDTV can make excellent final HD video.

Most strikingly, in broadcast television sports coverage—where very long focal length zoom lenses are a necessity—large-format lenses cannot compete with established 2/3-inch field lenses and cameras.

BE Extra: What about a station that wants to upgrade its news studio cameras and is thinking about leveraging the cost/performance of single large-sensor cameras? Good or bad idea?

Thorpe: Generally television station studios require a broad focal range zoom lens as well as wide-angle options. Studio box lenses are typically in the 25:1 zoom range. Studio portable lenses are generally in the 22-24:1 zoom range. Large-format zoom lenses don’t come close to such focal ranges.

Equally important is the expected systemization of studio cameras—requiring triax/fiber cabling to CCUs in central control rooms and also remote video operational panels. Few large format cameras offer such systemization, and those that do are very expensive.

BE Extra: Do you know if anyone is doing this?

Thorpe: Some stations and networks are using large format single sensor cameras for their news magazine shows where they seek a more cinematic look—especially for interviews. I know of no television station using a large-format camera for any cost advantages. Small format cameras are readily available from multiple manufacturers today that are highly cost-effective.

BE Extra: What are one or two important things regarding single large-sensor cameras vs. multiple small-sensor cameras that might not be immediately obvious?

Thorpe: A large-sensor camera sensor for HDTV generally has larger-sized photosites that offer greater dynamic range and lower noise than the small tri-sensor cameras. At a time when HDR is emerging as a desirable enhancement to digital imaging (both HD and UHD), this will become increasingly important.

Television stations that are considering acquiring new cameras need to first assess the nature of the program genres they will be originating. Some productions will find a shallow depth-of-field cinematic look desirable, while other shows will need to maintain the established look that is offered by small format lens-camera systems. Operational needs must also be factored in—and this entails lens focal ranges, viewfinder requirements and studio systemization. Interfaces must also be considered that can include possible teleprompter needs, placement of operational controls on the camera, menu designs, intercom, program audio, return videos to viewfinders and possible chromakey requirements.