HUNTSVILLE, Ala.—PESA Switching Systems has named Sara Kudrle as the director of global marketing. In her new role, Kudrle will lead PESA’s marketing initiatives, increasing channel and sales activities.

“Sara Kudrle has a solid reputation in the video broadcast industry and is now showing her strengths in the federal government market,” said Howard Sutton, executive chairman of PESA. “We look forward to leveraging Sara’s experience and creativity as we expand the market footprint of our secure video, audio, USB and KVM distribution solution to the federal and state local government markets.”

Kudrle most recently brought back the original “cats” branding of PESA with the launch of PESA Tiger Fusion, which the company says is the world’s largest 4K-12G/SDI single-link video distribution system.

Based in Princeton, N.J., Kudrle brings nearly 20 years of experience in the broadcast and video industry, from transmitters to broadcast routing and IP solutions. She started her career writing real-time, multithreaded software for TV transmitter control at Continental Electronics. From there she extended her software experience to designing custom protocols and routing control systems, eventually transitioning to product marketing for companies such as Miranda, Grass Valley and Imagine Communications.

Kudrle is active in the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE), achieving the status of SMPTE Fellow, serving on the SMPTE Board of Governors and participating in setting industry standards.

Shortly before the start of the SMPTE 2016 Annual Technical Conference & Exhibition, NewBay editors spoke with Sara Kudrle about her session “File Workflows and Formats 2 —IMF and DPP-Interoperability From Creation to Delivery.”

TV TECHNOLOGY:How many new IP standards can we expect over the next five years?

SARA KUDRLE: Ideally, just one: SMPTE ST 2110. IP Standards are currently in use for both compressed and uncompressed video signals. If I can narrow down the question to uncompressed signals for live production, ideally all vendors and users would follow one roadmap, such as the one promoted by the Alliance for IP Media Solutions (AIMS). The alliance is working with industry organizations and standards bodies, such as Video Services Forum (VSF), the Joint Task Force on Networked Media (JT-NM), the Advanced Media Workflow Association (AMWA), the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) and Society of Motion Pictures and Television Engineers (SMPTE), taking the work they’ve done to foster a unified path to IP interoperability. These industry experts are working towards a single standard, which is currently in progress, SMPTE ST 2110.

TVT:Should the United States make DPP a requirement as it is in the United Kingdom?

SK: Today all of our delivery standards are voluntary. Digital Production Partnership (DPP) offers some interesting advantages in delivering file formats, but when and where DPP is used should remain up to the individual broadcaster in order to best meet their needs.

TVT:Do these file formats have the flexibility to hold data from media files far beyond what's available today? Will they inevitably need to be upgraded at some point?

SK:Using the internet as a model, there are constant improvements and updates to the efficiency of delivery via new compression schemes and file formats. For instance, we used to have MPEG2 and then MPEG4 and now we have HEVC. As technology advances, formats will adapt. The file formats being suggested at this time have been designed to be flexible into the future, based on our current knowledge. It’s hard to say for certain what the future will bring and what features or requirements will be needed. File-based workflows have come a long way and the work continues. These formats have legs. Only time will tell how long they are.

TVT:Aside from technological issues, what are the most significant obstacles to an industry-wide adoption of a specific file format right away?

SK: Aside from technological issues, I would say a large obstacle would be the established workflows that work well today. Suggesting that someone change to another format, unless their model is broken, is not going to gain traction nor be a high priority. Instituting new workflows and the training that goes along with that task can introduce significant costs. Unless there is a clear monetary benefit to changing, broadcasters will wait until it affects them. Additionally, big internet companies have their own preferred codecs: Apple has ProRes. Google uses VP9 and is developing AV1. Netflix is moving to IMF. 

Another obstacle is that some applications may not be covered by a one-size-fits-all approach and as new applications appear, they may need new specific features.

TVT:Does interoperability necessarily require some kind of compromise over using more project- or display-specific formats?

SK:Interoperability means that it plays well with others. In my experience, playing nice with others has always meant some sort of compromise along the way. That’s the nature of collaboration; finding an equitable way to work together. In the long-run, the small compromises that are required pay off in greater efficiency, accelerated innovation and more confidence among buyers.

Sara Kudrle is currently Product Marketing Manager, Networking for Grass Valley, a Belden Brand. She is active within SMPTE serving on several committees and within the standards community. Sara is a current SMPTE Secretary/Treasurer and former Section Manager for Sacramento as well as the Western Region Governor for SMPTE.

HOLLYWOOD, CALIF.—Shortly before the start of the SMPTE 2015 Annual Technical Conference & Exhibition, TV Technology spoke with Sara Kudrle about her upcoming session “Media Workflows: Automated Techniques for Quality, Captions and Ad Insertions — Can They Work?.”

TV TECHNOLOGY: Are most of these techniques now done more or less manually? Won’t video quality, captions and ad insertion always require some level of human intervention — at least in terms of monitoring?


Sara Kudrle
SARA KUDRLE: There are many techniques available for quality monitoring, captions and ad insertion, and yes, there is still a need for manual intervention in many cases. Some software solutions make clever decisions based on presets or rules, that allow the software to take some action regarding errors or issues discovered, including corrections. Even though this required someone to set the rules or presets for the software to follow, the intervention is a “set once” scenario for those defined issues.

TVT: What are some of the obstacles to automating these functions?

KUDRLE: Some of the obstacles for automating functions are defining every possible scenario that could occur. Software will follow rules, but the rules need to be defined. Unlike people, who will adapt to unknown situations, the software will be restricted to what it is programmed to do. However, software can be updated with these new scenarios as they are encountered, which will improve the accuracy of the application.

Another obstacle is the human kind. People are naturally averse to change, and adding automation to a workflow will reduce the manual involvement, and possibly cause fear of becoming irrelevant. But, the great thing about automation is it allows your people to accomplish more, thereby allowing your operation to grow.

TVT: What is the chief benefit?

KUDRLE: There are several benefits to automating these functions. First of all, by automating functions, the number of tasks that can be accomplished per operator is much greater and these can be accomplished much faster, in many cases, with greater precision.

Secondly, subtle errors can be identified, which could be difficult for humans to notice, especially if multiple errors are occurring simultaneously. So, a more thorough and efficient system is created.

Third, software offers consistency. It does not matter if it is the first project of the day or the one thousandth; the results will be the same. Software does not get tired or distracted and can work 24x7.

And with more channels, more audio per channel, and more regulations to comply with, having an automated way to handle it is desirable. To add to this, the ability of software to log every action automatically can drastically help with proving compliance when needed.

For example, consider an operator working for a large station group or a playout provider who’s tasked with monitoring as many as 12-24 channels of programming at any given time. When that operator is asked to ensure that appropriate content is playing it can be easy to miss an error—especially if multiple errors take place simultaneously. Grass Valley offers a solution within its monitoring products called a Penalty Box, similar to other solutions on the market, which automatically alert the operator about channels or programs that fall outside preset parameters. In doing so, the automated system has told the operator which error to address. This sort of automation is critical to OPEX efficiency.

TVT: What is required to integrate these techniques into an existing workflow?

KUDRLE: A thorough understanding of your challenges and potential solutions is critical. A broadcaster should start by ensuring they have a detailed understanding of exactly what they’re hoping to accomplish. With this information, they can then go out and seek input from the suppliers in our industry that offer solutions. My company, Grass Valley, would be a good start, but, of course, there are other suitable solutions out there, as well, such as from Telestream and SAM, who are presenting in the session. Any desired vendor should be able to demonstrate how their solution can address any broadcaster’s specific concern. Depending on the exact nature of the challenge, solution providers could suggest a number of different solutions, including both hardware and software solutions. From the broadcaster’s perspective, it will be of paramount importance to ask questions about interoperability and scalability.

TVT: Do these techniques extend to digital (online) platforms?

KUDRLE: Absolutely! As we move to online platforms, the prevalence of automated techniques will only increase, if for no other reason than necessity. The number of channels is growing substantially, with lower revenue per channel expected. Therefore, it is necessary to find a more cost effective way to manage and monitor all of these functions on every channel.

Sara Kudrle is currently the Product Marketing Manager for Monitoring and Control within the Strategic Marketing group of Grass Valley, a Belden Brand. Kudrle's 15-plus years as an engineer in the broadcast industry started at Tektronix. Kudrle has authored papers for NAB, PBS and SMPTE conferences and has been published in the SMPTE Motion Imaging Journal and Broadcast Engineering. Kudrle is active within SMPTE serving on several committees and within the standards community.