The Imaging Technology Space Center (ITSC) is using the Accom WSD/HDi digital disc recorder technology as a foundation for creating ultra-HD cameras.
The Quad HD-Max camera--slated for release in 2005--is a joint effort between NASA, the U.S. Navy and Panavision. NASA is testing the camera--with four times the resolution of a regular HD camera--for use in high altitudes and the Navy will use a variant of the Quad HD-Max for surveillance and aircraft carrier inspections.
The Accom WSD/HDi records output from a camera in two simultaneous SMPTE 292 1.5 GB serial streams. Each channel appears as 1920 x 1080 60i video.
The ITSC team then plays back the twin signals from the WSD/HDi to record output through a process to recombine them into the full resolution 3840 x 2160 image, according to John Marcinka, project manager.
