In the analog days of occasionally snowy pictures from terrestrial reception due to weather, aircraft, or just being too far away from a station's tower, the problem was mostly eliminated by the advent of cable and satellite. Today, in the digital world, snow of a different kind is providing headaches for some stations. The real kind of snow.
Viewers with HD sets watching prime time programming on WKYT-TV, the CBS affiliate in Lexington, Ky., and other local broadcast outlets in the market, have complained this winter when HD-quality images on-screen are relegated to SD quality whenever the stations scroll their school closing lists due to snow, or when they issue Amber Alerts or add any other form of graphics on-air.
Some HD viewers, suddenly attuned (quite literally) to a superior picture, notice the difference in screen quality immediately and head for their phones to voice their displeasure, according to the Lexington Herald-Leader.
Mark Pimentel, general manager at ABC affiliate WTVQ-TV, a Media General property, said "it was particularly bad when we had over 100 closings at one time. Because even if you are [scrolling] through them [only] one time, and we typically will run through them twice, it takes 11 minutes."
Since most stations in Kentucky and elsewhere are still airing HD content on a pass through basis from their respective networks, graphics and other tools used by typical local news, weather and sports divisions remain at analog quality levels. That will all change, of course, as local outlets convert their news and other local fare to HD in the months ahead. (Thus far, about three-dozen stations have done so.)
