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Lights, camera, makeup! WCVB broadcasts role as first with new tech

May 14th, 2007

Lights, camera, makeup! WCVB broadcasts role as first with new tech
Boston Herald, MA

Bill Fine is passionate about all the geeky technological aspects of television broadcasting.
Fine, president of WVCB-TV (Ch.5), tends to speak about digital signals, compressed frequencies - even the doppler radar system - like a kid in a candy shop.
So he was visibly excited last week as the station prepared to become the first in the market to broadcast its local newscasts in high definition.
“I absolutely love it,” Fine said. “I’ve been walking down (to the station’s new set) every day for two weeks and just getting more and more pumped up about it.”

Starting with its 5 o’clock newscast tonight, WCVB will be the first and only station to broadcast its news in HD.
WCVB, which is owned by Hearst-Argyle Television, has invested millions of dollars buying the new camera equipment, creating a completely new set and installing a new control room.
Some of the effects of converting to HD will be immediate.
For viewers with high-definition TVs, the picture will be sharper, brighter and clearer. To hammer home the difference, WCVB has been running episodes of its show “Chronicle” - which began running in HD last October - on high-definition and old-fashioned analog TV sets side-by-side in its lobby.
Even for those watching at home, WCVB’s sleek set, which is twice the size of its previous one, will likely be a welcome improvement.
And, of course, there are the precious bragging rights of being first.
But what isn’t as clear is what kind of economic impact it will have for the station.
While HD TVs are gaining popularity, far more analog sets sit in homes. Only one in six households in the U.S. had at least one HD TV as of last year, according to the trade publication MediaPost.
Fine wouldn’t say how much the cost of converting to HD was for WCVB. But industry insiders said such a soup-to-nuts change-over could run above $10 million.
Fine acknowledged that WCVB is getting ahead of most of its audience by implementing the new technology. “You want to be ahead of the market,” he said.
“The more our lineup is 24 hours of high definition the better value we’re going to be for the viewer,” Fine said.
And HD can be especially appealing to advertisers who rely on showing their products in TV commercials, such as fashion brands, electronic gadgets or furniture stores, he added.
People who own HD sets tend to be a more affluent set, said Tim Gilbert, general manager of Lexington, Ky.-based KLEX-TV, which went to HD last month. “They’re very desirable households,” he said.
A wave of TV stations converting to HD has spread across the country in the past six months or so, said Dennis Wharton, president of the National Association of Broadcasters. Close to 50 stations now do local newscasts in HD in the United States “I think it’s a way to brand your station as the next generation of technology,” he said.
On Feb. 17, 2009, all TV stations will switch from an analog signal to a digital one. Plans are in place for vouchers to be provided to homes to help purchase converters for old analog sets. But the move is expected to push more consumers toward buying new HD sets and eventually the entire industry will shift to broadcasting in HD.
So, perhaps, the best reason for WCVB’s turning to HD was it was going to have to anyway.

Entry Filed under: World Digital Camera