Nizhny Novgorod, Russia — In the period from March, 15 till March, 23 Tecom Group analyzed loudness levels on 20 Russian TV channels of the first and second DVB-T2 multiplexes. The project was initiated by Tecom Group itself. The integrated loudness of the digital broadcast was measured by means of Qligent Vision, the product developed by Tecom Group’s partner company. It is worth mentioning that back in 2015 Tecom Group already monitored the loudness level of 8 federal TV channels the same way.
The loudness discrepancy issue has been a burning problem for quite a long time. When switching channels viewers cannot help noticing unreasonable increases and declines in the loudness level, which is inadmissible since it can ruin the content perception.
To solve the problem, last year the government of the Russian Federation came up with a legislative initiative. The Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications of the Russian Federation signed Act № 171 “Recommendations on the loudness level in broadcasting” on May 21, 2015. According to the Act, the Program Loudness has to meet the standard of - 23,0 LUFS within allowed precision ±0,5 LUFS. In cases when it is impossible to ensure the advisable loudness level of - 23,0 LUFS, the allowed precision of ±1,0 LU remains admissible. Once the discrepancy is discovered, a TV company faces the penalty of approximately $1 500 to $7 500.
The research, carried out by Tecom Group indicates that the loudness level of 9 TV channels out of 20 does not comply with the standards, introduced by the Act “Recommendations on the loudness level in broadcasting”. The integrated loudness level was overshot by 6 TV channels and undershot by 5 TV channels. The maximum registered discrepancies were -17,67 LUFS and -27,9 LUFS.
In order to broadcast within legal boundaries, the content has to go through multilevel verification. Moreover, despite having passed loudness verification in the studio, the content (a film, an ad, etc.) might end up failing to meet the loudness standards when approaching the last mile of the distribution chain due to multiplexing, decoding, local insertions etc.
To address this problem Tecom Group offers software solutions, which can regulate the loudness level in the most effective manner:
Loudness Analyzer - a cost-effective yet powerful desktop software solution that enables broadcasters, cable, IPTV, and satellite operators to easily perform loudness tasks such as compliance verification with loudness standards based on ITU-R BS.1770-3 Recommendation. The application allows scanning audio and video files for loudness level and performing loudness measurements after receiving these files from contractors.
Qligent Vision – a software based monitoring solution that brings intelligent architecture, intuitive display and limitless scalability for analyzing all aspects of media service delivery at any point in the distribution chain for terrestrial, cable, satellite or IPTV networks. It provides TV broadcasting companies with multi-point data aggregation, real-time monitoring, consolidated fault logging and comprehensive SLA metrics, trending and data analytics, integrated loudness level monitoring etc. The product was developed by Qligent - Tecom Group’s partner company.