Nuggets and MXF: Making the Networked Studio a Reality

Hans K. Heber graduated in 1969 with a degree in telecommunications (Dipl.Ing.) He has worked in R&D for broadcast equipment and systems as well as broadcast operations. Heber has been assigned to different international posts and is now responsible for strategic planning of production systems and infrastructure at the German Broadcaster, ZDF.

Jean-Pierre Lacotte joined Thomson-CSF in 1969 to work in the Central Research Laboratory of the Optical Storage Lab. In 1979, he became deputy director of the videodisk department where he was in charge of program development. In 1986, Lacotte joined the Thomson television division (Thomson Video Equipment) where he worked as strategic marketing group manager, and then technical director. He later worked as vice-president of IT-broadcasting and vice-president of R&D coordination of the Thomson multimedia Broadcast Solutions Group. Lacotte has received Emmy awards from the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS) for his contribution to the serial digital interface (SDI) (270 Mbits/sec standards) and for the development and/or commercialization of 16:9 video. He currently serves as chairman of H2G and vice-chair on the board of the Information Technology for European Advancement (ITEA).

Uwe Ritter studied electronics and communications. In 1979, he joined Bosch Professional TV division as a software development engineer, working several years on telecine, switcher, and digital VCR development projects. He also worked on the development of a LAN-based control systems for studio equipment and was software project manager for color corrector development of the FDL Telecine. In 1990, Ritter became project manager for the Philips turnkey systems business unit (playout facilities, DTH services). After working in numerous positions, he became head of the Transmission and Distribution Systems Department for Philips Broadcast. In 2002 he joined Thomson Grass Valley, where he currently works as director of business development and consulting. Ritter holds several patents for distributed LAN-based control systems and has authored various publications and papers.

Jan van Rooy is responsible for the video architecture in all Thomson Broadcast, high-speed and HDTV cameras. Currently, he is involved in the definition and implementation of the video processing chain, including HDTV for future generations of broadcast cameras and camcorders at Thomson.

Wolfgang Ruppel was born in 1964. He received a Diploma degree and a Dr.-Ing. degree in communications engineering from the Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany, in 1989 and 1994, respectively. From 1989 to 1994, he worked as a research scientist at the Institute of Communications Engineering at the Technical University of Darmstadt. Since 1994, he has worked in the research and development labs of Deutsche Telekom and has also headed the department of media services and broadcast systems of T-Systems, a subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom. His current application areas are digital cinema, broadcasting contribution solutions, and high-quality imaging applications. Ruppel is a member of ITG (Informationstechnische Gesellschaft) and a board member of FKTG (Fernseh-und Kinotechnische Gesellschaft).

Jean-Philippe Viollet graduated from ENST (Telecom Paris) in 1998, specializing in image and sound. He also received a degree in acoustic, signal processing and informatics applied to music from Paris University, IRCAM (Institut de Recherche et Coordination Acoustique/Musique) in 1999. After a short period at Arte France working on studies related to archival process and interactive TV, Viollet joined Enertec in 2001 and specialized in MXF. He is currently involved in specifying the use of this format for different purposes such as the IST Nuggets Project.