EBU, Partners Testing MPEG-H Audio in Next Generation Audio Trials at Eurovision

The Eurovision Song Contest is serving as a testing ground for Next Generation Audio in the MPEG-H audio format, said the European Broadcasting Union Thursday. Content is being made available to broadcasters for testing via the Eurovision FINE network, with on-site demos available to journalists and EBU members in Tel Aviv. NGA is said to deliver an immersive aural experience that can be personalized to any home or portable device. Broadcasters produce a mix once in a “deliver-anywhere” scenario for all possible playback situations, it said. With NGA, audio mixers will be able to adjust the relative volumes of the performers, commentary and background ambience or switch between different languages, EBU said. Headphone users will be able to experience 3D binaural sound, and NGA-enabled sound bars can experience audio “on all sides," it said. Consumers will be able to tailor audio to their taste or need: the hearing challenged can boost commentary while reducing background sounds, for instance. EBU said it’s working to ensure that broadcasters can evolve production and delivery workflows easily, “in an open and codec-independent way,” to serve the growing number of NGA-capable devices. The three standardized solutions for NGA are MPEG-H Audio, AC-4 and DTS-UHD. While MPEG-H Audio was used for the parallel immersive and object-based audio production and transmission in the Eurovision trial, that content will be made available to EBU members for further demonstrations and trials, said EBU. Its technology partners for demos at the Eurovision Song Contest 2019 are Ateme, Fraunhofer IIS, Junger Audio, Sennheiser, Solid State Logic and Telos Alliance.