How quickly have you grown as an organization?

TR: Please see the attached graph showing how the Alliance has grown from an original handful to the current 64 Member companies.The fact that the growth comes in spurts, while sometimes we lose Member companies in the face of global economic challenges, reflects the volatility of the security equipment industry. The logos of Member companies are listed at www.highdefcctv.org in the order in which the companies joined the Alliance. It is interesting to note that the Members joining recently include many Chinese companies, as well as many companies making chips for video transmission.

TR: I am responsible for all facets of the Alliance’s operations, for example ensuring smooth, effective operation of the committees; recruiting new Members; managing finances; reporting to the board of directors (who are selected by the Steering Members); and also reporting to ASIC. I also take care of the website, public relations, seminars, parties, and other events. I am a dedicated spokesman for the industry, although increasingly acute observers such as yourself around the world are beginning to step up and articulate from their own points of view the compelling advantages of HDcctv equipment.

TR: We wrote an article about the formation of the Alliance that came out a few months ago, still showing at the top of blogcatalog. The coincidence for me was that at ISC West in April 2008, a major OEM customer of EverFocus, where I was VP of Global Sales for the ODM business unit, challenged me to “unlock HD for the installed base.” Later the very same day, that I met Gareth Heywood of Gennum, who was beginning to promote the Aviia transmission solution for HDcctv.

TR: The Alliance is funded by its Members, through annual fees. A detailed list of membership benefits and costs is available online (check out HDcctv Alliance website). Each Member chooses a participation level based on their unique goals in the HDcctv market. In summary for corporate Members: Marketing Members may certify own-branded products as HDcctv compliant, and they participate in the Alliance’s marketing activities; Manufacturing Members have the rights of Manufacturing Members and also participate in the development of the standard as well as being able to certify their own-designed products as HDcctv compliant; and Steering Members have the rights of Manufacturing Members in addition to ratifying successive versions of the standard and determining the overall direction of the organization

TR: This is one of the great misconceptions of the current rush into HDcctv equipment: Increasingly, manufacturers readily recognize the uncompressed-HD-over-coax opportunity, and many think that HD-SDI is enough. However, HD-SDI is not enough. There is no comprehensive HD-SDI standard; HD-SDI is actually a loose collection of specifications developed over the past decade or so for broadcast television studio equipment. Critically, there is no compliance certification for HD-SDI. HD-SDI is appropriate for broadcast TV studios, wherein it is acceptable to send an engineer to install expensive cameras and adjust equipment to make everything work. However, surveillance demands mass produced interoperability and repeatable performance. Not all HD-SDI products are the same; in fact HD-SDI products have already been shown in some surveillance applications to deliver disappointing electrical performance or not to interoperate. Every time an end customer buys two pieces of equipment that don’t work together for one reason or another, the growth of the industry suffers. The HDcctv Alliance therefore provides a vital service in delivering a comprehensive interface standard that facilitates the fastest possible growth of the industry.

TR: I reckon it’s just getting started. EverFocus is selling products, some of which were designed in late 2009. While early movers like EverFocus continue to expand their HDcctv product lines, other more recent entrants will continue bringing more choice to end customers. The most recent entrants to the Alliance include European companies, and I hear positive indications from several others.

TR: You may have noticed that Samsung, who had the biggest booth at IFSEC 2011, featured their first HDcctv prototypes there. Samsung’s ASIS 2011 booth reflected an even bigger move into HDcctv, as did their CPSE booth in Shenzhen last week. Many incumbents face the marketing challenge of having committed resources and reputations to the notion that every HD surveillance camera should be an IP camera, and history suggests that the bigger companies sometimes take the longest to re-think such assumptions based on empirical evidence. So yes, we expect everyone in the industry eventually to offer HDcctv, why not? It’sjust hard to say when each company will make its move.

TR: Several advantages leap to mind: No camera boot-up time. No compression latency. No compression artifacts. Unadulterated live views. As-simple-as CCTV installation, commissioning, and operation, no specialist IT knowledge required on the local site. No camera LAN programming required. No reliance on high-QoS local-site IP LAN implementations to achieve high-quality video Ready integration with IP LANs (via DVRs and encoders) for enterprise-scale solutions. All cameras on a local site share a single network switch port, versus one port per IP camera. As-simple-as CCTV camera and DVR architecture, enabling low-make-cost implementations. Converting from an HDTV signal to an Ethernet packet stream in every camera requires adding sophisticated hardware to the cameras and running a local-site IP LAN to every camera mount, all for the purpose of eliminating potentially valuable forensic evidence before it can be transmitted from the camera; how does that system architecture improve surveillance, in the general case?

TR: For cameras, transmission circuits that integrate with signal processors; for DVRs, multi-channel receiver chips with multiplexing/scaling capabilities. Several HDcctv Alliance Member companies are reportedly developing new chips that will deliver unprecedented surveillance capabilities at very competitive total cost of ownership.

TR: The Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE) developed the original HDTV standards, including the various HD-SDI specifications. The HDcctv standard is developed under a unique license agreement with SMPTE that allows the Alliance to re-use and refine the SMPTE standards to suit the unique needs of surveillance. As a result of this licensing arrangement, HDcctv will track the SMPTE HDTV formats through their evolution, currently planned above 16MP per frame of video. For the next few years, we are focused on adding capabilities such as power-over-cable and native optical transmission while preserving the progressive-scan 720 and 1080 resolutions implemented in V1.0 HDcctv.

By the way, another often unexamined assumption is that a 5MP IP camera actually delivers a 5MP video stream. Over what local-site IP LAN? At what frame rate? What quality image in each frame? Depending on available bandwidth, an IP camera with a high-resolution sensor may actually deliver lower-quality video than even an analogue CCTV camera.

TR: Among other tests, V1.0 HDcctv requires testing 150m transmission over a particular common grade of RG-59, enabling manufacturers to guarantee 100m transmission between compliant products. V2.0 HDcctv is in the final stages of preparation; V2.0 HDcctv provides for 300m transmission over RG-59 and 100m over Cat5. With V2.0 HDcctv, almost any surveillance camera is a candidate for upgrade to highest-quality HD video. Here is coverage of the V2.0 HDcctv announcement last month www.info4security.com

HDcctv is a local interface technology optimized for carrying digital HD surveillance video within the local site; Ethernet is a flexible networking technology optimized for carrying packets through lossy channels over potentially long distances. HDcctv and IP video can be used to great effect together. However, many in our industry are wedded to the idea that every camera should provide an Ethernet output, despite the many facts that mitigate against that choice in the general case.

TR: Please see the attached market analysis. My expectations for the future are based on the chips being developed now that will see their way into products selling broadly through distribution in 3 years, many of which will be compliant with V2.0 HDcctv.

Assumption for growth over the next 5 years.

Integrated CCTV would like to thank Todd for his time. It certainly gives customers and installers a choice that previously was unavailable. The upgrade path to HD is inevitable, the predicted growth must excite CCTV installers and manufacturers alike. It now seems that HDcctv over coax will play a very big part in this HD revolution. Interesting times ahead. Look out for the HDcctv logo (below) for compliant products and manufacturers.