NHK and Village-Island have developed a new system that makes it possible to transport 8K 4:2:2 60p 10-bits on a single 12G-SDI cable.

VICO-8 uses intoPIX TICO compression technology, taking 8K video as four 12G-SDI inputs and compresses it by a factor of 4 to 1, in visually lossless quality, generating a single TICO 8K stream output mapped on a single 12G-SDI interface with minimal delay.

8K 60p 4:2:2 (10 bits) usually requires 16 3G-SDI or 4 12G-SDI for raw quality transport.

Vico 8

Vico 8

Such a high number of SDI cables implies many drawbacks such as  space constraints, high costs and high complexity of wiring.

Furthermore, a UHD signal spread on multiple SDI cables brings problems for signal distribution, switching, transmission and other basic operations.

Bringing 8K to a single 12G-SDI enables users to achieve 8K with 4K-ready appliances.

In addition, when it comes to matrix switchers, VICO-8 decreased the number of required inputs by 4 and the number of outputs by 4, dividing the number of required nodes by 16.

VICO-8 was developed in collaboration with NHK. “The gain of using VICO-8 can be dramatic within our 8K OB VAN where the constraints on space, heat, wirings, energy are the most challenging” said Miyazaki san, senior manager, Engineering Administration Department at NHK.

“8K on a single SDI cable will simplify our operations and reduce risks inside the OB VAN.”

Super hi vision

NHK is a pioneer in Super Hi Vision technology

VICO-8 can be configured as an encoder or a decoder. As an 8K decoder, it can also be configured to output a down-converted 4K output, thanks to the internal down-scaler available in the TICO compression.

’The gain of using VICO-8 can be dramatic within our 8K OB VAN where the constraints on space, heat, wirings, energy are the most challenging’

“TICO technology eases the access to 8K to a wide range of users and applications. 12G-SDI is getting more and more popular in new broadcast infrastructures”, said intoPIX Marketing Director Jean-Baptiste Lorent.

He added: “intoPIX is happy to accelerate the transition to 8K broadcasting, the so-called Super Hi-vision. Enabling 8K on TICO for NHK with the development of new FPGA IP-cores was a natural evolution for us”.