16th Annual HPA Tech Retreat Held February 16-19
February 4, 2010

16th Annual HPA Tech Retreat Held February 16-19

Hollywood - The Hollywood Post Alliance will host its 16th Annual HPA Tech Retreat, February 16-19, at Rancho Las Palmas in Rancho Mirage, California. A premiere event in the broadcast and postproduction industries, the four-day HPA Tech Retreat offers a unique opportunity to review the latest in cinema, broadcast, and related technologies, and to gain insights into the industry’s future from its leading innovators, thinkers, and analysts.
The Retreat has also become a networking forum where professionals meet and engage with colleagues in a relaxed and mutually supportive environment, free from sales pressures and marketing hype. Each year, the event draws professionals from around the globe, including top executives and researchers from Hollywood studios, broadcast networks, manufacturers, artists, and even the military.

The HPA has once again assembled an impressive roster of speakers, panelists, and presenters. They include director Pierre de Lespinois (Alien Planet), Michael Bergeron, Strategic Technical Liaison, Panasonic Broadcast; Hugo Gaggioni, Chief Technology Officer, Broadcast and Production Systems Division, Sony Electronics; Martin Banks, Director of the Visual Space Perception Laboratory at the University of California Berkeley; and the legendary Mo Henry whose name appears in the credits of more than 300 films.

Highlights of the event will include a half-day seminar by the Advanced Television Systems Committee, which recently approved standards for mobile digital TV and program loudness, and a half-day seminar by SMPTE Gold Medal Winner Charles Poynton on high-dynamic-range imaging, which could make pictures more life-like than HDTV.

A supersession on 3D in the home will feature (among many others) the European Broadcasting Union’s head of emerging media, David Wood, who has called for a health warning on 3D TV programming.

CableLabs CTO Ralph Brown will join TV network executives and others discussing program distribution from the internet and disk vending machines to mobile broadcasts, cable, satellite, live cinema, and immersive media. Netscape’s fifth employee Tom Paquin will discuss online games. Attendees will also learn how classic animation features are being restored at Disney. Germany’s Frauhhofer Institute will provide an overview of their latest developments in projection and production.

This year’s Tech Retreat Welcome Dinner will include a “roast” of Mark Schubin. Schubin, who has served chair of the Retreat program since 1997, is a multiple Emmy Award winner and SMPTE Fellow who has been working in and writing about the television industry for more than four decades. It promises to be a memorable event.

The Demo Room will feature the latest technological innovations from more than 50 leading manufacturers. Previous years have featured the introductions of such technologies as Dolby’s surround sound headphones and Panasonic’s Varicam and Sony’s HDCAM SR.

A special post-Retreat feature will be a presentation entitled “The Joy of Wire” by Steve Lampen, Multimedia Technology Manager at Belden.

Registration and a complete program are available on the HPA’s Web site at www.hpaonline.com.

The Tech Retreat is sponsored by the Hollywood Post Alliance, serving the professional community of businesses and individuals who provide expertise, support, tools and the infrastructure for the creation and finishing of motion pictures, television, commercials, digital media and other dynamic media content.