Grass Valley, CA – While college football fans have been watching games in high definition (HD) for some time, the 2010-11 season marks the first that officials will be getting their instant replays in HD -- in uncompressed quality that is far superior to what viewers see at home. The system delivering this evolution is the XOS HD Replay, based on video technology from AJA Video Systems.
Earlier this year XOS Digital, a leading provider of digital technologies for sports teams nationwide, introduced XOS HD Replay with AJA‚s KONA LHi capture and playback cards and HDP2 Mini-Converters at the foundation of the system‚s capabilities.
The XOS HD Replay system takes an uncompressed HD-SDI video feed from the on-field broadcast truck and captures it via an AJA KONA LHi. The HD-SDI output of a second KONA LHi card is routed through AJA HDP2 Mini-Converters to play back the uncompressed HD video on standard computer monitors in a replay booth, for the game‚s dedicated replay official. With multiple play angles in superior image quality, replay officials are able to get the conclusive video evidence they need to uphold, overturn or confirm an on field call or coaches‚ challenge while enabling decisions to be made by the replay official in a minimum amount of time.
“The capabilities of the KONA card are the life-blood of this system,” said XOS Digital Director of Development Tom Fuller. “It offers the highest image quality and is imminently reliable. That’s critical because the goal of the system is to enable officials to do their job faster and more accurately. The HDP2 converters are also key because they use a very high quality scaling engine and de-interlacer that enables us to play out to cost-effective HD resolution computer monitors so we‚re able to keep costs competitive without sacrificing video quality.”
NCAA football‚s Southeastern Conference (SEC) was the first to adopt the HD Replay system with other conferences joining over the course of the season. These conferences include the Big12, the WAC (Western Athletic Conference), and Conference USA.