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Snell & Wilcox to Release Free MXF Software Developer Kit and Desktop Player to Ease Broadcast IT Transition

Free MXF Tools to speed compatible broadcast equipment

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"It's time to remove the 'fear factor' and jumpstart the next generation of television broadcasting," says S&W CEO Simon Derry

SANTA CLARA, CALIFORNIA, March 1, 2004 -- Snell & Wilcox announced today that it will release at no charge at NAB 2004 (Booth #C6421) a comprehensive set of software developer tools -- called MXF Express -- designed to help broadcasters and equipment vendors ensure interoperability among file-sharing products and systems through the MXF file format. The company will also freely release MXF Desktop, a software-based MXF file player that will bring MXF compatibility to any Windows PC desktop.

MXF (Material eXchange Format) is a major new building block for IT-based broadcast and post-production environments offering a unique combination of several essential key features:

• Platform independence including compression, network protocol and operating systems


• Extensive support for metadata and improved workflows


• Packetized and streaming file-based capability


• An open industry format with broad-based support from industry vendors


• Interoperability tested between industry vendors


• Extensible for future source formats, metadata schemes etc.

Snell & Wilcox engineers played a critical role in the definition and standardization of MXF. As part of their standardization work, the company's research engineers developed over several years -- through hundreds of man hours of R&D -- a package of software tools that enable users to create products that conform to the MXF specification. Those tools are included in the free releases of MXF Express and MXF Desktop.

Major global broadcasters such as CNN, CBS, BBC, and Channel 4 have announced support in their facilities for MXF. Top broadcast technology vendors including Sony, Avid, Thomson, Pinnacle, JVC, Leitch, Da Vinci, Matrox, Cisco, SGI, Quantel, and Seachange have joined Snell & Wilcox in supporting the MXF format in their products. The broadcast industry has demanded total interoperability between all vendor implementations of the MXF standard and Snell & Wilcox's MXF Express is designed to help ensure that all manufacturers meet that goal with all first generation products.

MXF Express, set for NAB release, is a comprehensive software developer kit (SDK). It includes the following features:

• Support for OP1a, OP-Atom, MPEG, DV, BWAV and AES profiles that allow various media configurations within a single MXF file.


• C++ libraries that enable developers to add MXF awareness to their products (including sample code for creating MXF writers / readers)


• Directshow filters for easy MXF player / writer creation (including sample code for creating MXF players)


• High quality sample MXF files for testing and evaluation (based on the Snell & Wilcox "Test Card M")

The contents of the MXF Express SDK were proven internally by Snell & Wilcox engineers who used it to create several file-based products with sophisticated MXF-based functionality. These include Ingest Station, a high quality compression mastering system; Mosalina, an automated MPEG quality control software application; and MediaX, a powerful PCI-based hardware accelerator engine designed to bring Snell & Wilcox core algorithms and signal processing expertise to the IT domain.

Also being freely released is MXF Desktop, a software application that adds MXF awareness to PCs running Windows XP or Windows 2000 operating systems. It provides the following functionality:

• Enables Microsoft's Windows Media® Player to play MXF files
  
• Enables easy viewing of key metadata within an MXF file via the right click properties command in Windows Explorer®
  
• Enables WAV, MPEG and DV formats to be "wrapped" as essence into an MXF file

Both MXF Express and MXF Desktop will be released on April 19, the opening day of NAB 2004. The applications will be available to qualified users for download from a new MXF resource web site to be launched and supported by Snell & Wilcox. Users will be directed to the new site from a link on www.snellwilcox.com.

Building an MXF Community

MXF developers who use the MXF Express SDK will be invited to publicly share information and upload questions and solutions to an interactive online resource forum on the web site. Experts from Snell & Wilcox will moderate and contribute to the online community, but will not offer direct end user support for the free software.

"Our motivation for releasing these tools is that it benefits everyone to see the broadcast industry move easily and quickly to a file-based infrastructure. It's time to remove the 'fear factor' and jumpstart the next generation of image communications," said Simon Derry, Chief Executive of Snell & Wilcox.

Derry noted that the MXF Express SDK should be especially useful to smaller broadcast equipment manufacturers who do not have the resources or time to quickly digest and implement the nearly 500 pages of specifications encompassed in the MXF technical standard.

"By freely providing the broadcast industry with our extensive knowledge base on MXF, we can save valuable time and resources for everyone while reducing the chances of early glitches that could slow adoption of new technology," said Derry. "We must avoid the situation the industry encountered in the early days of MPEG-2 when broadcasters were plagued with interoperability issues between vendors who each interpreted the MPEG-2 specification slightly differently."

"The components in MXF Express and MXF Desktop conform to the MXF standard and are designed to help create products that conform to the MXF specification," noted Bruce Devlin, a Snell & Wilcox principal research engineer who was recently made a Fellow of SMPTE in recognition of his efforts as editor and contributing author of the MXF File Format Specifications, chair of the MXF Implementers Group and as active contributor to the work of the AAF Association and SMPTE.

Devlin compared MXF to the common BNC connector used to pass television signals through every piece of professional video equipment. "It's in no one's interest to have an incompatible BNC connector. We all want to get our signals into our equipment as quickly and easily as possible," said Devlin. "An MXF file is just like a BNC connector. All we want is for everyone to use the same flavor of it. At the end of the day, our business at Snell & Wilcox is to process the best pictures that go into that MXF file. Our only interest is that the file to be completely interoperative and transparent to all users."

Derry and Devlin emphasized that a key goal of the Snell & Wilcox initiative is to raise the comfort level of broadcasters and content creators as they use, handle and ultimately reaping the benefits of MXF technology.

"MXF is this big new standard that's a bit scary and intimidating," Derry noted. "We want to accelerate the learning curve and make MXF as accessible on your PC as any text file. Just double click it and it opens. Once we all see that these files can be easily created, exchanged and used, the uncertainly will disappear and the extraordinary benefits will be revealed."

Added Devlin: "MXF Express should help level the playing field between the biggest and smallest players in the broadcast industry, whether they are equipment manufacturers or broadcast operators. The essential knowledge to implement a smooth IT transition should be available to everyone because its early success benefits all of us."