Albuquerque, NM - HDTV - Page 239

I sent him a request. I hope he's not too busy to reply.
JR

Don't know whether this would apply, but a respected engineer Charlie Rhoades has a paper that dealt with interference to over the air digital reception on the high band VHF from high powered fm stations. Here is the link to that paper for you tech minded folks.
http://www.tvfmtranslators.com/PastP...09FMixtoTV.pdf

Looks like KOB went early. And not just windscreen. Looks HD!

Looks like a mix on 4. Some cameras HD but most SD.

I caught it right before the weather tonight, what little I watched at 110" at 1080p looked like widescreen SD, I watch KOB pretty much exclusivly unless Judge Judy is on in the afternoon, then it's KRQE...

Thanks for sending the request but no response, so I guess he's too busy. For now, I'm using an indoor antenna that seems to be working at the moment for KRQE and KOAT.

Looks good during the news breaks on the Today show...

One benefit, (for those that watch it)the Insider is HD...

Judge Judy isn't. I don't know what the deal is since AFAIK Judge Judy has a HD feed.

Overall, things are nice here in Albuquerque - all main newscasts are at least in widescreen now and many syndies are slowly but surely being aired in HD.

Albuquerque is getting a new multicast service. LIN is adding TheCoolTV (a music service) to Albuquerque among other markets with LIN stations.

The release I saw didn't mention which LIN property here is getting the multicast channel. I myself hope KASA because you could add TheCoolTV to KASA without as much potential picture degradation as if it was done on the KRQE signal.

Another LIN press release - looks like they will handle all the admin and technical stuff for ACME, so maybe you guys can actually get NFL preseason football in HD next season off the air!

It does bother me one organization is hired to handle admin, engineering, sales for 4 stations in our market, so I wonder when the FCC say enough is enough control of two media groups operating under the resources of one as far as being monopolistic. If you are a business owner in town, imagine your choices of negotiating an ad airing on the big 6 being limited to just the 3 (KOB, KOAT, and the acme/lin group) whereas earlier in the year it was 5.

press release follows:

LIN Media and ACME Communications Announce Shared Services Arrangement in the Albuquerque-Santa Fe, Dayton and Green Bay-Appleton Markets

PROVIDENCE, R.I., Jun 04, 2010 (BUSINESS WIRE) --LIN TV Corp. ("LIN Media"; NYSE: TVL), a local television and multimedia company, today announced that the Company and ACME Communications, Inc. have entered into shared services and related agreements for ACME's television stations KWBQ-TV and KASY-TV in Albuquerque-Santa Fe, NM; WBDT-TV in Dayton, OH; and WIWB-TV in Green Bay-Appleton, WI.

Under the terms of the agreements, LIN Media will provide technical, engineering, promotional, administrative and other operational support services from its stations KRQE-TV and KASA-TV in the Albuquerque-Santa Fe market, WDTN-TV in the Dayton market, and WLUK-TV in the Green Bay-Appleton market. In addition, LIN Media will provide advertising sales services under a joint sales agreement for the ACME stations in the Dayton and Green Bay-Appleton markets. The agreements are expected to provide operating synergies and expense savings to both parties in each of the markets.

In making the announcement, Vincent L. Sadusky, President and Chief Executive Officer of LIN Media, said, "This arrangement leverages LIN Media's core strengths in operating leading local multimedia platforms and allows both parties to enjoy the benefits of greater economies of scale."

Doug Gealy, President and Chief Operating Officer of ACME Television added, "We are delighted to have in place an arrangement that further strengthens our stations and will allow them to better serve their communities."

Safe Harbor

This press release includes statements that constitute "forward-looking statements," including statements regarding our future plans and strategies, growth opportunities, and our future prospects. Forward-looking statements inherently involve risks and uncertainties, including, among other factors, general economic conditions, demand for advertising, risks associated with the integration of acquired businesses, competition for audience and programming, government regulations and new technologies, that could cause our actual results to differ materially from the forward-looking statements. Factors that could contribute to such differences include the risks detailed in our periodic reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission. By making these forward-looking statements, we undertake no obligation to update these statements for revisions or changes after the date of this press release.

About LIN Media

LIN Media, along with its subsidiaries, is a local multimedia company that owns and/or operates 28 network-affiliated broadcast television stations and interactive television station and niche web sites in 17 U.S. markets. LIN Media's online advertising business, RMM, leverages unique technology, new product innovation and customized interactive and mobile advertising solutions to deliver measurable results to local, regional and national clients.

LIN TV Corp. is traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol "TVL". Financial information about the company is available at www.linmedia.com.

About ACME Communications, Inc.

ACME Communications, Inc. owns and operates six television stations serving markets covering 2.2% of the nation's television households. The Company's stations are: KWBQ-TV and KASY-TV, Albuquerque-Santa Fe, NM; WBXX-TV, Knoxville, TN; WBDT-TV, Dayton, OH; WIWB-TV, Green Bay-Appleton, WI and WBUW-TV, Madison, WI. All of the Company's stations, except KASY-TV, a MyNetworkTV affiliate, are affiliates of The CW Network. The Company also produces The Daily Buzz, a nationally syndicated morning news program which airs on 161 television stations across the country. The Company's shares are traded over-the-counter under the symbol: ACME.PK.

SOURCE: LIN TV Corp.

LIN TV Corp.
Courtney Guertin, 401-457-9501
Corporate Communications Manager
courtney.guertin@linmedia.com

Looks pretty good, but probably not HD. If it were HD, I'm sure they would be tagging it "KOB Eyewitness News 4 in HD". I don't see any HD tagging anywhere like you'd expect from a newscast that is in HD and not just widescreen.

The lack of a lot of on-air flubs makes me think the core of the newscast production in the control room hasn't changed - I bet it's using scalers or studio camera outputs to turn 16:9 HD studio camera output to 4:3 SD for processing in the existing core -- and then back to 16:9 widescreen for the lower thirds/graphics insertion on the way to the master control and transmitter.

I do wish they'd change two things - the big "4" and "KOB" on the cityscene bugs me when you have the individual anchors in the frame. It's fine when you use the two-shot. They should have just used the text ribbon at the bottom of the cityscape to read "KOB Eyewitness News 4" and left it at that, and let the shiny "4"'s speak for themselves at the flank video monitors of the main set desk.

I also wish they change the lower third template - between line one and two of the lower third is a split. I have no problems with the red/pink gradient but it bugs me to have that occasional white piece slide along the lower third in a choppy/artifacty/sparkly/distracting way. Red/pink should have been enough as it fills the gap in a non-distracting way.

^ I was wondering why they haven't promoted their shows as HD at all. Also, I was checking out the analog ch4 on Comcast and the shows are widescreen instead of 4:3. If they are gonna do that they should move their bugs out to the edge of the screen and use "the whole space". It's really bugging me how far the bug sits in the middle of the screen.

Edit: I hadn't watched the analog ch4 since sunday (who does really?) but looking right now at noon it appears they are doing 4:3 and not widescreen.

Looks like Comcast does what DISH Network does - trims the "pillar" areas to make a 4:3 image (rather than letterbox or an in-between zoom level).

KOB is definitely still doing widescreen newscasts so anything but that from your provider is their doing and not KOB's unless your provider's tuner uses the auto aspect feature and KOB is sending the wrong aspect ratio info at times for the tuner to follow.

Comcast doesn't do that to the analog FoxNews channel (34), so I don't know why they would do it to KOB. Or if they could even get away with it. I know if I wanted to put out my product as widescreen for the analog and digital tiers and the cable operator cut&zoomed it full I would be irate.

KOB looks much better than KOAT but its not HD. Maybe just the difference between 1080i and 720p. KRQE still looks way better than any of them hands down IMHO.

That may be true, but I still don't want to watch them. Just not a fan of 13.

I should hope KRQE looks best of the three! Comparing them to KOAT/KOB is like apples and oranges.

BTW, KOB is airing their balloon fiesta ascensions in widescreen this year! No more pillars!

1) FOX News might have it in their contract that they are to be letterboxed on Comcast, or the sat receiver that tunes the FOX News HD signal with a special second output for analog might automatically output it in letterbox and not be changeable by Comcast through the receiver's configuration menu.

2) I doubt most programmers (exception being those who might have aspect ratio language in their contracts) are irate how their signal is displayed in a 4:3 aspect ratio. As long as they get carriage and get paid, I don't think it matters for most programmers if the pay tv provider clips the wings or shows it in letterbox on their systems.

Does that make me an old fart that I remember "The Box" on analog UHF channel 56.

I can't wait to see how CoolTV is - I am pretty sure it's server-based because I haven't seen a distribution feed on backyard dish satellites and I wonder with so many music types out there if the service is going to air music that is fairly evenly distributed or if it will learn heavier on R&B and Mexican/Latino.

It is server-based and fed on the Internet. I am not 100% sure about the music but my impression is that it's more Rock-focused. I could be wrong on that.

- Trip

Someone on this forum stated that Comcast was going "all digital" this summer and now it's fall and I'm still waiting for "The Daily Show" in HD from Comcast. Anyone have any new information?

1) I'm guessing that Fox news does have it in their contracts. And it's most likely just one output from the receiver and Comcasts' equipment chain spits out the HD and down-rez'd SD signal... But that's neither here nor there.

2) Agreed. But if a broadcaster did want their SD output in widescreen, to actually use all the available screen space instead of the 4:3 safe title area, Comcast or any provider shouldn't take it upon themselves to zoom&crop it. I would bet the locals send both HD and some down converted SD version to the providers thus dictating exactly how they want their signals to look.

I just got a mailer from Comcast stating it's gonna be soon and any TVs that use just the basic cable channels are going to need a "special" digital converter in order to keep watching those basic cable channels. IIRC they will give you 2 boxes free and then charge you $1.99/month for any extras beyond the two. You do have to contact them to get your boxes though.

And I am still waiting for Comedy Central HD too. C'mon Comcast!

Thanks for the info but "soon" is a relative term.

Depending on where you live, November or December.

Digital does not necessarily mean HD.

I'm aware of that but the chances are higher that we'll get the HD versions of the shows if available.