High-Dynamic-Range Video Solution

The natural world presents our visual system with a wide, ever-changing range of colors and intensities. Existing video cameras are only capable of capturing a limited part of this wide range with sufficient resolution. High-dynamic-range (HDR) images can represent most of the real world's luminances, but until now capturing HDR images with a linear-response function has been limited to static scenes. This demonstration showcases a novel complete HDR video solution. The system includes a unique HDR video camera capable of capturing a full HDTV video stream consisting of 20 f-stops dynamic range at a resolution of 1920 x 1080 pixels at 30 frames per second; an encoding method for coping with the huge amount of data generated by the camera (achieving a compression ratio of up to 100:1 and real-time decompression); and a new 22-inch desktop HDR display for directly visualizing the dynamic HDR content. 

This HDR video solution should be of great interest to cinematographers. The camera accurately captures real-world lighting, from lions moving in deep shadow on the bright African veldt to recording surgery with its vast range of lighting from dark body cavities to bright operating-theater lights. In addition, HDR video content can be incorporated into dynamic visualization systems, allowing virtual objects to be viewed under dynamic real-world settings. So, for example, rather than taking a physical mock-up of a proposed new car to a remote location to produce advertising material, a camera crew can take the HDR video system to the location and capture the desired lighting and environment, including any moving objects (such as clouds, people, etc.), then combine the video material with the car CAD model and paint BRDFs to produce highly compelling imagery.

Alan Chalmers 
University of Warwick

Gerhard Bonnet 
Spheron VR

Francesco Banterle
Piotr Dubla
Kurt Debattista 
University of Warwick

Alessandro Artusi
CASToRC Cyprus Institute

Christopher Moir 
University of Warwick