MWI hosts Jeff Jewett from
Blu-Ray
On May 21st, 2009, Metalworks Institute hosted a seminar from Jeff Jewett of Sony DADC Digitalworks in the MWI Lecture Hall. Mr. Jewett ‘s lecture focused on the diverse capabilities of Blu-ray technology, beyond the obvious improvements in picture quality.
Blu-ray is the name of a next-generation optical disc format jointly developed by the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA), a group of the world's leading consumer electronics, personal computer and media manufacturers (including Apple, Dell, Hitachi, HP, JVC, LG, Mitsubishi, Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, TDK and Thomson).
The format was developed to enable recording, rewriting and playback of high-definition video (HD), as well as storing large amounts of data. The format offers more than five times the storage capacity of traditional DVDs and can hold up to 25GB on a single-layer disc and 50GB on a dual-layer disc. This extra capacity combined with the use of advanced video and audio codecs will offer consumers an unprecedented HD experience.
While current optical disc technologies such as DVD, DVD-R, DVD-RW, and DVD-RAM rely on a red laser to read and write data, the new format uses a blue-violet laser instead, hence the name Blu-ray. Despite the different type of lasers used, Blu-ray products can easily be made backwards compatible with CDs and DVDs through the use of a BD/DVD/CD compatible optical pickup unit.
The benefit of using a blue-violet laser (405nm) is that it has a shorter wavelength than a red laser (650nm), which makes it possible to focus the laser spot with even greater precision. This allows data to be packed more tightly and stored in less space, so it's possible to fit more data on the disc even though it's the same size as a CD/DVD. Blu-ray Discs can hold up to 50GB of information.
With all of the technical jargon aside, we can expect that Blu-ray is going to change not only the way we experience our favourite musical acts, but also the film and television industries as well.
