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with the launch of the fourth orbital

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atk resupply mission to the

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international space station nasa

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delivered a brand new video camera

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capable of recording and revealing

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images so with six times the detail of

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your average high definition television

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set and nasa wants to bring this dynamic

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and captivating video into your living

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room so with that in mind we sat down

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with nasa's imagery experts program

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manager rodney grubbs here at marshall

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to talk about the future of video

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imagery and nasa tv in uhd

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so a lot of people will be familiar with

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their high definition televisions that

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they may have in their living room but

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there's been a big push lately to go to

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something called 4k or ultra high

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definition can you explain the

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difference for us

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so ultra high definition or 4k the four

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is four times 1080p so if you're looking

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at a television set that says full hd

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then it is 1080p resolution this is four

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times that in the same space

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is it a much sharper and cleaner image

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much much sharper and cleaner uh the

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there's

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many many more pixels and the pixels are

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smaller

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why is nasa studying this technology so

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there's two reasons why

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nasa would be interested in shooting in

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this format one is

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for the science and applica the science

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and engineering applications so if we

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have more pixels higher dynamic range

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higher frame rate then that's more data

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for analysis and engineering purposes

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right

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the other is because a lot of what nasa

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does has a shelf life we're still

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looking at apollo films

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even today all these many years later

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well 20 to 40 years from now somebody is

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going to be very appreciative that we

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shot in video formats that have a shelf

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life that actually hold up to whatever

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may come in the future 6k 8k

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who knows what 40 years from now people

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will be able to

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watch on large screens and so forth so

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having something in a higher resolution

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today is going to be useful for many

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decades to come so you think it's

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helpful for historical documentation as

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well yes right so

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you know a lot of what we do

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may not seem to be

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that terribly important today but

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there may be some science or application

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10 20 30 years from now where somebody's

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going to come back and do a search and

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find that footage whether it's a solid

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rocket booster test in utah or an orion

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splashdown

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you know the folks working on orion have

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been looking at apollo era film to

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understand how the capsule behaved

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you know at splashdown for example so

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you just never know how what we shoot

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today is going to be used in the future

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if we're shooting an event a one-time

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shot you don't get a do-over there may

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be something that happened that we

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didn't see at first so the analysis

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community looks at that footage and they

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pour over it frame by frame well if they

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can see in the shadows and they can see

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in the bright areas or they have more

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frames to a higher frame rate to capture

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something

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the higher resolution the more frames

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the better because there may have been

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one little instance for a fraction of a

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second of something that occurred that

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everybody missed in real time and

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they've saw it in the review of the

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footage well if you think back to uh the

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early space flight days we we flew film

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cameras and we flew film cameras for

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practical reasons and because it had a

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shelf life

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the same thing uh goes on today so if if

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we can have a 4k or 6k camera on board

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the space station documenting life and

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documenting the science that they do

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first off it allows us all the rest of

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us to paid for it to go along for the

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ride with them and really appreciate

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what life is like up there every time we

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get a higher resolution

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imaging system and we look at it here it

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makes you feel like okay i really

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actually kind of understand what life is

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like up there and then as we mentioned

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earlier

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the science and engineering applications

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of the higher resolution helps too plus

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that's a very high dynamic range

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place to shoot you have a very stark

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contrast so the better the imagery and

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the higher the dynamic range of the

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imaging system

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the more natural it will appear to us

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when it's replicated on a screen so it's

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again allowing all of us to go for a

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ride with them so tell us about the

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development of the of the new nasa uhd

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channel

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so

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an encoder manufacturer called harmonic

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approached us at a technical expo

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and said we would like to talk to nasa

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about creating a full-time ultra-high

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definition satellite channel

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so we went through a negotiation process

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uh they provided nasa new encoders so

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that we could make room on this

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satellite transponder for a new channel

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which basically meant we are further

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compressing the existing channels that

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we had to make room for this ultra high

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definition channel

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and it gives us an opportunity to

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experience have experience with a new

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encoding algorithm with new equipment

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it also gives nasa an outlet for a lot

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of this

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4k and ultra high definition content

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that we've been accumulating over the

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years but really haven't had a practical

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way to release to the public

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being first being

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the first ones to have a full-time

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channel in this format is

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really exciting for us and i know my

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colleagues enjoyed the challenge and it

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was a challenge because we're so

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out in front of the rest of the industry

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that a lot of this equipment that has

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come in to this lab

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to be worked with by our colleagues was

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serial number one or still in

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development hardware and software

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and so there's some frustration that

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goes along with that but it's also kind

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of exciting to be

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on the very very bleeding edge

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at the beginning of what may be a new

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revolution in television

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i can tell you based on firsthand

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experience the clarity and detail of

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this video is really impressive and

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we're looking forward to sharing it with

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you but harmonica nasa are currently in

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talks with cable and satellite providers

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to deliver nasa tv uhd but right now the

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only way to see this new channel is a

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with a uhd tv set and b by pulling it

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directly off of the satellite and you

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can learn more about how to try to do

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that by visiting the nasa tv website at