FEATURE: WABE President Tessa Potter is back from Paris 2024 and shares her behind-the-scenes takeaways from the Olympics. “The first one is IP technology for video is here to stay and is ready,” writes Potter. “Learning it, educating myself in it, and finding opportunities to work with it will be the challenge in the next five years of my career. It is not perfect, it is not easier, and it absolutely requires knowledge of video and audio and why we have certain workflows in media. Left to network engineers who think about traffic flow only and not quality control, the transition will be felt by viewers…The obvious tie-in for WABE, in my mind, is how important our educational programming and having speakers and ideas presented at our conference is.” Registration for WABE, September 23-25 in Edmonton, is still open. Read more here.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences has announced that 11 investigations have been launched for 2024 in the lead-up to the Scientific and Technical Awards on Feb. 18. Those areas include: Character dental prosthetics; On-set tools for live compositing of virtual characters and environments; In-Camera Visual Effects rendering or playback engines; LED processors for In-Camera Visual Effects; Image-based lighting for CG rendering; Heat-protective gel for stunt performer safety; Artist-friendly tools for constructing anatomical character simulation setups; Final frame post process denoisers for CG rendering; Dynamic time alignment of multiple moving microphones; Stabilized multi-camera systems for capturing wide FOV plates; and Transportable six-degrees-of-freedom motion bases capable of supporting heavy loads. Individuals and companies with devices or claims of innovation within these areas can submit achievements for review, with the deadline to submit entries Sept. 5.