I was unable to attend the NAB this year, but one story caught my eye - the Japanese Broadcasting Corporation (NHK) announced plans to broadcast high-definition video from the moon!

Hirokazu Nishiyama, the managing director of the Japanese Broadcasting Corporation NHK, was giving a speech about the company's Ultra-HDTV technology.

"We believe that Ultra-HDTV is the medium that will transform tele-vision to tele-sense," he said. "Ultra-HDTV will open a door to a new world of broadcasting and become an essential medium of the future."

For all the readers who thrive on pushing the technical envelope, Ultra-HDTV is a 32 megapixel Super Hi-Vision system that has a resolution of 7680x4320 - 16 times that of the best high-definition television transmissions today. It also features 22.2 channel surround sound.

For the rest of us, we only pay attention when the story has a hook. Well, Hirokazu came prepared.



Briefly, the Japanese lunar orbiter SELENE is scheduled to launch this summer. It will orbit the moon for a year. HHK will have telephoto and wide-angle high-definition color cameras, each with three 2.2M pixel sensors onboard. No doubt this will supply spectacular shots of the earth rising over the moon.

A minute of high-definition video will be compressed, stored and transmitted to the earth in a 20-minute transmission.