Quantel
 | This articlepossibly containsoriginal research.(March 2023) |
 | |
| Company type | Limited |
|---|---|
| Industry | Broadcasttelevision,video productionandmotion picture |
| Founded | 1973 |
| Founders | Peter Michael,Arthur Graves, Anthony Stalley, John Coffey |
| Defunct | 2015 |
| Fate | Rebranded asSnell Advanced Mediafollowing consolidation |
| Successor | Snell Ltd. |
| Headquarters | , |
Key people | Richard Taylor OBE (FormerChairman), Paul Kellar MBE (Former Research Director) |
| Products | Digital production equipment |
Number of employees | 1,000 plus (1995) approx 250 (2014) |
| Website | www |
| Footnotes / references [1] | |
Quantelwas a company based in theUnited Kingdomand founded in 1973 that designed and manufactureddigitalproduction equipment for thebroadcasttelevision,video productionandmotion pictureindustries. It was headquartered inNewbury,Berkshire.The name Quantel came fromQuantised Television,in reference to the process of converting atelevisionpicture into adigitalsignal.
Quantel acquiredSnell Limitedin March 2014.[2]Following a period of consolidation the two companies started operating under the Snell name, trading as Snell Advanced Media or SAM, from September 2015, following the staged removal of the Quantel board of directors by incoming CEO Ray Cross.[2]
Quantel was purchased byGrass Valley,who were taken over by Cayman Island-registered Black Dragon Capital in2020who decided to close down Newbury factory in 2023, the 50th anniversary year of Quantel.
Around 50 legacy Quantel machines are known to still exist in museums and private collections around the world, several of which have been restored to working order by enthusiasts.
History[edit]
Quantel founder,Peter Michael,had previously founded Micro Consultants Group (MCG). MCG had pioneered a range of fast data conversion products that could be used for converting video signals from analog to digital and back to analog. These devices found use in many early Quantel products.
In the 1980s, Michael merged Quantel along with his other interests such asLink Electronics Ltdinto the UEI Group of companies.[3]
Michael became chairman with Quantel remaining a privately owned company of the publicly quoted UEI.[4]Under the leadership of Richard Taylor OBE, chairman from 1975 and Paul Kellar MBE, Quantel made several pioneering firsts in video:
- In 1975, it released the first all-digitalframestore,the Quantel DFS 3000. It was first introduced in TV coverage of the1976 Montreal Olympicsto generate apicture-in-pictureinset of the Olympics' flaming torch while the rest of the picture featured the runner entering the stadium. Framestore technology provided the cornerstone for the future development of digital television products.
- In 1981, it released thePaintbox,an extremely advanced television graphics system for its time. Paintboxes are still in use today due to their image quality, and versatility.The Weather Channelwas the first customer in the United States to purchase a Paintbox in 1982 (they had serial number '1' in the USA), which was used to generate its on-air weather maps during their first years of operation.MTVwas another early customer of the Paintbox.
- When theBBCweather department decided to move from magnetic weather symbols on a board in 1985 to a complete digital solution it used modified Paintboxes which were controlled viaApple Lisacomputers.[5]The weather presenter then stood in front of a blue screen holding a button that was connected to the Lisa; which then in turn communicated with the Paintbox to bring up the next slide.
- In 1985, Quantel released the "Harry" effects compositing system/non-linear editor. The Harry was designed to edit in real time and render special effects in non-real time using the video recorded on its built-in hard disk array (much like most computer basednon-linear editing systemstoday). The hard disk array used drives made byFujitsu,and were connected to the Harry using a proprietary parallel interface, much like a modern-dayRAIDarray. Technically, it was the first all-digitalnon-linear editingsystem. Due to technical constraints of the time, the Harry could only record 80 seconds of video, albeit encoded in full broadcast-quality, uncompressedD1-style 8-bitCCIR 601format. This aside, the Harry was quite an advanced machine, and the only system like it for its time.
- In 1992, Quantel released "Henry", the first multilayer compositing system, which became the worldwide industry standard for commercials production and went on to win the British government's Queen's Award for Export Achievement, Quantel's ninth such award.
This period until 1998 marked the high point of the company's profitability, size and market position, placing it in the top handful of broadcast vendors. The company had a global presence with major offices, staff and facilities on the east and west coast of the US, in Paris, Tokyo, London, Seoul, Hong Kong and Sydney, plus other overseas resources. There was a private air operation - Quantel Aviation - based in Farnborough which included a privateCessna Citationexecutive jet. However, as software based products began to gain ground in Quantel's then core businesses of compositing, graphics and news editing, the company was not able to maintain this position.
Recent history[edit]
In 1989 Quantel had been acquired from UEI byCarlton Communicationswhich had also acquired high end sound console manufacturerSolid State Logicas part of the same deal. This relationship ended in 2000 when Quantel management bought the company back for $76.6m funded byLloyds Banking Groupventure capital arm LDC.
From 2000 to 2005, Quantel then specialised in:
- sQ -Video serverbased system for the broadcast industry which is designed for all forms of fast turnaround production, such as sports and news
- Newsbox - Complete news production system in a box
- iQ - Used fordigital intermediatefilm work
- eQ - Used for post production and TV commercial work
- Pablo - Color grading system
- Mission - A media and asset management system for handling media in large systems
December 2005 saw the forced departure from the board of long-standing chairman and chief executive Richard Taylor OBE by owners LDC in conjunction with Ray Cross - who had worked as an external consultant with Taylor and LDC to create the business plan to present to Lloyds for the 2000 management buyout from Carlton. Taylor was subsequently diagnosed with cancer in December 2008 and died in June 2009.[6]
Research and development director Paul Kellar MBE, who had been key to Quantel's previous technology leadership, immediately resigned on hearing of Taylor's ousting and Neil Hinson was promoted to replace Kellar by Cross. Hinson had joined Quantel in 1980 and played a pivotal part in the design of many of the most successful Quantel products including Harry, Henry, Mirage and Clipbox as well as the later generationQ family of products but was also quickly replaced by Cross with another Quantel employee, Simon Rogers in December 2008.
In the autumn of 2008 Cross made a sizeable round of redundancies, saying that the company was moving towards being more software based. Cross engaged in another round of redundancies in April 2009, giving the reason that the global recession has been deeper than had been planned for. Cross made further redundancies in October 2012, as its quarterly results were not as good as expected.
In March 2014 Quantel acquired Snell Ltd. also owned by Lloyds, and began the consolidation of the two companies. Cross made further redundancies, primarily in the former Snell organisation.[2]Like Quantel, Snell (as Snell and Wilcox) had formerly been a major player in the broadcast space but also like Quantel had seen a long-term decline in its market position and profitability. Although both companies produced media technology, each had quite separate but complementary products.[7]
In its heyday under Taylor, Quantel was ranked in the top four broadcast vendors and had one of the strongest brand names. Finally after almost 10 years of Cross downsizing Quantel and after apparently several failed attempts to sell the business, Cross himself was forcibly removed in March 2015 - allegedly partly following senior staff complaints about Cross to backersLloyds Development Capital- and replaced by former Grass Valley CEO Tim Thorsteinson, chosen on a "proven track record of value creation". Thorsteinson subsequently sacked the entire Quantel board of directors. Finally in September 2015, the Quantel name was dropped and the residual business placed inside the Snell operation, branded as Snell Advanced Media (SAM). Thorsteinson has previously been involved in downsizing and restructuring other broadcast companies, such as Grass Valley and Harris, in order to prepare them for sale, which was the role LDC had originally brought Cross in to Quantel to achieve.
Timeline[edit]
- 1973TBC 2000 / TBC 2200-Time base corrector.
- 1975DFS 3000- Digital framestore synchroniser.
- 1977DSC 4002- Digitalvideo standards converter.
- 1977Intellect(Sold under Micro Consultants brand name)- Built for image processing research, including the design of the brush profiles on Paintbox. It was used for a wide variety of commercial and military applications including ANPR camera robotic imaging research. More Compact Intellect 100launched in 1979
- 1978DPE 5000- Digital processing effects. One of the first digital video effects systems.
- 1981Paint Box-the first version was only a paint system, with stencils and cutouts added in 1982, then digital fonts in 1983
- 1982Mirage- 3D real-time video effects processor.
- 1983Cypher- 2D and 3D character generator
- 1983Crystal (Sold under Micro Consultants brand name)- enhancement of monochrome still images from electron microscopes, used mainly by scientists doing semiconductor and medical research
- 1983Encore-digital video effects machine
- 1985GPB Graphic Paintbox- print quality Paintbox
- 1985Harry-Non-Linear Editor.
- 1985Sapphire (Sold under Micro Consultants brand name)- a version of Crystal with special input video processing to allow processing of monochrome video data from x-ray systems.
- 1985Revue (Sold under Micro Consultants brand name)- a digital disk recorder allowing the replay of short lengths of collected data
- 1985IDIS (Sold under Micro Consultants brand name)- X-Ray (fluorography) image enhancement machine which combined Revue and Sapphire into a medical system for early digital x-ray angiography
- 1985Scanline (Sold under Micro Consultants brand name)- a 'military' version of Crystal, taking inputs from radar or thermal sensors with data collected as the aircraft flew along
- 1985The Military Paintbox- combined with Scanline, Crystal and Revue for a wide range of applications from simulations and reconnaissance, to analysis of data and briefing graphics
- 1986Central Library- image filing system
- 1986Satin- 4:2:2 digital standards converter
- 1989Paintbox V- Second generation Paintbox, faster and smaller.
- 1989Florence (Sold under Micro Consultants brand name)- high definition video standards converter for the medical industry
- 1990Picturebox- Digital still store. Capacity is 520MB or 500 images. Increased to 1000 images withPicturebox twin.
- 1990Harriet- Manipulating live graphics over video. Capacity is 323PALframes (around 12 seconds).
- 1992Henry- Effects Editor which became the mainstay of the post industry across the world in the mid-nineties.
- 1992HAL- Video design suite.
- 1993Desktop Paintbox- print quality paintbox which could connect to a Mac
- 1993Dylan- 20 diskRAIDexternal storage package for video and audio.
- 1993Editbox- OnlineNLE.
- 1993Domino- A film in, film-out digital optical system that was a Paintbox and HAL for the movie industry
- 1994Clipbox- Multi-user video server.
- 1994Printbox- pre press machine for publishers which could integrate with Mac and PC through Quantel's "Courier" image management system
- 1994GPB2- cheaper desktop size version of Graphic Paintbox but with new CMYK colour cards
- 1995Open Picturenet- Networking for Quantel products.
- 1998Inspiration- Integrated news and sports production system.
- 2000 PaintboxFX - a higher spec and more compact version of HAL, with three internal disk drives instead of the separate Dylan
- 2000iQ- Media editing and compositing platform.
- 2002generationQ- Harnesses uncompressed storage through using Dylans, and runs on an 'open platform' allowing easier networking between machines, and file sharing. The new generation of products included the iQ, for digital intermediate. eQ for post and editing, and gQ, aimed towards the graphics market.
- 2004Enterprise sQ- second-generation fast-turnaround production system for news and sports applications. ESPN equips its new Bristol, CT Digital Center with Enterprise sQ HD production system.
- 2005Paintbox- New Paintbox launched which is a powerful design and compositing tool. Dealing with the moving image, and still images, this new Paintbox was named in honour of the original Paintbox created in 1981.
- 2005Newsbox- A complete television newsroom production system to record, edit and playout news material.
- 2005Pablo- Nonlinear Color grading system - Quantel's first fully featured color corrector.
- 2005Picturebox sQ- Graphics server for stills and moving sequences.
- 2006Pablo HD- High definition color grading system.
- 2006Newsbox HD- High definition capable version of Newsbox.
- 2006Marco- Software only DV field editor.
- 2007Mission- Media and asset management system.
- 2007Stereoscopic 3D- 3D post-production system.
- 2008Pablo Neo- Ergonomic 'heads up' control panel for Pablo post-production system.
- 2010QTube- Global media workflow technology, enabling viewing and editing of media from anywhere using the internet.
- 2012revolutionQ- Allows the use of 'off the shelf' IT storage rather than traditionally expensive Quantel dedicated video storage.
- 2012Pablo Rio(2015: Quantel Rio) - software color correction and finishing system.
Headquarters and manufacturing[edit]
Quantel was based at 31 Turnpike Road, Newbury, Berkshire, England since 1982. The 126,000 sq ft (11,700 m2) building was built on the 6.7-acre (27,000 m2) site in 1940 forVickers Armstrongand manufacturedSpitfirefighter aircraft duringWorld War II.Air raid shelters are still present in the grounds of the site. Other users of the building included the Post Office and the Ministry of Transport.
A large part of the site was dedicated to manufacturing. It is now very rare that companies manufacture their own products due to the complex nature of multiple layer circuit boards containing high densitysurface mountedcomponents. It is more common now to design complex circuits on a computer and await delivery of a ready built board or simply use off the shelf IT.
As part of restructuring during the 1990s, Quantel decided to outsource support of legacy products to a separate company Effect Systems. Also based in Newbury and staffed by many ex Quantel staff, Effect Systems took over support for products. These include Editbox, Henry, Hal, Paintbox, Picturebox, Domino as well as older products dating back to the 1980s including Mirage, Harry and Encore. On 1 October 2008 Quantel ended the outsourcing contract with Effect Systems. Effect continued to offer independent support for Quantel legacy equipment (Paintbox V, Picturebox, Henry, Editbox and Domino) but has now ceased that support and in 2016 disposed of the inventory of spare parts.
Products[edit]
Traditionally, Quantel systems were based around proprietary hardware and software. With the introduction of the generationQ range a number of Quantel products were based onMicrosoft Windowsand standard PC hardware with occasional use of custom hardware.
Despite Quantel holding hundreds of Patents for inventions that many other companies utilized, such as the pressure sensitive stylus first used on the 1981 Paintbox, the company only ever sued three other companies for Patent infringement. Due to the high profile of the cases against Spaceward for their Matisse, which was marketed as a cheaper version of Paintbox andAdobe Systemsfor Patented elements within itsPhotoshopsoftware, Quantel were unfairly accused of trying to suppress and control competitors. Quantel won their case against Spaceward in London and blocked further sales, though let the company service the systems already sold.[8]Adobe already having been punished for various anti-competitive practices such as buying and closing down CorelDraw in 1994 as it competed with Illustrator but Quantel was portrayed as a British company trying to destroy Adobe. The case partly hinged on first use of a digital airbrush. Adobe's lawyers, who were provided and funded by Apple, found a prior use of the airbrush by academics atNYITwhich predated Quantel's Patent, therefore invalidating it and greatly influencing the judge's decision to dismiss the case.
The majority of Quantel products used code names for some parts of their systems before launch. One source of code names was the television seriesThe Magic Roundabout.The Dylan disk system and the Zebedee processor take their names from characters in this series. Quantel's product names often seemed random but Henry, Harry, Harriet and HAL were chosen as they stood out in the broadcast arena where technology was named in a more mathematical acronym way.
As well as news, sports and weather graphics, Quantel video technology was used extensively in production of a wide spectrum of TV shows, fromTop of the Popsin the UK, to the American television seriesStar Trek: The Next Generation.[9]
Many of the major movies released since 1999 were created or manipulated using Quantel technology, includingStar Wars episode 2and3,The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring,The Day After Tomorrow,andSin City.Users of sQ server based systems includeESPNin the US,Rogers Mediain Canada, andBBC,BSkyBandQVCin the United Kingdom.
Quantel effects appear in many TV Commercials and music videos, including the winner of the first MTV Award and most famously, Dire Straits'Money For Nothing
Quantel-designed technologies include:
- Dynamic rounding- Dynamic rounding was a technique devised by Quantel for truncating the word length of pixels – an unavoidable process when processing images. Rather than simply losing the lower bits, dynamic rounding uses their information to control, via a randomiser, the dither of the LSB of the truncated result. This effectively removes any artefacts that would otherwise be visible. Dynamic rounding is non-cumulative on any number of passes and produces statistically correct results. Dynamic rounding eliminates any truncation artefacts.
- FrameMagic- A system used on video servers where video clips are treated as individual frames rather than a single clip. This allows very efficient use of storage as only frames used in subsequent edits need to be kept from an original recording. This allows the rest of the unused frames to be discarded.
- TimeMagic- A background rendering system which renders editing effects as the operator continues working.
- Resolution Co-existence- Allows a video edit to be made up of different formats of source material without any extra work required by the operator. One example is an edit that will play out standard definition but some parts of the edit may be part of a high definition source clip.
- Genetic Engineering- A technology that allowed multiple users to work on the same media independently without having to have multiple copies of it.
References[edit]
- ^"Radiohead", biography of Sir Peter Michael,by Darius Sanai,The Independent,27 September 2000 (retrieved 24 August 2012).
- ^abc"Former SAM-branded Products".grassvalley.com.Retrieved5 January2019.[permanent dead link]
- ^Nielsen Business Media, Inc. (20 September 1986).Billboard.Nielsen Business Media, Inc. pp. 55–.ISSN0006-2510.
{{cite book}}:|author=has generic name (help) - ^"Sir Peter Michael - Biography".Archived fromthe originalon 5 June 2008.Retrieved24 May2008.
- ^"A Change in the Weather", BBC Television, broadcast Mon 18 Feb 1985.YouTube copy.
The weather goes electric,Blue Peter,18 February 1985; via YouTube - ^"Richard Taylor obituary written by Paul Kellar MBE"(PDF).
- ^"LDC decides to merge rather than sell Snell - Megabuyte".megabuyte.com.Retrieved5 January2019.
- ^#author.fullName}."Patents: Spun out tale".New Scientist.Retrieved5 August2023.
{{cite web}}:|last=has generic name (help) - ^"Revisiting Cinefex (37): Star Trek: TNG, The Fly II, Oxford Scientific Films".Graham Edwards.31 May 2013.Retrieved17 July2022.
