4K Technology has been a major buzzword at electronic digital signage trade shows of late. Many digital display suppliers are clearly looking to bring higher resolutions and new applications to their clients. 4K video—and especially 4K Ultra High Definition video—delivers stunning beauty and astounding resolutions to digital signage and video extension applications.
A 4K UHD display features four times the number of pixels (3840 x 2160) compared to full HD (1080p) resolution. Several manufacturers are already shipping 4K UHD displays in a range of sizes, from desktop monitors to large screens.
In addition to making waves in the consumer electronics industry, this burgeoning technology is also offering many new applications in the commercial markets, including the digital signage sector.
Emerging Trends in Digital Signage
“While the industry continues to focus on increasing screen sizes and a motto of ‘bigger is better,’ the commercial display market is now also seeing a trend in the new demand for smaller form-factor signage,” says Kevin Schroll, senior product marketing manager, Large Format Displays at Samsung, Ridgefield Park, New Jersey. “Smaller displays—in the 20-inch or even 10-inch range—can replace static posters, but also now enable retailers or other businesses to create more interactive in-store experiences to engage customers.”
Additionally he says they are seeing technology advancements like the introduction of embedded media players and Wi-Fi in smart commercial displays opening the way for simplified and more affordable digital signage solutions for even the smallest of businesses.
“With two million small businesses in the U.S., Samsung sees a significant growth opportunity in helping simplify the transition to dynamic, digital signage for businesses of all sizes,” Schroll says.
A Closer Look at 4K
Lou Carulli, marketing manager at New York City-based YCD Multimedia says that 4K is the popular term used to describe “quadruple resolution.” The origin of this name comes from the DCI, or digital cinema initiative.
“In recent years, we’ve seen display manufacturers aggressively promoting 4K as a (decreasing) differentiator to help sell their displays,” he says. “You may have read somewhere that a screen manufacturer has ‘invented’ an ‘Ultra High Def’ 4K. This really is still 4K, but the displays made under this acronym have the theoretical ability to display higher color depth content. Therefore, you can consider 4K and 4K UHD to be one and the same.”
The 4K Advantage
Brian Rhatigan, business development manager for Almo Professional A/V, Lutherville, Maryland, says that 4K, 4K UHD, Ultra HD and UHD-TV are all terms that refer to the new digital format available on some projectors, flat panel monitors and televisions. “The resolution is 3840 x 2160, which is four times the number of pixels as the current 1080p standard. It is slowly being adopted, and as it pertains to EDS, I see it being used in critical viewing applications where there is a shorter-than-usual viewing distance. If there is any downside, it would be that these displays are significantly more expensive than 1080p displays, and high-quality 4K content can be harder to obtain,” he explains.
Rhatigan states that a major advantage of using a 4K display with 4K content is that you can deliver a very immersive and rich experience that is in close proximity to the display without sacrificing image quality.
“This is especially true when you get into larger screen sizes like 84-inch, 98-inch and up, as well as large projected images where the pixels in the display would be much more noticeable,” he says.
Content, Content, Content
Richard Ventura, vice president of business development and solutions at NEC Display Solutions, Itasca, Illinois, reports that the big trends in digital signage today includes 4K, video walls, interactive touch, bigger screens, new technologies such as Google Chrome entering the landscape, use of projectors and more focus on impactful content.
He points out that UHD means the ability to showcase finer details and more information on a screen and says that the key things to remember with 4K are: content, content delivery, application and viewing distances. “Having true UHD content that is meaningful is not necessarily easy. More and more content houses are delivering the right content but it is very expensive. Delivery of the content is the next hurdle. Having lower-cost media players like Brightsign’s 4K are helping this situation. Also, there are concerns with bandwidth and existing infrastructure. As the technology matures, we will see more and more systems that will be able to truly handle the content and not have the high price points we are seeing today.”
Applications are Key
According to Ventura, applications are the next key to 4K.
“Not every application will need or require 4K resolution. With the high acquisition price of 4K UHD, the 1080p HD screens are still very attractive. Most of the acquisition for 4K has either been application specific or for flagship installations,” he says. Viewing distance is another issue (see Chart 1).
Ventura says that there is finer detail and amazing depth of colors while being able to display multiple applications and content on a single screen.
“4K allows users to truly deliver what the eye sees,” he says. “It’s a pallet of larger space and pixels that demand more information than a traditional 1080p screen does.
“Media player manufacturers are beginning to develop more content for the innovative screens we’ve seen in previous years. Now a lot of companies—out of necessity—are running 1080p content on 4K screens. But as more content becomes available and as the cost to create the content decreases, we will see more options for content.
“With touchscreens it is a natural progression to move towards UHD,” he says. “As the technology matures and costs are driven down, we will see 4K screens become the norm and 1080 slowly drift away. The key is for the costs of the displays to be the same or in cases where we have seen before, 1080p screens become more expensive due to the lack of production.”
Wall of Confusion
With this new technology there also appears to be a trend where screens seem to be shifting away from LCD and toward brighter LED screen technologies; but this perception might not be the case. Rhatigan says there is a lot of confusion when it comes to LCD and LED. “The display technology used currently is still LCD, however, the backlight has changed from CCFL (cold cathode fluorescent lamps) to LED (either edge lit or full array backlit). These displays are commonly referred to as LED displays when in fact they are LED backlit LCD displays. The backlight offers no advantage when it comes to resolution, although LED technology uses less power, allows for a thinner panel design, lasts longer, and can quickly switch from light to dark for better contrast,” he explains.
Multi-touch Interactive EDS
There is also growing trend using touchscreen technology, especially in the retail and hospitality industries. Rhatigan says when comes to EDS, the use of touchscreens is nothing new.
“Touchscreens have been in use for many years, however, improvements to touch technology have made these displays perform better than they have in the past,” he says. “Newer types of touch technology like projected capacitive offer a completely flat front glass surface from edge-to-edge, similar to what you would find in a consumer tablet, making for a very sleek looking panel with a design that users are familiar with. Multi-touch interactive EDS screens allow for either more than one user to interact with the screen simultaneously or one person to use gestures to control the content on the screen.”
Carulli adds that “multi-touch” is a common term for interactive touchscreens that can handle more than a single touch-point (or click) by the by the user. In some cases, single-touch technologies are converted to support “dual-touch” for gesture recognition. This is still not multi-touch.
“In EDS we see these screens used in interactive data kiosks and self-exploration signs (like an ‘e-concierge’ in a hotel lobby),” Carulli says. “More often used with gesture interaction (the familiar ‘pinch’ ‘swipe’ and ‘pinch’ gestures made popular by iPhone) and sometimes true multi-touch, where more than one user instruction is performed at any given time—like for example multiple viewers interacting with the same display.”
Future Digital Possibilities
Samsung’s Schroll points to a number of new opportunities coming down the pike for the digital signage industry.
“Beacon technology, NFC, gesture-based interactivity, facial recognition, audience analytics and augmented reality—there are so many exciting possibilities for brands at the bleeding-edge of digital signage,” Schroll says. “For those who have made the leap to dynamic signage, it’s providing new ways to attract, engage and connect with their customers in this digital, mobile-first economy.”
He says that despite all these new opportunities there are still many who hesitate to take the plunge.
“Despite the ample data and anecdotal evidence of its business value, there remains a misperception among many that digital signage is an endeavor that is too complex, time-consuming or too costly. And this has ultimately created a Digital Signage Divide,” he says.
Schroll says that on one side of the fence there are early adopters who are perhaps on their second or third iteration of digital signage. They have settled on efficient platforms for delivering dynamic content and are now exploring advanced applications like those discussed above. On the other hand there are still organizations that are bound by print. “They’re unable to track communications consistency or franchisee compliance and are stuck delivering the same static message hour after hour, day after day,” he adds.
“Digital signage skeptics perhaps had some valid concerns in the past, but the smart new display technology and cloud-based delivery solutions available today have dramatically simplified the pathway to deploying these digital signage networks. One of our key focuses at Samsung over the past three years has been breaking down the barriers—making the displays, the software, the installation and management so easy that even the smallest mom and pop stores can make the transition from static to digital,” Schroll says.
Print and Digital Working Together
Ventura says that while it’s an exciting time for new opportunities in digital signage, it won’t replace static signage.
“Print signage will never go away,” he says. “The real key is how to dual-purpose this technology with the various forms of print. Digital gives the sign industry new avenues and new strategies for communications. It allows users to showcase multiple items, day part, limited time offerings, mix in video, allow for interaction with the brand or the experience, creates a multi-dimensional experience, allows for true engagement, and for the sign industry it allows for new revenue potentials that they did not have before. And it allows output providers to deliver on every level what their customer is looking for. Print and digital can and should coexist to deliver the complete experience for the customer.”
More Powerful Media Players Needed to Drive 4K Content
Content is the key to building a successful digital signage system and it takes a powerful system to help drive that content.
Media player manufacturers are now developing faster equipment for the innovative screens that we have seen in previous years. Going forward there will be 1080p content on 4K screens and more touchscreen capabilities. This will make for a whole different immersive experience.
Marty Lash, director of sales and marketing at Shuttle Computer Group, City of Industry, California, says with more than eight million pixels in a 4K display, art directors, designers and videographers can use a giant pallet to create an eye-popping multimedia digital signage experience: super-rich graphics, top-quality movie trailers, and detailed images that will capture the attention of anyone passing by.
However, the display is only one part of the equation, Lash says. “You need a powerful, small form factor computer to drive all that data and get the best results,” he says. “Make sure the media player you select has a powerful enough CPU and GPU, adequate memory and storage, all running super-fast. And look for a vendor who has been in the business for a long time and has a great reputation. Once you have a top-quality display with a powerful computer to process those huge files, your digital signage is sure to stand out.”
Almo Professional A/V’s Brian Rhatigan also expects to see 1080p content on 4K screens, at least in the near term. He says users are influenced by industry buzzwords like 4K and inclined to go out and purchase the latest and greatest in display technology although sometimes the process is not fully thought through and the existing content is likely not designed in 4K. “Just like other displays, 4K screens are perfectly capable of showing lower-resolution content using the built-in scaling capability,” he says.
Rhatigan says that traditional sign companies are being asked more frequently by their customers to provide digital solutions and some have been quicker to adopt than others. “Keeping up with the trends and educating yourself on the latest offerings by reading trade magazines, attending trade shows, or attending vendor presentations will be key to success,” he says.