The SMPTE has announced that its entire Standards catalog is now freely available to the global media technology community. This includes all published SMPTE Standards, Recommended Practices, Engineering Guidelines and Registered Disclosure Documents (RDDs), as well as all future releases. The SMPTE’s move to an open-access Standards Library is part of a broader effort to modernize the organization’s Standards development and publication processes. The idea is that removing barriers to access will accelerate adoption and implementation, strengthen interoperability, and help drive the next generation of innovation. 

For those who are not familiar, the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE), is a global professional association of engineers, technologists, and executives working in the media and entertainment industry. They have been creating and publishing technical standards for broadcast, filmmaking, digital cinema, and audio recording for over 110 years.  They have published over eight hundred standards on everything from the size of the celluloid sprocket holes, to frame rates, time code, and the color bars we use to set up our monitors.  As the saying goes, “Standards are very important…that’s why there are so many of them.”

The point is that technological progress would not be possible if such standards were not constantly evolving and the SMPTE is helping to enable the interoperability that underpins the entertainment technology industry. For more details and to access the standards catalogue visit: https://www.smpte.org/setting-the-standards-free