Adding to the audio-visual experience, long video will be popular again in 2024

In 2024, long video platforms will rise again.

From the explosive popularity of "Kuang Biao" last year to the popularity of "Fang Hua" at the beginning of this year, the content focus of long video platforms has shifted from the early traffic logic to focusing on high-quality products.

iQIYI has made early arrangements for the high-quality content. In 2023, in addition to "Kuang Bi", iQIYI's "Changfengdu", "Lotus Tower", "Ning'an Rumeng" and "Yi Nian Guanshan" have a total of 5 dramas with popularity values ​​exceeding 10,000 on the site. In addition, works with novel themes and outstanding artistic styles such as "Imperfect Victim" and "Moses on the Plains" are also new breakthroughs in the subject matter and content.

It is worth noting that long videos are not only fiercely competitive in terms of content quality and content themes, but also in terms of viewing experience. 4K high-definition, HDR... these high standards are being included in the "standard configuration" by various platforms. Among them, iQiyi has been working hard to promote the popularization of the "Frame Qiyinghua MAX" certification standard on large-screen TVs this year, aiming to include high-definition and high frame rate compatibility through certification calibration, opening up a new competitive track: good content is not only about stories, but also about good audio-visual experience.

In 2023, long videos will become profitable, proving that users are willing to pay for exclusive good content. Starting in 2024, paying for a better audio-visual experience will not only be an opportunity for long videos to compete, but also another arena for competition.

After the development of high-quality products, the battle of audio-visual quality

Recently, Yunhe Data released a report on online broadcasts of TV series and variety shows in 2023. The report shows that in 2023, eight of the top 10 TV series with effective playback on the entire network are on iQiyi, namely "Kuang Biao", "Changfengdu", "Lotus Tower", "Do You Know It Should Be Green, Fat, Red and Thin", "Ning'an Rumeng", "One Thought Guanshan", "Going to the Wind" and "The Legend of Yunxiang". Among them, "Kuang Biao" ranks first on the list with an effective playback volume of over 10 billion, and breaks the peak single-day market share record of Yunhe Data in history. The eight works on iQiyi's TOP10 list cover themes such as criminal investigation, martial arts, urban, and costume love, and these works run throughout 2023.

Cloud Data

Yunhe data also shows that the effective playback volume of drama membership content on the entire network reached 158.8 billion in 2023, up 9% year-on-year. Among them, iQiyi, Tencent Video, Youku Video, and Mango TV had playback volumes of 68.9 billion, 51 billion, 31.1 billion, and 6 billion, respectively, up 12%, 5%, 0%, and 56% year-on-year, respectively.

IQIYI's Chief Content Officer Wang Xiaohui previously revealed to the media that iQIYI is concentrating funds and resources on more top-notch and more certain content, and will increase investment in major subject matter content.

This year, several dramas on iQiyi that have exceeded 10,000 viewers have their own unique plots, especially several costume dramas that have shown a high level in terms of set design, costumes, props, and action design.

Yu Fei, the producer of "Chang Feng Du", said that in addition to "putting in a lot of effort" in plot adaptation and character performances, the drama had determined the "quality and classic costume track" from the time the project was prepared, and it took nine months to prepare and reference thousands of costumes from various traditional cultural elements. The producers and the platform have tried their best to improve the texture of the entire series from the details as much as possible.

The styling director of the play will also convey the changes in the character's situation and personality through the color of the costumes and the character's appearance according to the character's growth arc and the changes in the scenes in the play. But even if the photogenic effect and the viewing environment are taken into consideration, there are still some aspects that cannot be controlled in the styling design, such as the color grading in post-production, which will still have an impact.

How to restore these details to the audience "losslessly" is very important to improving the viewing experience. How to restore the creativity and design of the first-line creators as much as possible from a technical level, so that the creativity can be presented to the audience in its original form. This is also the original intention of iQIYI to launch the FrameQi Film MAX technology.

In the process of repeated attempts and iterations, directors, producers, colorists, and iQIYI FrameQIYINGMAX algorithm engineers all participated in the process. They not only checked the film sources, but also adjusted the parameters of different terminal devices to ensure that the images broadcast by terminal devices certified by FrameQIYINGMAX were infinitely close to the effects expected by the creators.

"Changfengdu" Frame Qiyinghua MAX comparison chart

Dr. Wang Zhihang, a senior engineer at iQIYI, once publicly stated that in practice, the current algorithmic color grading model has been released for a year and a half, and the feedback received so far has been positive, including for "Long Wind Ferry".

Technology and content complement and promote each other. The combination of the two greatly enhances the user's viewing experience.

iQIYI disclosed in its third quarter 2023 financial report that the display resolution of iQIYI members on mobile devices and TVs has reached 4K or 8K. When users watch TV series and movies on iQIYI FrameMAX-certified TVs, they can get a visual and auditory experience comparable to that of a movie theater. It is not difficult to see a trend from this that improving audio-visual quality has become the key to the capacity building of long video platforms.

Audiovisual technologies have their own advantages

In addition to improving quality, the development and changes in display terminals and playback technology are another driving force behind the construction of audio-visual experience for long videos.

The development of new-generation TV panel technologies such as OLED and MiniLED has greatly improved the richness and clarity of color presentation on the playback side. All parent video platforms are actively launching their own solutions to meet the needs of viewers and improve their competitiveness.

According to the analysis of public information from various platforms, each parent video platform currently has its own technical focus on improving audio-visual quality, and all emphasize features such as "ultra-high definition".

According to the "Guidelines for the Construction of Ultra-High Definition Video Standard System (2020 Edition)" issued by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, ultra-high definition video is a new generation of video with a resolution of 4K (3840X2160 pixels) or 8K (7680X4320 pixels), which meets the technical requirements of high frame rate, high bit depth, wide color gamut, high dynamic range, etc. So based on this, what are the differences between the "signboards" of each company?

Image source: IT68

According to IT168's report on the comparison of audio-visual capabilities of long video platforms ("When mobile phones start to support 4KHDR and 1000 nits peak brightness, have the audio-visual capabilities of long videos kept up?"), it can be found that judging from the clarity of mobile phone APP image quality alone, only iQiyi and Mango TV clearly display that the video content has achieved 4K clarity, but from a comprehensive perspective of resolution, color display and color standards, frame rate and other aspects, each platform has its own advantages.

The above functions are all manifestations of picture quality upgrades on various platforms, and sound effects are also an important part of audio-visual quality.

In terms of sound effects, from the mobile app, iQiyi provides five options: balanced, vocal enhancement, nostalgic radio, Dolby Atmos, Dolby 5.1 surround sound, and standard; Tencent provides Dolby Vision sound effects; Youku provides four options: texture, clear vocals, retro radio, and Dolby 5.1 surround sound; Mango TV provides lossless panoramic sound; Bilibili has no sound effect options.

With the popularization of surround sound technology and the increasing demand of consumers for high-quality audio experience, 5.1-channel surround sound technology has been applied in more and more scenarios.

Overall, various parent video platforms have realized the long-term significance of audio-visual quality to users and themselves, and have applied corresponding technologies to varying degrees.

iQIYI has already prepared for the next match point

In 2019, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology released the "Ultra-High Definition Video Industry Development Action Plan (2019-2022)", which estimates that by 2022, the overall scale of my country's ultra-high definition video industry will exceed 4 trillion yuan, and the 4K industry ecosystem will be basically complete. Against this background, issues such as industry standard unification and industry collaboration are also receiving increasing attention. Audio-visual quality is the general trend and the next key node for long videos.

As we all know, the audio-visual quality experience requires high-quality content on the one hand, and the support of broadcasting equipment on the other. Although screen and display technology have been continuously improved, many viewers are also complaining that they spent a lot of money to buy a "good screen", but the user experience was "castrated".

The same film will be shown differently in cinemas, TVs, mobile phones and other scenes. From the perspective of content production, the environment in cinemas is standard and controllable, which technically determines that the content seen by the audience is exactly the same as the original. However, TVs, mobile phones and other devices have different parameters and performances, such as brand, brightness, color temperature, etc. If no technical processing is performed, each audience may see a different version of the same film.

To put it more bluntly, what users see on TVs, mobile phones and other devices and what the director sees on the monitor are often two different things. If technical control is not carried out, the creative intent of the film cannot be fully displayed, and the devices in the hands of the audience will be a regrettable waste.

iQIYI naturally saw such pain points and needs, and launched the "Frame Qiyinghua" format on mobile devices in July 2020 as another higher-specification audio-visual option in addition to 480P, 720P, and 1080P. The core of "Frame Qiyinghua" is to solve the problem of large differences in audio-visual performance between various terminal devices in the entire chain from production to broadcasting through standardized standards. By establishing a quality control system covering the entire chain of shooting, production, delivery, and playback, users only need to select "Frame Qiyinghua" on mobile devices, and the picture effects they see can maintain a unified standard regardless of the model of mobile phone or PAD.

In August 2022, iQIYI continued to launch the "FrameQi Yinghua MAX" certification for large-screen terminals, expanding the coverage of high-quality audio-visual standards to TV terminals. The core of this is to restore the real picture quality that the director can see on the monitor during shooting by adjusting the parameters of TV hardware equipment, giving full play to the advantages of flagship models and quality film sources.

The realization of product functions is only the first step. For iQiyi, the key and difficulty lies in getting more manufacturers and content producers involved. It is not easy to get major manufacturers to jointly formulate an industry-wide unified playback standard. iQiyi has taken a different approach. By calibrating the technical standards of multiple key links such as shooting, production, and playback terminals, it has achieved consistent expressiveness of the same content on different devices, thereby achieving the "lossless" presentation of artistic creation to the greatest extent.

It is reported that the iQIYI platform has reached cooperation with well-known manufacturers such as Samsung, TCL, Skyworth, Hisense, Huawei, Konka, Sony, Sharp, and Xiaomi, and a total of more than 150 flagship TV models have passed the "Frame Qi Yinghua MAX" certification. On the other hand, iQIYI is also constantly expanding the number of ultra-high-definition and HDR content in the platform's film library. As of now, iQIYI has produced and accumulated more than 20,000 pieces of content that support Frame Qi Yinghua MAX bitstreams. The length of 4K content has increased by 170% compared to January 2021, and the length of 60-frame programs has increased by 330% compared to April 2023.

In September 2023, iQIYI and Hisense jointly launched the "Frame Qi X" calibration mode, which is the first time in the industry that a TV manufacturer and a long video platform have focused on upgrading the audio-visual experience of large-screen terminals and jointly released color calibration technology. In this regard, Wang Yedong, general manager of Hisense's visual display product R&D department and director of the Visual Health and Display Picture Quality Research Institute, pointed out that the global display industry has shifted from the competition of "screen" and "cost-effectiveness" to the competition of sound and picture quality. Hisense and iQIYI's Frame Qi Yinghua MAX have reached an in-depth cooperation, which is another innovative attempt by Hisense to continue to focus on upgrading the sound and picture quality of large-screen terminals. He pointed out that the ULED X perception picture quality display technology platform equipped with Hisense TV has been developed and innovated from multiple dimensions such as new environment and character perception modules, backlight, screen, and chip technology, which fully meets the requirements of HDR brightness and color gamut in the Frame Qi Yinghua MAX certification standard, and has reached the professional picture quality level of film and television production equipment.

Compared with similar manufacturers, according to public information retrieved, Youku has launched about 2,000 video contents that meet the "Frame Enjoy" standard, and Tencent Video's manual expert color grading works have accumulated nearly 1,000 works.

For the industry, the launch of the "FrameQi Yinghua MAX" certification standard also standardizes the display capabilities of flagship TV models in terms of hardware equipment display level and actual playback effect. The longer-term significance lies in achieving full-chain control and promoting standardization of every step from production to broadcasting.

Entering 2024, the advantage of taking the lead in increasing the full-link audio-visual quality control system has also become iQiyi's "moat". By "sticking to" quality in every link of content production, iQiyi has taken a lead in the audio-visual quality competition in the new year.

As a winner of Toutiao's Qingyun Plan and Baijiahao's Bai+ Plan, the 2019 Baidu Digital Author of the Year, the Baijiahao's Most Popular Author in the Technology Field, the 2019 Sogou Technology and Culture Author, and the 2021 Baijiahao Quarterly Influential Creator, he has won many awards, including the 2013 Sohu Best Industry Media Person, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Beijing Third Place, the 2015 Guangmang Experience Award, the 2015 China New Media Entrepreneurship Competition Finals Third Place, and the 2018 Baidu Dynamic Annual Powerful Celebrity.