Paul Kafno
Managing Director, HD Thames
UK
With a career in both commercial and public broadcasting, Paul knows how to use the right technology to share emotion. His productions have won a string of awards including Prix Italia, RTS, BAFTA, the Prix Gemini. Able to enthuse as well as amuse.

Bye Bye Box? (or Is the Future Flat?)

Europe’s television screens are getting bigger and flatter. What will we put on them? Programmes? Interactive games? More Hollywood? And from which tap - broadcast, broadband or disk? With an apparent profusion of choice, younger viewers seem too bored to watch, while the older ones claim they cannot find anything they like. With DVD triumphant, commercials easy to avoid and broadband steaming over the distant horizon, broadcasters are desperate to recapture their audience. So, will the future have us leaning back to yawn at the same old content or leaning forward to something exciting and genuinely new?

And what might that something be? Paul Kafno explores the possibilities at Summit of the Future

Paul Kafno is MD of HD Thames, an independent UK TV production company that also develops digital technology for the creative industries. A graduate of Oxford University, where he was awarded an Open Exhibition, Paul was trained as a producer and director at the BBC where he made education, drama and arts programmes before joining Thames Television. His productions have been shown around the world and won the Prix Italia, RTS, BAFTA, Prix Gemini and Golden Gate awards. A pioneer of digital television, Paul shot his first High Definition Programme in 1990 and has since used the medium to produce and direct drama, sport, documentary and music programmes, including the Les Miserables Tenth Anniversary Concert. His company has produced HD coverage of three Olympic Games and The World Ice-Skating Championships. R&D work includes Europe’s first digital cinema project, remote camera tracking systems, virtual reality software to prototype movies and commercials, and the new generation of virtual people. Current projects include the development of Electronic Theatre in the UK, tools for cross platform content and interactive storytelling. Paul is a reviewer, assessor and rapporteur for the European Union’s IST programme, and has delivered and published papers at many international conferences. Technical publications include the Broadcast Engineer’s Reference Book (Focal Press), High Definition TV - The Essential Guide for TV Professionals (DTG), Using Virtual Reality Technologies for Storytelling (Springer Notes on Computer Science) and Reflections from a Hobby Horse (Springer). Paul serves on programme boards for the International Conference on Virtual Storytelling, Cross Media Service Delivery and Europrix Scholars. He holds a Professorship at the IAB in Switzerland, and is a member of the Council of IBC.