"This came as something of a surprise," site founder Mark Prince said. "We introduced the format slowly, wanting people who had the equipment to migrate to it first. But it turns out most people who could view our regular, 20 frame per second video are able to see the hi-definition."
Prince also told XBiz that sales and traffic to the site’s hi-def chat room are about 400 percent higher than its standard video chatrooms and twice as many people check out the hi-def room first before checking out the other rooms.
“This is not to say that the other chatrooms are suffering,” Prince said. “The quality that LiveCamNetwork.com puts out is still top quality, especially when our own ‘LCN Girls’ are online.”
Prince said the site’s hi-def format, created by 2Much Internet Services, is dissimilar to pre-recorded hi-def formats, as the site’s formatting is designed specifically for live, online interactive video.
The site served as the testing ground for 2Much.net's new format less than two months ago, with “The Luna Show” and the “Nude Light Sabre Duel” serving as beta tests of the software.
"We're running 30 frames per second," Prince said. "And the aspect ratio is 16:9, not the squarer 4:3."
LiveCamNetwork's standard video format is based on MPEG4, 240 lines of video and 10-15 FPS natural looking video, with good "Near-FM" quality sound. Prince added that 2Much Internet Services is the first to apply this format to the industry.
“Movies are running at 24 FPS, and television projects 29.9 frames per second on the screen,” 2Much Internet Services Spokesman Greg Jones said. “Now standard video streaming on the net runs anywhere from four FPS to about eight, maybe 12. LiveCamNetwork.com runs at 15 to 20 FPS."
Jones added that the site initially launched at 10-12 FPS six years ago. At that time, Jones said the company’s nearest competitors were running at one or two FPS.
“Applied commercially, it was the fastest video available,” he said. “We haven't looked back since — always leaping ahead of any competition that started even coming close. Now that there's smooth flash video and other formats generally available on the web today, we are once again taking the end user by surprise with the incredible quality of our live LiveCamNetwork hi-def video.”
The stream also is carrying audio quality in the form of 48 Khz Dolby Surround 5.1 stereo, which permits models and studio managers to plug in their music and microphones to bring out what Prince described as “the warmth and ‘closeness’ of the chat hostess.”
“We are in the process of upgrading all of our rooms to the LiveCamNetwork HD format by mid-January 2006,” Prince added.
LiveCamNetwork.com is a subsidiary of 2Much Internet Services, an online software company founded in 1997 by Prince. The company now employs a growing cadre of trusted in-house staff who provide technical and programming support and customer service.
