Arte to stage first Ultra HD test at the weekend

German and French cultural broadcaster Arte is due to stage its first test broadcast in Ultra High Definition at the weekend.

Arte is due to broadcast, via satellite, a Vienna State Opera production of the ballet Le Corsaire on Saturday night.

This will be available on Astra’s UHD1 demo channel in Germany. In France the broadcast will be on the Hot Bird 4K1 demo channel and on the Eutelsat-broadcast Fransat Ultra HD channel.

Viewers with an Ultra HD TV, satellite tuner and integrated HEVC decoder will be able to receive the broadcast, while Arte is also planning to test UHD live streaming via the Arte HbbTV app.

An HD version of the ballet will be available to watch online on the concert.arte.tv website.