Digital Video - June 2008 - (Page 6)

DV UPDATE NEW DIMENSIONS IN POST THE 2008 NAB SHOW DEMONSTRATED AN ARRAY OF NEW HIGH-END POSTPRODUCTION OFFERINGS. BY OLIVER PETERS E arly fears that Apple and Avid’s lack of a booth would result in drastically reduced National Association of Broadcasters Show attendance turned out to be unfounded. The South Hall — home of most of the postproduction products — was nearly as crowded as ever, with solid attendance at all the demos until the bitter end at the booths of stalwarts like Quantel, Autodesk and Adobe. In spite of all the interest in new editing features, this year was more about chasing the camera manufacturers. Sure, Red has captured a lot of press, but the thing that interests most editors is whether their chosen NLE can support the various mainstream, file-based camera systems out today. Sony’s got XDCAM, XDCAM HD and now the SxS cards used on the EX1 and the new EX3 camcorders. Panasonic’s expanded its P2 media to use both the DVCPRO HD and the AVC-Intra codecs. New for NAB was a lower cost Panasonic product line using the consumer-grade AVCHD codec and standard memory cards. This may be great news for shooters, but it’s simply a faster moving target for all NLE vendors as they try to anticipate which new codec or transport medium will reach a critical mass requiring post support at the professional level. Every major NLE company announced support for one or more of these new file-based systems. In some cases, that was the only new feature they brought to the convention. For their part, both Sony Electronics and Panasonic are expanding the ecosystem surrounding their P2, dv june 2008 XDCAM HD and SxS products, announcing various drives and VTR replacement devices based on these storage systems. In fact, only Sony announced new VTRs, including two new HDCAM SR decks — the SRW-5800 studio VTR and the SRW-5100 player. If you’re looking for big news from an editing company, then Quantel was happy to oblige. Their big “wow factor” was 3-D stereoscopic post. Quantel has 17 stereo 3-D systems installed worldwide and sees a big future in that presentation format. 3-Dequipped Pablo systems allow simultaneous left/right-eye ingest and the ability to edit left/right eye views at the same time. Color grading can be matched between the two and there is control over parallax effects. Quantel also announced its Quattro software update, an across-the-board release for eQ, iQ and Pablo. Among other things, it features AAF conform of FCP projects courtesy of Quantel’s collaboration with Automatic Duck. Another continued development is Quantel’s Genetic Engineering, of which 30 systems are installed worldwide. Genetic Engineering is a file virtualization system, whereby Quantel hardware presents Quantel media as virtual graphic files (such as DPX) to outside Mac, Linux and PC Above: NAB Show crowds filled numerous venues to experience 3-D demonstrations. Left: Quantel’s Pablo system, now equipped for 3-D post. 6 www.dv.com http://www.dv.com

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Digital Video - June 2008 Contents DV Update My Studio Runners World Brevis Flip 35MM Lens Adapter 4160 Soom Tripod System Century Essential-5 Filter Kit Little Big Disk Quadra Instant Expert DXA-2S Adapter Technology Treasures Making What You See Sound Great Click to Play DV 101 Production Diary

Digital Video - June 2008

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