News posts from 2004 Q2
 

I had heard talk for a while of a Best of DVX100 DVD coming out at some point (produced by Panasonic).
This was confirmed recently by Panasonic themselves.

While I don't know much about the projects that are on it I do know of two for sure.

1. November - the well known Digital Cinematography winner at Sundance
2. Art History - a project that I directed/wrote.

Footage from both those projects (and I suspect all the others that will be on the DVD) will be shown at the Panasonic stand at NAB later this month.

Here's a link to the press release about this from the Art History official website

http://www.stealart.com/press/arthistory_nab2004.pdf

Thanks guys

Nick

Pioneer 50GB Optical Disc
 

Pioneer has announced a new technique for optical storage that allows them to go to 50GB per disc. The story says "Blu-Ray", but since this is not a blue LASER, I am not sure if that is really true. Read the short note at The Inquirer.

Pioneer 50GB optical news at The Inquirer

Edit - giggling... I just noticed they called it a disk too. Will tell the ed.

I went to a screening of Novemeber helld here in L.A. it wasn't that bad, Nick's film also "Looks" pretty darn good as well, congrats!

yead I'd love to see november...
 

I haven't seen a single frame of it as yet...

nick

Yeah at the screening they were complaing about not having a distributor yet, it's kind of a risky movie but it should eventually find it's way at least to dvd.

P's
Nick

I'm not sure how much of a "breakthrough" this is. The Register reported last month that Sony is preparing a dual-layer, single-sided Blu-Ray recorder deck to ship by the end of 2004. Here's a link to the article:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/03/26/sony_preps_50gb_nextgen_bluray/

Best wishes,
Len Feldman
Riverbend Entertainment

Atlanta area DV info members
 

Watch for your local ABC affiliate camera people and see if they are using any new cameras, news has it (no pun intended) that they are beta testing a new camera, only info is it's "blue something", probably blue-ray format.

Canon to show cinemascope lens at NAB
 

This is an anamorphic adapter designed to be used with existing HD equipment to create a 2.35:1 (cinemascope) image. Not that it helps us much, but still pretty neat, huh?

http://home.businesswire.com/portal/...ewID=news_view

Plus, according to the press release, they're showing six new HD primes and an HD zoom. I don't recall Canon's Broadcast Video Lens division having so many new products out at once. Here are their various NAB press releases:

CANON RECEIVES COMPTIA CDIA+ INDUSTRY LEADERSHIP AWARD

CANON EXTENDS ADVANCED e-IFxs/HDxs TECHNOLOGY

CANON INTRODUCES TWO NEW HD LENSES FOR THE STUDIO

CANON ENHANCES REMOTE CONTROL LENS SERIES WITH NEW HDTV/SDTV ADDITIONS

CANON DEBUTS NEW ENG/EFP LENSES FOR HDTV AND SDTV

CANON ENHANCES INDUSTRY'S ABILITY TO DELIVER HIGH QUALITY HD CONTENT

CANON LENSES POSITIONED AS QUALITY STANDARD AND LEADER

MPEG encode acceleration on new nVidia GFX
 

http://www.tomshardware.com/graphic/...e_6800-16.html

Graphics chips have supported hardware accelerated video playback for quite a while now. But to date, the de- and encoding of compressed video data is still left to the CPU.

NVIDIA's GeForce 6800 as well all other versions of the NV4x graphics processor come with a separate, programmable video processor. Think of it as a chip within a chip which will handle video acceleration functions and also sports a real video hardware encoder/decoder.

High Quality Video
Motion Adaptive De-interlacing
High quality scaling & filtering
Video de-blocking
Integrated TV-encoder
Complete HDTV Solution
Transport stream handling
HDTV Output (720p, 1080i,
480p, CGMS)
Complete PVR Solution
Hardware Audio/Video
Synchronization
MPEG 1/2/4 encode/decode
WMV9 decode acceleration
HDCP Support
No changes to any program or video files are necessary to take advantage of the acceleration decoding features, as the driver intercepts all DirectX calls and forwards them directly to the video processor. In the case of MPEG 1/2/4 encoding, however, special software is required. Adobe has already announced support in upcoming versions of the After Effects suite.

Panasonic and Apple Bring HD Over FireWire to the Desktop
 

Panasonic and Apple Collaborate to Bring HD Over FireWire to the Desktop and Mobile Editing

New Hardware and Software Solution Dramatically Lowers the Costs of HD Production

NAB, LAS VEGAS (April 18, 2004) -- Panasonic and Apple today announced the world’s first implementation of IEEE 1394 FireWire with 100 Mbps DV-HD (the native video compression of Panasonic DVCPRO HD recording systems) to bring unmatched capabilities and dramatically lower price points to high definition (HD) post-production and content distribution.

Together, Panasonic and Apple are bringing HD over FireWire capabilities to desktop and mobile editing with Panasonic’s new AJ-HD1200A, the first HD production VTR to offer a FireWire interface, and Apple’s newly-announced Final Cut Pro HD professional video editing software, enabling mass adoption of HD resolution images on the desktop, and even on PowerBooks.

more at:
http://www.apple.com/pr/library/2004/apr/18panasonic.html

The announcement of this software finally convinces me to get a MAC. As an up and coming movie maker, I want to stick with one NLE that can grow with my career (going from DV to hopefully HD and 35mm) and this one does it.

Apple has introduced a lot of other neat software at NAB -- including a new application "Motion" that looks like it will compete with Adobe AE.

The Mac platform just gets better and better for pro video.

Glenn,

That's why I bought a blue and white G3 400 mhz (top of the line then) five years ago. And a little later on, I bought Final Cut Pro. All because it could grow with me. As my needs changed, I bought new Apples and FCP updates, which have been outstanding, with the exception of FCP 2, don't know why it didn't work out quite as well...

heath

NAB coverage?
 

Anyone know of a site that is covering NAB? I already visit camcorderinfo.com, but Robin Liss can only write so much copy herself. Any other sites out there?