It looks like NAB ’99 may be the setting for a high-stakes nonlinear faceoff among industry leaders Avid Technology, Tewksbury, Mass.; Montreal-based Autodesk subsidiary Discreet, and Quantel, headquartered in Newbury, U.K. All three manufacturers (previously highlighted in SHOOT’s "Road To NAB" series) made additional DTV/HDTV strategy and product announcements last week.
But in the commercial editorial community, which continues to rely primarily on the Media Composer, all eyes may be on Avid. Reliable sources requesting anonymity indicated that Avid would unveil a Media Composer for the NT platform at NAB. Avid would not confirm or deny this report. Some commercial editors who have considered such a product pointed out that an offline/online Media Composer could garner significant attention from editorial houses; however, it may also add to a longtime concern among some editors that Avid may shift focus from or abandon the Mac platform. Avid has repeatedly denied such speculation.
On the DTV/HDTV front, Avid, Discreet and Quantel all announced plans to introduce 24P technology for nonlinear editing/ compositing. The product lines aim to support 601 online and HD online. The reason, according to Avid chairman/CEO Bill Miller, is that the industry requires multiformat, multiversion delivery. "The world of digital television is about many formats," he said. "HD is just one. And digital formats are an addition to-not a replacement of-current formats and delivery requirements."
Following are highlights of announcements made last week by Avid, Discreet and Quantel. Also included is a sneak peak at Avid’s DTV/HDTV white paper, scheduled for release on April 19, which details many products and strategies.
Avid
Avid’s plans are to offer 24P technology for all current and future products. This will begin with the NAB introduction of a capability dubbed "24P universal editing and mastering," initially for SDTV in the next version of Symphony. "Symphony will enable content producers to edit uncompressed 24 frame progressive content in its native format, and at the push of a button, deliver NTSC, PAL, 4:3, 16:9, and letterbox formats," Miller explained. "The offline-only version of this capability (dubbed ‘universal offline’) will be available as an option for Media Composer." Avid expects to ship these capabilities in time for fall TV season production.
Avid also announced plans to develop a HD conforming and finishing system, code-named Avid HD. "Avid HD will be capable of autoconforming and finishing projects originated on Media Composer, Softimage|DS or Symphony, in a wide range of HD resolutions," Miller said. "It will provide a complete set of editing, audio, graphics and effects tools." Avid HD will be previewed in a technology demonstration at NAB. Avid did not offer pricing or a scheduled release date.
Additionally, Miller hinted, "we are also about to give the world a look at our next-generation storage and networking solution, which lies at the heart of Avid’s nonlinear production environment."
This technology is included in the product details in Avid’s aforementioned white paper. The technology-Avid Unity MediaNet-is described as a system for "nonlinear tools, sharing and protecting storage, and enabling facility management." According to the report, "it functions with all of Avid products [and] enables real-time media sharing and high speed media transfer. It features a network-based access scheme that is highly secure but nearly transparent to the users. … [It] is HD-ready today." Pricing and availability are not covered in the white paper.
Discreet
As reported last week (SHOOT, 4/9, p. 1, p. 50), Discreet and Sony Electronics, Park Ridge, N.J., said they are collaborating to deliver integrated HDTV production tools. Specifically, the companies revealed that they are developing an HDCAM software enabling input/output, storage and manipulation of compressed HDCAM format HDTV images over SDI interfaces.
The software would enable real-time input and output from Discreet’s Fire and Inferno systems to Sony’s HDCAM VTRs. Demonstrations are scheduled during NAB; the technology is expected to deliver to customers during the second half of ’99.
Quantel
Also last week, Quantel held a press conference detailing its NAB products and strategies. Many of these announcements were detailed in an exclusive interview with Quantel executive chairman Richard Taylor (SHOOT, 3/19, p. 13). They included development of a 1080/24P editing system based on Monty technology, as well as new capabilities for the Editbox and Henry/Infinity product lines. During his SHOOT interview, Taylor said that he expected Quantel to have HD products shipping during 2000. But last week’s announcement indicated that it may be sooner.
Last week, the company said at NAB it would unveil Editbox Chaser, an interface based on Monty technology that allows any Editbox or Henry/Infinity to provide nonlinear HD finishing-including 1080/24P. It is expected to ship by the end of the summer.
Quantel also unveiled Publisher HD, a storage system designed to store 601 images and up-res the material to any ATSC standard. It is scheduled to ship in September. Prices for the new Quantel offerings were not disclosed.
