Anyone who visited the South Hall at last month’s National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) confab in Las Vegas heard the fierce nonlinear battle cries between Avid, headquartered in Tewksbury, Mass., and Apple Computer, located in Cupertino, Calif. It began each morning when the exhibits opened with a stampede of editors—quite resembling the running of the bulls in Pamplona, Spain—heading toward the side-by-side booths of the two companies. Crowds spilled into the aisles during the stage demos, creating an obstacle course for anyone trying to pass to other booths. Then they turned up the volume. By the final afternoon of NAB ’04, the Avid’s ProTools demo echoed across the hall, drowning out Apple’s equally loud presenters on its demo stage.
Discreet and other nearby manufacturers challenged them by upping their volume and added to the deafening noise. One thing was certain: One couldn’t miss that section of the hall. And this demonstrated just how competitive the nonlinear space has once again become.
Avid’s Adrenaline and Nitris—based on the Avid DNA architecture, which was unveiled at NAB in ’03—began shipping this past year as more robust and cost effective systems. These systems have already been adopted in a significant number of commercial editorial houses.
Avid
At NAB, Avid revealed high-definition support across these product lines, using Avid’s new DNxHD 10-bit HD encoding technology that enables collaborative HD postproduction with the same storage bandwidth and capacity requirements as standard-definition files. The DNxHD source code will be licensable free of charge to any user who wants to compile it on any platform. Adrenaline options will include uncompressed HD and native HDV.
That message may have been dulled in the NAB shuffle, but editors such as Alan Miller of Moving Pictures, New York, saw this as a savvy move by Avid. "It seems the battle lines are being drawn between compressed and uncompressed HD," he notes. "Purists like Discreet and Quantel will keep touting uncompressed HD … but a lot of facilities are [currently] wired for serial digital and the bandwidth for uncompressed NTSC, and most can’t handle uncompressed HD. That’s the primary reason why I think Avid made these DNxHD codecs, so editorial houses don’t have to rewire. They can use their existing facility [infrastructure] to route the signals around. I think that makes a lot of sense. … Plus, [the images] really look great. [DNxHD] makes HD usable now without people having to rewire—that’s a big advantage. It’s subtle, but a really good move on Avid’s part."
Other Avid customers were disappointed—although not surprised—to hear that Avid is not going to develop HD on its older Meridien-based systems, in order to focus on R&D on the newer platform. Charlie Russell, Avid’s senior post product marketing manager reported that if there are any more software releases for Meridien products, "it’s probably going to be bug fixes or a minor feature."
Avid also made an aggressive push for the all-in-one system for the lower end, introducing Avid Xpress Studio, a bundle for an all-in-one content creation system that works seamlessly together in the same computer. The applications include Avid Xpress Pro nonlinear editing system, Avid ProTools LE—an audio post tool based on Avid’s ProTools—Avid 3D, a 3-D product based on Avid’s Softimage XSI, Avid FX, based on the Boris Red titling and compositing package, and Avid DVD by Sonic, a DVD authoring tool developed for Avid by San Francisco-based DVD creation software maker Sonic Solutions. The package lists for $3,995, or $6,995 with the addition of the Avid Mojo accelerator.
Apple
Across the aisle, Apple answered with its open standards message. "I think one of the things that helped validate us in the editorial and broadcast space is our partnerships," opines marketing manager Richard Kerris. "They have encouraged us as to what can be done with our product. Up until a few years ago, it was just Final Cut, now it’s a part of the system. I think what it’s helping to do for the industry is set an open standard. A year ago at NAB we launched Final Cut 4 and brought XML [interchange format] out. XML allows anyone to have full access to all of our product files. So you have control to every element of your work through XML, and that’s proven to be the winner.
"Tying [Final Cut] into the rest of [the customers’] environment has always been a challenge," he continues. "That’s all changed with XML. So we are really keen on keeping partners and making sure the open standard approach is the way to go."
This year, the company unveiled Final Cut Pro HD, which the company said would deliver the ability to capture, edit and output broadcast quality HD video over a single FireWire cable, without requiring any additional hardware. The software lists for $999, or an upgrade price of $399. (It should be noted that HD was previously doable on Final Cut Pro with third party technology, such as Pinnacle Systems’ Cinewave HD.)
In conjunction with its product news, Apple was handing out DVDs of content in various flavors of HD at NAB. "We know that the majority of the industry today isn’t doing HD production, but over forty percent of those we surveyed said in the next eighteen months they expect to be doing HD production," Kerris explains. "We want them to be doing it on our platform; we want them to be doing it with Final Cut Pro. By giving them FCP HD and a bunch of content that they can mess with, they are going to get experience doing it now, ahead of the curve."
Discreet
Montreal-based Autodesk subsidiary Discreet included support for Apple’s Final Cut Pro XML interchange format in upcoming versions of Discreet’s editing and visual effects systems. This integration is intended to improve the workflow for creative professionals using both Final Cut Pro and Discreet systems such as Smoke, Fire and Lustre. Editorial decisions made in Final Cut Pro will be directly transferable to Discreet systems, in order to simplify the postproduction process. "Many customers are adopting multi-vendor workflows. Discreet’s strategy is to support standards that give customers maximum flexibility in their production environments," says Marc Petit, VP of product development at Discreet.
Of course, Discreet had complete workflow demonstrated at the high end, with its Fire nonlinear editing, Inferno compositing, new version 2 of its Lustre color correction software, and network and storage technologies. Discreet’s booth remained a key destination for the commercialmaking community.
So too did Newbury, U.K.-headquartered Quantel, whose version 2 software for its generationQ product line was a must-see for many in the industry. The now-shipping version 2 software for iQ and eQ includes added speed and a multi-view compositor. eQ also gained an HD-RGB option, which Quantel reported coincides with a move in the mainstream HD market toward 4:4:4 image handling thanks to developments such as the Sony HDCAM SR format, which uses mild compression to store 4:4:4 HD-RGB signal data.
With the Quantel systems’ ability to handle nonlinear editing, effects, color grading and mastering, Quantel corporate relations manager Roger Thornton says that this enables post house to begin to make money in the HD world today. And, with the ability to handle 4:4:4 RGB images, Thornton points out that companies can also get into cinema advertising production.
New Faces
Sony Broadcast and Professional Systems, Park Ridge, N.J., came to NAB with an aggressive new effort to move its XPRI nonlinear editing system, which has had minimal penetration in commercialmaking. But facilities did take a close look at the preview of XPRI version 7, which is scheduled to ship in July. Aimed at both long and shortform workflows, new features include native HDCAM support, which would be of interest to anyone considering the Sony CineAlta camera for production, which records HDCAM. "We are the only people that offer a native HDCAM SAN," says Sony’s Lance Kelvin. "So you can actually take native HDCAM material, bit for bit, and bring it directly into the system. Since we are the only ones that handle that, we really keep your video quality completely optimized."
Additional features include multi-cam capabilities at full resolution with formats including HDCAM, and an advanced mode that enables editors to, for instance, color correct or do effects in individual camera footage. "It’s kind of a pre-process upstream of the multi-cam," comments Kelvin. "So you can dive into the multi-cam … and do all kinds of things that really save a tremendous amount of time."
Kelvin added that XPRI also has features that can be accomplished in real-time—even in HD—including primary and secondary color correction, 3-D transitions, and advanced chroma keying.
The response has been great," enthuses Linda White, general manager of sales and marketing for XPRI. "People like the interface, people love the new features. … XPRI fits in the finishing world—and can easily directly replace a linear bay both SD and HD—and now offers some of the tools we have in the SD world for cutting and offline."
Another new face that was sharing the attention of the nonlinear space was Toronto-headquartered Leitch Technology with its new VelocityHD, a format-flexible, real-time, non-linear editing system that brings Leitch’s Velocity nonlinear editing line to the realm of high-definition video—and starts just under $10,000.
The system is based on Leitch’s Altitude hardware, featuring full-quality, online playback of two HD video streams, two HD graphics streams, and true dual-stream, real-time HD transitions and effects. VelocityHD’s real-time power also enables interactive full-quality feedback on the HD monitor while key-framing transitions and effects. Altitude supports 1080i, 1080PsF and 720p frame formats at all common frame rates, with compressed and uncompressed (8-bit and 10-bit) recording and playback, and the flexibility to mix compressed and uncompressed footage within a project. In addition to SMPTE-292 HD-SDI I/O, Altitude also features VGA HD output, enabling HD playback to be viewed on VGA monitors and reducing the need for expensive high-definition displays. HD output is also simultaneously down-converted for monitoring on standard-definition displays. Audio is supported through embedded SDI and discrete AES/EBU I/O, plus unbalanced analog monitoring.
For those who use primarily SD today, VelocityHD also features full-quality, real-time playback and mixing of multiple SD video and graphics streams, and a flexible new mixer architecture. The optional A3DX 3D DVE module adds one channel of real-time high-definition 3-D DVE, and four channels of real-time standard-definition 3-D effects, including perspectives, warps, rotation and more.
VelocityHD is slated for release in August, and will be available as a turnkey system, or as a hardware/ software bundle for installation into qualified Microsoft Windows XP Professional workstations.
Windows Media
9 Series
Since its release last year, there continues to be strong interest in Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft Corp.’s Windows Media 9 Series (WM9S) platform. The audio and video codecs in the WM9S have impressed with its image quality and compression efficiency, even supporting high-definition video and up to 7.1 channel audio. For example, Microsoft estimates that the WM9S codec has approximately three times the compression efficiency of MPEG-2 and twice that of MPEG-4, which means more content can be delivered at higher quality over networks or on physical media. Microsoft’s submission of the compression technology used in the Windows Media Video 9 codec (VC-9) to the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE) C24 Technical Committee was recently elevated to Committee Draft status.
Related NAB news came from San Antonio-based BOXX Technologies, which unveiled its new integrated desktop HD editing system for Windows XP, HD [pro] RT. This professional editing system features both CineForm’s Prospect HD and Adobe Premiere Pro, which together deliver real-time, 10-bit HD-SDI capture and software-based real-time, multi-stream editing and effects capability. It is scheduled to ship during Q3, starting at $24,000 for a turnkey system and starts with 512GBs for nine hours of storage. "This makes editing HD an extremely affordable reality for anyone working with HD footage," comments BOXX CTO Todd Bryant.
HD [pro] RT employs CineForm’s Prospect HD, which replaces the existing video engine within Adobe Premiere Pro to deliver real-time multi-stream processing of HD video within Premiere Pro. This configuration can process three 1080 24p streams simultaneously in real-time and offers color correction on each stream, effects processing, transitions, titles and graphic overlays with motion. HD [pro] RT with Prospect HD supports a HD-SDI input and output interface for real-time capturing of high-definition video and simultaneous monitoring of the timeline in YUV color space. It accepts video input from a variety of 8-bit or 10-bit HD sources, including HD-SDI and HDV. It also enables direct export to WMV HD, whether for production review or final delivery.
More quietly, DVS with U.S. headquarters in Burbank, Calif., presented Clipster, its real-time online editing system that supports formats including HD and 2k. The company bills Clipster as having all digital intermediate processes in one system. The company reported that Clipster handles capturing, editing, zooming, panning, multi-resolution primary color correction and finishing. For more involved selective color grading work, DVS offers real-time tools in cooperation with Pandora and da Vinci.
