One of the best things you can do with your time here is digest the presentations at the Adobe booth. Not so much the usual stuff–features of Premiere Pro and After Effects, etc. It’s more important to take in the demos related to distribution (Adobe Media Player/Adobe Flash Player) and Flash-related content creation. That means in all tools; for example, look at what an interactive SWF file looks like coming out of Encore DVD. Also take in the Sneak Peek presentations–all to help visualize the metadata driven future. Whether for traditional, linear film resolultion projects or production for web and mobile, Adobe’s put forth some ideas that are helpful to consider.

I got the nickel tour from Simon Hayhurst. Some highlights:

For those of you who liked the sound of the native P2 workflow but have a Sony camera, Adobe unveils XDCAM EX support. Started shipping yesterday. Still no transcoding. For those still on the fence about tapeless, take a look at what the Adobe workflow is all about. It’s a shame you can’t do the same here with the Apple P2 workflow (Maybe you can. If anyone’s seen FCP P2 demos on the floor, speak up in Comments).

Also on the acquisition front, Adobe and friends are trying to bring the open standards collaboration that worked to standardize archiving and exchange of RAW still data to the digital cinema world. Adobe plans to tap its Digital Negative Specification (DNG) file format as the foundation; partners in the initiative (kickoff meeting here this week) include Panavision, Silicon Imaging, Dalsa, Weisscam, Arri, The Foundry, Iridas and Cineform. The goal an open, publicly documented file format called CinemaDNG. Hayhurst says they’re looking at it on a few fronts. First what he calls the “Disney” workflow (keep every pixel of data forever, the “fidelity and archiving” approach), which presumes tons of storage for the sensor data, and an HD proxy workflow. Then there’s the “pragmatic workflow” in the spirit of CineForm’s lightly compressed approach to DI. And finally an “advanced color workflow” that presumes a metadata structure that allows color decisions to be done throughout the process starting on set. This metadata-dependent workflow assumes that data will continue to change workflow and blur the line between production and post.

Hayhurst would like to get a spec this year. If you want to follow along, start by getting the bit of info that’s available in the Sneak Peek session on the Adobe booth, then tune into Adobe Labs as the working group exposes the sausage making.

Next up, more sneak peek info on Adobe metadata workflow, after my meeting with Avid (which has managed to turn not being at NAB into a distinct NAB presence).