I call Thursday NAB’s “rump� day, a short, casual afternoon of thin crowds, when tired booth personnel slip away to visit competitors and otherwise view the show floor for themselves. It’s my favorite day.

For instance, I swung by RED’s tent and found no lines. I stepped immediately inside and like those before me, ogled the aluminum prototypes of the upcoming 5K Epic (the small boxy one) and 3K Scarlet (“3K for $3K�) rotating behind glass.

I waited in line no more than five minutes to see two clips (projected 4K) from Soderbergh’s upcoming Che Guevara duology, The Argentine and Guerilla. The first was shot 2K with anamorphic lenses, and the second flat, at 4K. I’ll be the first to admit, when all is said and done, both look superb. Nitpicking about noise and black levels aside (not me… others), these are images of a cinematographic caliber any DP would be proud to claim. I hope the finished films live up to the promise of these clips.

Fortunately for RED, third party manufacturers ponied up this year. P+S Technik of Munich introduced their Interchangeable Mount System (IMS) for the 4K RED ONE, which provides a replacement camera front as well as an assortment of lens mount adapters to open RED ONE to a universe of excellent and inexpensive still camera lenses.

Cooke introduced a package of four S4/i lenses called the Cooke RED Set, which includes a 15-40mm zoom and three primes, 50mm, 75mm, and 100mm. Shown here, wrapped up and ready to go home. (Originally I intended to use this image to say “it’s a wrap� on the last day of NAB.)

That’s a stripped-down RED ONE on a second-generation Sachtler Artemis EFP camera stabilizer, featuring a new carbon fiber spring arm nearly four pounds lighter than the original aluminum arm. Seems to enable lighter operators too.

And this is a Sony EX1 perched happily atop Tiffen’s new Steadicam Pilot, a full 3-axis gimbal stabilizer with vest, spring arm, “Carbonlite� post, sled and 5.8� color LCD monitor for what I was told is $4000—two-thirds the cost of an EX1! For camcorders from 2-10 lbs.

Note, by the way, the new Litepanels Micro atop the EX1’s shoe mount. If you missed it at the show, this feather-light (4 oz.) dimmable LED fixture runs 1.5 hours off four AA cells, or a jaw-dropping 7 hours off Duracell Lithium AAs. Made of plastic, it weighs hardly more than its batteries yet delivers considerable punch. Expect to see these small miracles Velcroed, rubber-banded, gaffer-taped, tucked into the most unexpected places.

Another advance in LED lighting is Element Labs’ Kelvin Tile system. Instead of white LEDs, this device uses tiny clusters of red, green, blue, orange, cyan, and white LEDs, whose contributions to output can be dialed up or down. Any color or color temperature is possible using the controller box shown in the photo. (DMX controllable too.) At the rear is a V-mount for brick batteries for portability. Barndoors close down to form a hard cover for transporting. Kino Flo is going to OEM the Kelvin Tile system, which is why it appeared at their stand too.

Returning to Sony’s EX1, here’s a sophisticated matte box with rotating stages and follow-focus. Geared, quite literally, to the EX1’s mechanically focusing Fujinon zoom. From ARRI, as seen at their booth.

And here’s a clever rain jacket for the EX1 from Petrol, introduced at the show. Designed to facilitate hand-held work too.

Literally on the show floor is Petrol’s winsome new big-mouth ditty bag. Note the generous but rugged rubber handle. Like an open electrician’s bag, there are endless external pockets, fasteners and loops to hold tape rolls and expendables. This bag closes of course, but there’s also a built-in light nylon cover to protect contents from sand, dust, prying fingers etc.

Exciting new monitor technology glowed from a number of dark corners. Impressive were the 120 Hz fast-scanning 17� LCD from Panasonic for clearer motion reproduction (BT-LH1760), and Field Emission Technologies’ 20� FED prototype, a show floor sensation and the closest match yet to traditional CRTs in color, contrast, and black levels. (Uses standard SMPTE/EBU phosphors.) Qualities that are hard to depict in a snapshot.

I did manage however to get a good snapshot of that other show floor sensation, Sony’s 11� OLED display, with saturated colors and inky blacks that have to be seen to be believed. Pictured is not the $2500 consumer version, also on the floor, but the camera viewfinder version, at ten times the price.

If size matters to you, Panasonic 103� plasma might be the ticket.

If you want size and breath-taking resolution too, Sony’s 56� QFHD prototype points to the future. This 4K display (well, 3830 x 2160) is basically four 23� BVM-L230 LED-backlit LCDs stitched together, taking four dual-link feeds. So vivid, it’s like looking at a Kodachrome slide show. The demo footage about seeking mountain gorillas was spectacular too, some of it from 65mm negative, I believe. Sony reps told me QFHD is an actual product, to be launched next year presumably at NAB.

Finding a 4K digital camera however is still no walk in the park. Outside of RED and Dalsa there are few, unless you count Vision Research’s Phantom 65, seen here at Abel Cine Tech’s booth. Note the Sony HD color LCD viewfinder. And yes, that’s a wooden Aaton handgrip with a start-stop button.

It’s called Phantom 65 because its huge single CMOS sensor is the size of a 65mm frame of color negative film. As in any large-format cinematography, lenses remain a challenge. Here’s Abel’s solution: a new Hasselblad mount and 50mm Zeiss Distagon (wide angle for that format).

Phantom 65 records up to 125 fps at full 4K to built-in 32GB RAM, or, new at NAB, to Abel’s 512GB Phantom CineMag, pictured here. CineMag expands Phantom 65’s record capacity to 32 minutes of 4K RAW. Or 132 minutes of uncompressed 1920×1080 RAW. (In the photo, CineMag is the gray slab atop the back of the Phantom HD—identical in size to Phantom 65). To download and transfer CineMag contents, Abel also introduced the small, dockable, portable Vision CineStation.

But wait, Abel and Vision Research have one more surprise for us this year! What looks like a digital SLR in the hands of Abel’s Technical Director of Rentals, Mitch Gross, is instead Vision’s new Miro, a high-speed camera that can run up to 1,265 fps. (Not a typo.) Tech specs are: CMOS sensor (larger than 2/3â€?), 800×600 pixels, 500 ASA equivalent, C-mount, uncompressed RAW capture to Compact Flash card, 3.5 lbs weight. Pictured is a Zeiss lens (from a Nikon) with a C-mount adapter.

Speaking of miniaturization, this photo says it all: brick battery, rods, viewfinder, Zeiss DigiPrime… where’s the camera? Ten points if you spot Silicon Imaging’s SI-2K Mini attached to the rear of the lens.

Isn’t it comforting that not everything is shrinkable?

So here’s my parting shot: Aaton’s 2-perf/3-perf Penelope. I threw it in because loaded with Kodak’s new Vision 3 5219, this cool new sync-sound 35mm film camera (24 dB) can outgun any digital camera at NAB in dynamic range.

Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose.

That about sums it up for NAB 2008.