Archive of the Digital Content Creation Category

If you work on color correcting in post, or have to match cameras in the field, it‘s easy to rue the passing of CRT technology. While that analog technology had its limits, moving to LCD monitors meant losing track of colors such as emerald green and dark red, since backlighting the screen with fluorescent tubes greatly limits color fidelity.
At their Sunday press conference, Sony provided a solution with its BVM-L230 LCD video reference monitor; the 22.5-inch HD monitor employs a newly developed LED backlight system and display engine capable of producing 1,024 levels of gray scale. (The ability to render a greater number of luminance values directly influences color reproduction fidelity.)
Sony claims the new LCD panel is the industry’s first with to offer a 10-bit driver, replacing 8-bit technology, which is capable of only 256 levels of gray scale. more

Today’s Digital Cinema Summit (put on by the Entertainment Technology Center at USC) was heavy on the 3D theme and its impact on both the creation of content and the distribution and exhibition of that content. The topic was apropos coming on the heels of Disney’s Meet the Robinsons–the subject of an afternoon session at the conference. During that session, panel members cited statistics indicating that the 3D version of “Meet the Robinsons” opened on 892 screens simultaneously worldwide, making it, according to them, “the biggest D-cinema release to date.” more

Teamworking in post is all the rage. You can‘t read far though the slew of pre-show press releases to learn that playing well with others will be a big part of the news at NAB 07

Quantel does its part with the launch of Genetic Engineering at their Sunday press conference. No need to worry about stem cells piling up on your NLE though: the Brit company is talking about overturning the traditional way of looking at SANs (storage area networks), allowing Q users to hook together any of its products–whether eQ, iQ, or Pablo–and getting access to the same clips at the same time without copying, reformatting, or moving the media. more

NAB, LAS VEGAS–April 15, 2007–Apple® today unveiled Final Cut Studio® 2, a significant upgrade to the industry‘s leading video production suite that delivers new creative tools designed expressly for editors. Final Cut Studio 2 includes Final Cut Pro® 6, which introduces Apple‘s ProRes 422 format for uncompressed HD quality at SD file sizes and support for mixed video formats and frame rates in a single Timeline; Motion 3 featuring an intuitive 3D environment, paint and new behaviors; Soundtrack® Pro 2 with dozens of innovative tools for multitrack editing, surround mixing and conforming sound to picture; Compressor 3 delivering powerful batch encoding for multiple formats with a single click; and DVD Studio Pro 4.2 for SD and HD DVD authoring. Final Cut Studio 2 also introduces “Color,” a professional color grading and finishing application for ensuring consistent color and creating signature looks. Read on at The Briefing Room: 2007 NAB Newslink