Archive of the Sound for Picture Category

Back from the show. I like taking a day or so after my last postings to look through everything I’ve collected, selecting some last items to include in a final wrapup. While that’s not a lot of time for deep reflection, I am at least far enough away from the hype of the moment to enable a bit of perspective.

At the NAB press office earlier this week I overheard an NAB official talk to the editor of one of the leading trade mags. He was asked about what he thought would be among the most exciting developments of the show. Instead, he begged off answering, stating that as far as he was concerned it was all just a rehash. He could find nothing new or interesting worth commenting on. more

Mobile Studios is on the Panasonic booth with an elegant flypack system for live production. The set up includes a Panasonic AV-HS400 switcher, BT-LH2600W monitor, and an AJ-HPM110 P2 recorder. It can be configured with Mobile Studios own MS-CG100HD character generator (available separately at $9995). Fourteen available rack spaces for optional intercom, wireless sound audio mixer, direct-to-edit capture, and battery backup/UPS. $30K to $75K.

In addition to the flypack on display here, the company also does one with a MOTU V3HD option for direct-to-edit capture on laptops with FCP or Premiere CS3. www.mobilestudios.com for more.

Holophone, a leading manufacturer of surround microphones, is simplifying workflow when editing the Holophone PortaMic 5.1’s and H4 SuperMINI’s Pro Logic II encoded audio with the introduction of the Holophone D-CODE multi-channel Pro Logic II decoder. The Holophone D-CODE will make its industry debut at NAB 2008 (Booth N6438, N6435). Read on at The Briefing Room

More 2008 NAB Show news from The Briefing Room

Most know EDIROL, Roland’s line of audio production gear, for its portable handheld (and larger) audio recorders and mixers. At the Roland booth, we got a look at the company’s latest in an expanding line-up: the EDIROL F-1 Video Field Recorder, which combines video capture with multi-channel audio.

This small black box with LCD screen fits onto a camcorder via a standard brick battery attachment; the battery then attaches to the F-1. While it adds a bit of weight and length, it seemed to balance well with longer beaked camcorders from Canon and JVC.

In addition to capturing HDV or DV video (there’s no 2GB or 4GB file size limitation as with some other products) the F-1 offers two additional balanced audio inputs for capture of uncompressed linear broadcast WAV (these channels are in addition to the two channels that are already part of the video stream). The two add-on channels offer improved 16-bit/48Hz audio quality over that of compressed HDV audio. more

Blastwave FX, developer of next-generation HD sound effects libraries, announced the release of its flagship library, SONOPEDIA, the encyclopedia of HD sound effects. With 20,000 royalty-free HD sound effects ranging from Alligators to Zippers, SONOPEDIA is the first professional all-purpose HD sound effects library available to HD media producers. Read on at The Briefing Room

More 2008 NAB Show news from The Briefing Room

I recently chose the background music for a series of radio advertisements run by a local physician. Total time spent choosing the music? About two hours. Total time spent adjusting volume to match the narration and other similar edits? Oh, about five minutes. Thinking back, that’s not unusual; hunting for just the right song in any music library always seems to take forever.

With Sonicfire Pro 5, SmartSound Software will add several features to accelerate finding and customizing the right track. By way of background, SmartSound sells custom-length, royalty free music that you choose and customize in Sonicfire Pro. Depending upon the project, you can either export the selected audio file at the desired length, or input your video file into Sonicfire so you can choose and customize your audio in context. more

I had an interesting chat with Andrew Wild, Euphonix marketing VP, this morning as he was showing me the ins-and-outs of the S5 Fusion mixing console. The technology is an updated version of the S5 series of consoles made to fit nicely into the agenda of those mixing audio in the HD post world.

But Andrew pointed out that it is also meant to be viewed as a scaleable ‘package’ that can be configured to be a multi-tasking mixer in a variety of applications beyond just the traditional broadast post world. For instance, he pointed out that the S5 Fusion is currently being deployed into a wide range of high-end permanent facilities that have broadcast needs and post needs, certainly, but also live event needs. more

Sony Vegas has accumulated an increasingly large group of raving fans; Dave Chaimson, VP Worldwide Marketing for Sony Creative Software, talks about why, and the benefits of the new 64-bit version. Also new from the Sony Creative Software group is Soundforge 9, which includes the company’s vaunted noise reduction software and several plug-ins from Izotope, plus multichannel capabilities. To listen to his conversation with Digital Content Producer Contributing Writer Jan Ozer, click here

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