Scott Brown
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Well it's the eve of the final day of IBC 2011 and I'm sitting here with a glass of vino reflecting on what I've seen over the past few days here in Amsterdam.
Thoughts - overall, disappointment this year. 3D everywhere but a lot of it was really not very impressive and I remain to be convinced that 3D is going to really take off in the broadcast arena. The BBC Wimbleton tennis demo was impressive though!
Sony - OLED displays were very nice. Finally I saw a grade 1 monitor that outperformed CRT...at a cost though! + they have a great little 9" production monitor that is a stunner. Still nothing to replace the EX1/3 work horses that are now almost 4 years old. All they need to do is add 50 M/bs capture and they will sell thousands....these cameras are still the best hand held units in the market but we need to use a Nano Flash or similar to keep the BBC happy. F3....nice pictures BUT 35 M/bs recording just can't get my head round this and I just know that Scarlet is going to completely kill this product. F65 was shown delivering lovely pictures BUT they are very late arriving at the 4K party and the camera is double the cost of Epic! At the other end of the scale, I really liked Sony's little NX70 AVCHD camera that is water and dust proof, shoots 50/60p and has a cute infra red night vision option. This will be a great camera for news gathering in hostile environments.
Panasonic - only big news on the camera front was the AG-HPX250 handheld camera that shoots 50 M/bs and thus should be approved by the BBC for HD acquisition. It is quite a big camera though and I was surprised at how fragile and plastic it was, however the lens is a cracker! Panny also have a new range of pro plasmas which are nice BUT the VT30 consumer range still offer best bang for buck. They had a stunning 150" 4K plasma on display and this truly is an object of desire...shame they didn't have any 4K RED footage to show on it
)
Canon - nothing much doing. The XF305 camera is nice but the lens servo drove me nuts and it really is not a low light star. Cut the front end off though, add the 7D sensor and add RAW recording and they would have a camera that would potentially give RED some competition. Nothing doing on this front though I have to believe that Canon must be working on this!
There were LOTS of portable camera recorders from companies such as Atmos, Sound Devices, AJA etc. I don't quite understand these devices...they were born out of silly games played by Sony and Panasonic whereby they crippled data rates on lower priced cameras deliberately to protect higher cost cameras! I get sooooo frustrated at the games Sony and Panasonic play but companies like RED will continue to thrive while these games are played! Out of all the units I looked at, I liked the the Atmos units the best.
RED...small stand but it was always busy and everyone was amazed at the size of the Epic in comparison to the RED One. Ted was in great form and it was a joy to hold an Epic in my hands for the first time.
LOT's of copycat manufacturers from the Far East who have blatantly ripped off US and European manufacturers lighting products....Grrrrrrrrr.
In the post Apple FCP-X era Adobe and Avid were doing lots of business with Adobe's stand having the bigger crowds in my opinion. Looks like we'll ditch FCP 7 in favour of Avid for our TV work and Adobe for corporate and VFX. Black Magic Design had a big stand with lots of new product, however I feel their range is now getting too complicated and perhaps needs streamlining. BIG announcement was of course Resolve coming to the PC and they had a beta version on display that was 80% complete. Love this software and at the cost it is an obvious buy for all RED owners.
I'll post other thoughts once I have time to digest everything. Last day tomorrow so let me know of there is anything specifically that you'd like me to check out if you're unable to be here in person.
Best wishes
Scott
Thoughts - overall, disappointment this year. 3D everywhere but a lot of it was really not very impressive and I remain to be convinced that 3D is going to really take off in the broadcast arena. The BBC Wimbleton tennis demo was impressive though!
Sony - OLED displays were very nice. Finally I saw a grade 1 monitor that outperformed CRT...at a cost though! + they have a great little 9" production monitor that is a stunner. Still nothing to replace the EX1/3 work horses that are now almost 4 years old. All they need to do is add 50 M/bs capture and they will sell thousands....these cameras are still the best hand held units in the market but we need to use a Nano Flash or similar to keep the BBC happy. F3....nice pictures BUT 35 M/bs recording just can't get my head round this and I just know that Scarlet is going to completely kill this product. F65 was shown delivering lovely pictures BUT they are very late arriving at the 4K party and the camera is double the cost of Epic! At the other end of the scale, I really liked Sony's little NX70 AVCHD camera that is water and dust proof, shoots 50/60p and has a cute infra red night vision option. This will be a great camera for news gathering in hostile environments.
Panasonic - only big news on the camera front was the AG-HPX250 handheld camera that shoots 50 M/bs and thus should be approved by the BBC for HD acquisition. It is quite a big camera though and I was surprised at how fragile and plastic it was, however the lens is a cracker! Panny also have a new range of pro plasmas which are nice BUT the VT30 consumer range still offer best bang for buck. They had a stunning 150" 4K plasma on display and this truly is an object of desire...shame they didn't have any 4K RED footage to show on it
)Canon - nothing much doing. The XF305 camera is nice but the lens servo drove me nuts and it really is not a low light star. Cut the front end off though, add the 7D sensor and add RAW recording and they would have a camera that would potentially give RED some competition. Nothing doing on this front though I have to believe that Canon must be working on this!
There were LOTS of portable camera recorders from companies such as Atmos, Sound Devices, AJA etc. I don't quite understand these devices...they were born out of silly games played by Sony and Panasonic whereby they crippled data rates on lower priced cameras deliberately to protect higher cost cameras! I get sooooo frustrated at the games Sony and Panasonic play but companies like RED will continue to thrive while these games are played! Out of all the units I looked at, I liked the the Atmos units the best.
RED...small stand but it was always busy and everyone was amazed at the size of the Epic in comparison to the RED One. Ted was in great form and it was a joy to hold an Epic in my hands for the first time.
LOT's of copycat manufacturers from the Far East who have blatantly ripped off US and European manufacturers lighting products....Grrrrrrrrr.
In the post Apple FCP-X era Adobe and Avid were doing lots of business with Adobe's stand having the bigger crowds in my opinion. Looks like we'll ditch FCP 7 in favour of Avid for our TV work and Adobe for corporate and VFX. Black Magic Design had a big stand with lots of new product, however I feel their range is now getting too complicated and perhaps needs streamlining. BIG announcement was of course Resolve coming to the PC and they had a beta version on display that was 80% complete. Love this software and at the cost it is an obvious buy for all RED owners.
I'll post other thoughts once I have time to digest everything. Last day tomorrow so let me know of there is anything specifically that you'd like me to check out if you're unable to be here in person.
Best wishes
Scott
