What's Happening in Networking and Storage?
Though trends usually disappear like last year's software upgrade, the growth of SANs in video and audio post continues at a steady pace.
One remaining challenge: finding specific edits within a SAN that may hold more than 1TB of data. But there's work being done to solve that conundrum. Studio Network Solutions (www.studionetworksolutions.com) now offers SANscan — a database-driven search tool — as a software enhancement for its SAN systems. With SANscan editors can, for example, easily find their most recently modified edits from a database of Pro Tools sessions, says Gary Holiday, chief systems designer at the St. Louis-based company. “What's unique is that even if you have a couple terabytes of storage, you don't have to mount the volumes to find where things are,” he says. “You scan and then just mount the exact drive you need.” The software also shows open storage areas on the whole SAN, ideal for setting up the next job.
Today most SANs function as storage islands within a facility. But that may be changing, too. “We like to think of SANs as standalone environments, but that's really not the case anymore,” says Claude Lorenson, director of product marketing at Vixel (www.vixel.com), a maker of SAN switches and software. Vixel is working with Lucent (www.lucent.com) to expand the potential of Fibre Channel over IP (FCIP).
FCIP over public networks employs huge, high-speed fiber optic pipes to connect Fibre Channel SANs across existing carrier networks. For businesses, this provides a cost-effective way to offer critical storage applications such as data backup, disaster recovery, data replication, storage hosting, and storage trading with other network members throughout the country.
Vixel now says it can extend that model to better accommodate video files with a new Fibre Channel “blade” for Lucent's OptiStar EdgeSwitch, the actual device that connects SANs to OC-48 (2.5 Gbps) SONET networks. Users wouldn't know if the storage was down the hall, across town, or even farther away. Lucent plans to price the EdgeSwitch to cost-effectively provide high-speed interconnection of SANs over regional and long-distance backbones.
At AES 2001, Studio Network Solutions will introduce A/V NET, a subscription-based private virtual network for collaboration between SNS A/V SAN users. A/V NET employs the Lucent EdgeSwitch to create point-to-point — not Internet — connections, though it does use Internet Protocol. “I can definitely see the point where engineers would have a central storage location for some 200 studios in [Nashville's] Music Row,” says Holiday. “[You'd] be able to log into that from any studio on the A/V NET network.” Some of the studios, Holiday points out, can have 10 buildings, so creating a central storage area makes sense for efficient management.
Avid Ups NewsCutter Chops
At IBC 2001, Avid released NewsCutter XP version 2.1 and NewsCutter XP Mobile, which include support for the 4:1:1 PAL format.
The XP version follows the recent release of NewsCutter version 2.5 with its support of the Sony MPEG IMX format. The theme? Release a more affordable news-style NLE to European and other PAL markets.
Another innovation: The XP version delivers PortServer Pro support. This new feature interfaces the NLE with the Avid Unity for News media network, one more move toward today's preferred topology of collaborative news workgroups.
Other news editing product introductions included iNEWS version 1.5, Media Browse, and AirSPACE version 2.6, all of which herald interoperability between Avid broadcast systems and third-party applications. Building on the recent addition of active X hosting and MOS integration, iNEWS 1.5 can now run the Media Browse application in the same iNEWS environment. Journalists don't need to switch between applications, and text moves easily from iNEWS to the Media Browse system.
The new release of the AirSPACE videoserver includes the SimulEdit feature. As material is recorded to AirSPACE, this technology allows simultaneous transfer to the Avid Unity for News workgroup, where 50 or more editors can concurrently access the material. Another feature, SimulPlay, also pushes a multitasking approach: it allows stories to play to air from the AirSPACE system directly as the video material transfers from an Avid Unity for News workgroup. Mean-while, SimulPlay also creates a local server-based backup copy.
For more information, visit the Avid website at www.avid.com.
Airstar Improves Lighting Balloons
Airstar made its first splash with halogen lighting elements inside helium-filled balloons for the filming of Titanic.
Now the French company introduces its Solarc 500 Elliptic and Tube Indoor, pegging the more reliable and efficient lighting systems for both location and studio work.
The Solarc 500, a 14'×20' balloon inflated with helium, can illuminate an area of up to 129,000 square feet with its halogen element. The company spots the elliptical shape of the balloon as most suitable for outdoor shooting — it's more stable in wind. The Tube Indoor is specially shaped for indoor filming.
The key improvement over the company's predecessor balloons is the internal color corrector. This makes it possible to vary the color from 4,500°K to 8,000°K and to increase the electrical power up to 18,000W for the Solarc 500 Elliptic and 4,400W for the Tube Indoor.
Other improvements include a new fabric texture that gives a 20% increase in the amount of light, interchangeable ballasts with other flicker-free makes such as ARRI, and an increased separation between the high-voltage cables, which makes it possible to increase the power.
For more information, contact the U.S. headquarters, Airstar America, in Los Angeles at (323) 344-1498, or visit www.airstar-light.com.
Quantel Pushes iQ Potential
At IBC 2001, Quantel demonstrated the new capabilities of its flagship iQ product. IQ brings together Quantel's years of NLE development with a push to incorporate third-party software and hardware, acknowledging the reality of ubiquitous PC graphics technology.
When iQ first debuted last year, a price tag of approximately $500,000 caused some to question its place in today's more cost-conscious marketplace. To some extent Quantel heard that, and it now touts a $330,000 entry-level price for this online HD editing system. One selling point: all supported resolutions can intermix on the editing timeline, with clips up- or down-rezzed on the fly.
Now, Quantel adds Qeffects, which it describes as the world's first fully interactive multi-resolution effects toolset. Qeffects offers eight superlayers with color correction, tracking, DVE, keying, and blurring. The neat part? An iQ editor can work freely with different resolution material in all layers. A film-level (2K) iQ at the show offered up to three hours of 10-bit 2K storage (that's about eight hours of HD).
On the iQ partnership front, Quantel had previously demonstrated iQ working with the Pandora color corrector at the NAB show. Now the actual results are in, including realtime scan, flip, zoom, and re-format. These telecine suite operations, Quantel says, are now for the first time integrated into a full editing environment. Also at IBC, iQ connected with a Da Vinci 2K color-corrector.
Two further announcements: the new Mokey foreground separation and image replacement software package from IS Distribution will be available as a plug-in for iQ, in addition to a number of plug-in applications from Miranda.
For more information, visit www.quantel.com.
Leitch MediaFile Still and Clip Store
Leitch calls its MediaFile a “next-generation image store,” and in a competitive market, certain design details stand out, especially for users of its dpsReality cards running Windows 2000.
Offered in 2 RU and 4 RU platforms, its integrated browser enables the MediaFile operator to transfer stills and sequences over TCP/IP networks and existing Leitch StillNet networks. Its relative compactness makes for a good remote production package, while the drag-and-drop import feature (from Mac, PC, SGI, and Chyron gear) simplifies the insertion of computer-generated elements for sporting events, remote news, and other forms of live remote broadcast.
The 2 RU version supports up to two channels of analog PGM and KEY, the 4 RU configurations contain up to two combined analog and digital channels. MediaFile uses Leitch 3120RP protocol on RS422 as well as Abekas A-42 automation protocol.
Features include database management, automation support, more than 200 realtime transition effects, integrated CG, 4:2:2:4 sampling with full alpha-channel support, and A/B, PGM/PVW, and PGM/KEY playback modes. An optional SDI I/O and standalone sequence-editing software are also available.
For more information, visit www.leitch.com.
New from Snell & Wilcox
At IBC 2001, Snell & Wilcox debuted Alchemist Platinum, said by the British company to be the world's first motion-compensated upconverter that converts frame rates. Directed at broadcasters who deal with poor-quality footage, such as in newsrooms, the Alchemist Platinum processes PAL and SECAM material.
Also introduced: Golden DaVE SD2524, a standard-definition version of the company's compact HD switcher. The SD2524 includes 2½ M/Es, 24 inputs, and a number of DVE options, including the ability to simultaneously produce 12 individual tiles.
Mach1, Snell & Wilcox's compact (1 RU) motion-compensated standards converter, had its European introduction. Mach1 provides multi-format standards conversion using the company's recently released “Motion Science” (M.Sc) compensation technology, developed to provide improved conversion performance on video material that includes substantial movement.
Earlier in September, Snell & Wilcox announced it had acquired Newbury, England-based Post Impressions, a developer and manufacturer of a line of well-received HD workstations that includes the SpiRINT Diskstation.
For more information, visit the Snell & Wilcox website at www.snellwilcox.com.
Plus8Video Develops Cine-Style HD Lens
Burbank-based Plus8Video, a rental facility with an additional office in New York City, decided that the major manufacturers weren't serving the film production community well enough. So in September, the company introduced the Cinesmart 18 × 7.5 high-definition zoom lens for film-style applications. The company, one of the first to rent HD production technology, also develops HD equipment that, according to Plus8 president Marker Karahadian, “we got tired of asking manufacturers to build.”
Based on the Fujinon HA20X7.5 HD ENG-style zoom lens, Plus8 adds a number of mechanical and optical enhancements. Focus markings, for example, have been changed to give a more linear motion to the lens; this enables a finer touch through a more usable focus range. Each 1/4-in. turn represents about 5ft., so turning distances respond to how an AC needs to manipulate the lens. As is standard on film lenses, focus markings appear on both the left and right sides of the lens barrel.
Another difference: The focus mechanism has an added cam lifter to increase optical stability over twin-cam systems, which delivers a more solid feel with no back-and-forth motion. A modified pitch to the gearing now accommodates film lenses and other accessories.
For more information, contact Plus8Video at (818) 845-6480.
Discreet Announces Smoke Version 5
At IBC 2001, Discreet announced Smoke 5, the latest version of its online NLE “multi-master” editing and finishing system. Running on SGI's speedy new Octane2 (as well as the earlier version Octane), Smoke 5 offers crucial components Discreet officials said they pulled from Smoke editors' wish lists, including support for Avid's Open Media Framework Interchange (OMFI), which offers file-format compatibility between Smoke and Avid NLE systems.
Expected to ship by the end of the year, Smoke 5 also includes realtime HD capability, along with new editorial features, such as “sparks” (third-party plug-ins), matte containers, and audio time warps.
One new emphasis brings to the fore a controversy long brewing: Should editors also do effects? The argument is that by offering such capabilities an editor can decrease overall production time. But the added responsibility of a 3D effects tool kit causes some editors to blanch, as they feel they will have to master a whole new capability, or else.
Nonetheless, Smoke 5 offers fairly extensive 3D compositing tools, including a 3D space work environment with camera control and up to eight light sources; selective lighting (so that a light only affects a specific layer); multiple DVE layers with independent control of key, color correction, tracking, and axis attributes; surface attributes like shininess and specular highlights; and the ability to import camera data from 3ds Max.
For more information, contact Discreet at product_info@discreet.com, or visit www.discreet.com.
Synthetic Aperture AE Color Correction Plug-in
Describing Color Finesse as a telecine-style color corrector within After Effects, Synthetic Aperture now offers a color-correction tool that isn't limited to eight bits per color channel as with some other products. In fact, say officials at the San Juan Capistrano, Calif.-based company, Color Finesse isn't even limited to 10 or 16 bits per color, but delivers a 32-bit floating point representation for each color channel, yielding an astonishing 96 bits per pixel.
By using such floating-point chops, the plug-in can encode colors with great resolution, while maintaining wide image latitude. Even extreme adjustments won't cause clipping of out-of-range highlights and shadows.
Since Color Finesse is resolution independent, users can correct NTSC, PAL, HD, or film. There's also automatic color matching as well as black, white, and gray balance; smart chroma and luma limiting; six-channel secondary color correction for isolating and correcting individual color vectors; and reference images and split-screen wipes to facilitate accurate color grading and matching. The built-in waveform monitor, vectorscope, histogram, and correction-curve displays give full visibility into the color-correction process area.
For more information contact Synthetic Aperture by visiting www.synthetic-ap.com.
JEMS Delivers Removable Firewire RAID
Describing it as the only true removable FireWire RAID array, JEMS Data Unlimited recently introduced its Fire Vault RAID.
The array offers three removable drives claimed capable of delivering transfer rates beyond 60MBps with capacities from 122GB to 225GB in a compact desktop footprint. Features include hot plug and unplug capability, three separate FireWire channels, and cammed drive mechanisms to maximize reliability by lessened vibration and noise.
Although the company states the array can sustain transfer rates of up to 70MBps, that number came by striping across the native Mac FireWire bus as well as a PCI Firewire bus adapter. Priced at $11/GB, the Fire Vault RAID ships with Mac utility and striping software, but also runs under Windows.
For more information, contact Salem, N.H.-based JEMS by visiting www.jemsdata.com.
DynaPel Systems Camera Steadying Software
Wired of that shaky handheld look, but don't want to buy a new camera just for its built-in stabilization capabilities? Try an inexpensive solution with DynaPel Systems' SteadyHand DV, which removes errant camera motion including vertical, horizontal, and rotation motion caused by a not-so-steady camera technique. DynaPel even promises SteadyHand DV corrects poorly executed zooms.
How's it work? First, look at what a good, normal camera pan or zoom produces: a relatively slow, low-frequency movement of the camera or lens. But when walking or running with a camera sans a Steadicam or built-in optical stabilizer, high-frequency motion is introduced into the final images. High-frequency data also gets generated from whipping a zoom lens back and forth quickly.
SteadyHand DV's algorithms correct poorly shot video by separating camera motion from any object motion in the frames of a video, differentiating desirable movement from undesirable movement by separating low-frequency vectors from high-frequency vectors, and compensating for the undesirable motion with equal and opposite motion. Finally a rendering engine recreates the frames using the compensated motion to yield a smooth video image.
SteadyHand DV costs $49.99 and runs under Windows. Get more information from New York-based DynaPel's website at www.dynapel.com.
