Multimedia
Blogs
Forum
Affordable HD
Whitepapers
Newsletters
Events
Advertisers
DCP Directory
MillimeterEditor's Notes
May 1, 2007 12:00 PM, By Cynthia Wisehart
One of my favorite things I heard at NAB was the comment that Apple had, with the announcement of ProRes 422, legitimized compression. The implication wasn't that Apple had discovered or invented compression — or even improved it, nailed it, or transformed it — but, in that hung-the-moon kind of way, it had sexed it up and sold it to the audience.
Of course, compression has been doing the Lord's work in video since the beginning of video time. There should really be a Compression Hall of Fame for all the smart engineers who have done the all-important, often thankless work. Certainly, compression has come into its own as the currency for many postproduction transactions (even as uncompressed hits 4K and beyond).
But Apple does have a way of making everything sizzle. It also helped bring attention and luster to I/O; with frequent partner AJA and others, it set expectations for desktop I/O in recent years. This was true again at NAB with AJA's Io HD, a portable survival kit of ProRes acceleration hardware — and I/O that looks expedition-ready, like you might think about heading to Everest with your laptop. At least to base camp.
But while you could argue that Apple lit a fire under desktop I/O — or maybe just rode a wave — others have also stepped up to support the Tower of Babel. The most recent offering comes from an interesting and somewhat unexpected source.
At NAB, while Io HD made friends on the show floor, MOTU beckoned a handful of people into a whisper suite to see that company's take on the whole device-intensive, format-intensive, compressed post infrastructure.
A respected manufacturer of audio hardware (and software), Cambridge, Mass.-based MOTU has a long legacy of experience in moving streams of data. Now the company has branched out with the V3HD, the first “all-in-one FireWire HD/SD video interface for Mac and PC.” This means capture, playback, and conversion for a dizzying array of audio and video devices, content, and formats. To see the spec, go to v3hd.com.
The core of the V3HD hub is a compression all-star — DVCPro HD. I saw the pictures at NAB, and they looked beautiful across a range of devices from traditional color reference monitor to plasmas.
As expected, the 2RU device is very strong on audio I/O, but it also supports Final Cut Pro 5 and 6 (and higher) and Premiere Pro 6 (and higher) on the PC for most HD and SD formats. (It can also work as a standalone converter without a computer).
The V3HD is scheduled to ship Q3; price TBD, although you can expect it to be competitive.
