NAB 2008 Sony Press Conference (Bally's)
Miss Universe 2008 presented Sony's PMW-EX3 HD camcorder ($13000 including lens). Recent Sony HD broadcast firsts were, of course, the Miss Universe Pagent, and the 2007 Indy 500. They also highlighted the burgeoning houses of worship market.
The new BVM L420 42" LCD is an impressive tool for broadcast monitoring... the largest LCD in its class.
Panasonic Press Conference (Planet Hollywood Hotel)
The presentation opened with a groan, playing the "bringing us together with Panasonic" corporate video that was a re-edit of the pretentious CES pitch. John Beasley, President Broadcast Systems readings from Panasonic teleprompters included the now familiar "eco pledge". I.E. they'll do wonderful things, as long as it doesn't affect their ROI.
Panasonic introduced a new AVC field recorder, and the Varicam 2700 for sports, documentary and other lightweight requirements.
BlackMagic Design Press Conference (South Hall)
Blackmagic's new offerings for NAB include the Broadcast Vision Hub ($14,995) for SDI and control routing. Their Decklink HD Extreme ($995) is now 2K capable, with a lookup table built in. The spiffy little "Video Recorder" ($119) plugs into USB port, providing video capture with scalin
g/cropping feature built in. They also have five new 3Gb/s mini converters that will auto switch between SD and HD signals. ($495).
