NAB, in high definition.(National Association of Broadcasters conference)(Editorial)

Once again, Las Vegas was the hot spot for multimedia professionals working in broadcast and related industries. This year, along with new releases, the product news was focused heavily on workflow and upgrades and offerings positioned to help users do their jobs more efficiently.

The big subject, naturally, was HD--in particular, real HD and lossless HD conversion. Granted, those topics have been bantered about in the past. But this time, companies were talking about real offerings that are delivering as promised. In this realm, the belle of the ball was AJA, which launched new converters that support the tag line "everything in, everything out architecture for HD and SD video." To this end, the company rolled out the FS1, supporting virtually any video input or output in HD and SD, and the GEN10, an SD/HD/AES sync generator for professional video post and broadcast environments. The FS1 simultaneously supports both HD and SD--all in full 10-bit broadcast-quality video. It can up- or down-convert between SD and HD. In addition, AJA debuted its Io HD for 10-bit editing, which natively supports Apple's new ProRes 422 format. The end result is portable HD editing on the MacBook Pro or Mac Pro.

Generating the big news at the conference was Apple. At the traditional Sunday press conference, Apple users as usual created a revival-like atmosphere, applauding frequently as the company unveiled new offerings--and the group had good reason to cheer. First, Apple introduced Final Cut Server, a new server application (at an enticing price) that works seamlessly with Final Cut Studio 2 to provide media asset management and workflow automation. The company's big unveil was Final Cut Studio 2, which includes major upgrades to Final Cut Pro ...