We asked John Gresch, ARRI Vice President of Lighting Products, to tell us more about the products ARRI had to show at NAB 2012 and he gave us some details about the ARRI M40. It offers more light than what you’d get from a traditional power lamp and features the ARRIMAX reflector.

We talked with Jose Larios, Sales and Marketing for Libec of America, to learn more about their SWIFT JIB50. The product is equipped with a telescopic arm that can be easily adjusted by simply turning the arm’s lock levers. In addition, the jib can be retracted at both ends.

Niki Mustain from Schneider Optics took the time to tell us about the Tilt/Shift Lenses they were showing off at NAB.  The high-resolution optics are combined with a precise zero-play mechanism in a lens housing ensuring long-term stability required for professional photography.

I love stacking cucolorii (plural of “cucoloris”) and I thought it was time to write an article about how this technique works and why I like it so much. I was a bit stretched for ideas that would illustrate this concept… and then an eclipse happened. Why that made a difference is a very interesting story…

PESA, a leading U.S.-based custom design and build manufacturing company for professional audio and video signal distribution, recently expanded its PESA PRO line of professional AV routers with the new PRO-3GSDI-1616 Routing Switcher. It supports all common SMPTE and ITU standard serial digital video signals, as well as embedded audio and other ancillary data required for HD-SDI and DVB/ASI sources. The new router will be featured at InfoComm 2012 (Booth N1327), which runs June 13-15 in Las Vegas, Nev.

FOR-A Company Limited, a leading manufacturer of video and audio systems for the broadcast and professional video industries, will debut the FT-ONE full 4K high resolution variable frame rate camera—the world’s first full 4K super slow motion camera—Booth S320 at Cine Gear Expo, which runs from June 1-2 at The Studios @ Paramount in Hollywood.  Now in its 16th year, Cine Gear Expo is the premier film, video, and digital media expo for the entertainment industry. 

Digital Juice® announced today that it is releasing ready2go(TM) Projects & Templates for Adobe After Effects® Collection 16. ready2go projects are animated template graphics that provide After Effects users with a variety of professional finished looks, and feature expertly designed “drop zones” for text and video. This new collection in the ready2go library is available for purchase as either an Instant Download or a boxed DVD product. The designs in this collection push the limits of professional style and suit a wide range of productions from wedding videos, business presentations and network show promos to broadcast television commercial spots, sports highlights reels and training material.

On this week’s MacBreak Studio, I show Steve Martin from Ripple Training a few things I’ve discovered in my exploration of the compositing features in Final Cut Pro X.

We have more from Litepanels as Toby Sali showed us their newest on-camera lights from the floor of NAB 2012. He gives us some details about the Luma, which is a daylight only light, and the new Chroma which is a bi-color light.

In December 2011, the 12th quadrennial Arab Games took place in Doha, Qatar at Khalifa International Stadium. As part of the planning process for the Doha games, the world-renowned event production agency, David Atkins Enterprises (DAE), was commissioned to conceive and produce the opening and closing ceremonies. Following this commission, DAE contracted Australian digital design and video production specialists, Digital Pulse, to produce the animated visuals for the opening ceremony including the athletes’ parade and cultural segments. Far from a conventional production canvas, the animated visuals that the Digital Pulse team were to produce for the event would have to play seamlessly across the stadium’s two different playback systems: a contiguous LED system installed behind all stadium seats and an 86-projector projection system that covered a world record 12,600 cubic metres of on-field projection space.

At the upcoming InfoComm Convention, scheduled for June 9-15, at the Las Vegas Convention Center, Grass Valley™ will exhibit its latest high-definition (HD) video and audio editing, as well as digital video recording and management solutions. The products will be on display in the Starin Marketing booth (#C6023) and are targeted at helping audiovisual (A/V) producers cost-effectively implement streamlined workflows for the creation and presentation of all types of sophisticated multimedia projects and multi-camera live events.

Introducing 3DBOXX 4050 XTREME, the rock-solid, affordably priced, high performance solution for SolidWorks, Autodesk® 3ds Max®, Revit®, CATIA and more. Order before May 31, 2012 for special pricing on 3DBOXX 4050 XTREME.

In response to the enormous interest generated by the launch of its new, on-location review and color management tool, Cortex::Capture, MTI Film is extending a product giveaway that it began at NAB 2012. Each week from now until the product launch, the company will hold a drawing with the winner receiving a FREE Cortex::Capture license.  Names entered in the drawing will roll over to the new drawing from week to week.  Everyone who enters will be included in the Grand Prize drawing on July 5th for a FREE seat of Cortex::Convey.

FUJIFILM North America Corporation, Optical Devices Division will showcase several products designed for the film and video production community at the Cine Gear Expo, which takes place in Los Angeles at The Studios at Paramount in Hollywood from June 1-3. The company will display its Premier Series of PL Mount zoom lenses, including the new 19-90 Cabrio compact zoom, a variety of HD broadcast lenses, accessories for studio and field production, as well as its wireless control system for remote lens control.

As we mentioned what now seems like ages ago, we spent a year and a half creating an extensive, multi-course video training series based on our popular beginner’s book After Effects Apprentice. The introduction plus one or more additional videos from each course are available for free preview; we re-posted here on PVC the videos that contain tips and instruction you might find useful. Well, the series is done, and we’re off writing the next edition of the book. But before we go, we had one last video to share with you, which may be of interest to any After Effects user who still has to create both 16:9 and 4:3 versions of their compositions.

Shaun Dail from Orad took the time to tell us about what they had to show and talk about at NAB 2012. He tells us about TD Control, a sports specific MAM system as well as their virtual studio that was on display at the show

Jeff Okonczak from ATTO Technologies took some time to tell us about what they were showing off at NAB 2012. He lets us take a look at the ExpressSAS 6Gb/s Host Bus Adapters (HBAs) which deliver the fastest available connection to SAS or SATA tape or disk storage.

We grabbed Jerry Zorek, Manager of Business Development at B&H, to learn about what B&H was showing off at their studio booth.  He shows us a Resolve system with the full panels for DaVinci, Autodesk’s Smoke 2013, a Matthews motorized slider and the new Sony camera 300 along with a Marshall 3D monitor. 

DVEO, the broadcast division of Computer Modules, Inc. (CMI), today announced the U.S. launch of the IPGuard™ failover and redundancy switch from Enensys Technologies SA.  DVEO is the U.S. reseller of Enensys products.

Testronic Labs - the recognized global leader in quality assurance services for film and television, games, websites, hardware and software - has announced that its File-Based QC Lab has implemented a Veristream testing tool designed by Deluxe Digital Studios, a subsidiary of Deluxe Entertainment Services Group Inc.

I had great fun last week presenting the Final Cut Pro X multicam editing webinar for Moviola Filmmaking Webinars. It was a lightning fast 90 minutes and we covered a lot of ground but we didn’t get through everything I wanted to cover. The On-Demand version can be purchased and I recorded an extra screencast about one topic that I didn’t get to cover in the webinar. Check it out after the jump.

When Adam Wilt and I shot “Fire and Ice” together on a prototype FS700 we had no idea that it would be shown at NAB… and that it would be hit. We wanted to do more, so we pitched Sony a commercial concept for a local company that involved high speed “veggie baseball.” Guess what: they sent us an FS700 again. Edible baseball never looked so good.

Schneider Optics introduces the Schneider Kreuznach Cine-Xenar III prime lenses. Designed for PL-mount 35mm single sensor and film cameras, the fine optics feature fast T/stops, superb image quality and robust construction. The lens range includes an18mm/T 2.2 in addition to a 25mm/T 2.2, 35mm/T 2.1, 50mm/T 2.0, 75mm/T 2.0 and 95mm/T 2.0.

Here’s a short and sweet video with a tip on the best way to get good production dialogue audio from your talent. Watch below.

Editing & Effects All-In-One
Autodesk has always been known for the strength of their effects and image processing tools. The tools in Smoke have been used in everything from major Hollywood blockbusters, to national commercials for major corporations, to finishing shows airing on premium cable and broadcast networks.  Personally, knowing that I am using these same tools for my local broadcast promos… gets me where my geek lives.  Smoke has some very powerful tools.  Who wouldn’t want to use those same tools on their own projects?

Post NAB 2012 Adobe has released the CS6 suite, Avid is pushing Symphony, and you may think that the editing revolution is over… but you would be wrong. Autodesk announced Smoke 2013 for the Mac platform for $3495.  There has been quite a buzz about Smoke since NAB. 

As we mentioned awhile back, we’ve been busy the past year and a half creating an extensive, multi-course video training series based on our popular beginner’s book After Effects Apprentice. Buried in the shuffle of the release of After Effects CS6 is that we concluded this series with a 3+ hour course dedicated to that book’s Final Project. Several movies from this course are available for free preview from lynda.com; we’d like to share those with you here - including this movie that demonstrates using parenting to group together a set of 3D layers.

Full Compass Systems, one of the nation’s leading retailers of pro audio, pro video, AV, lighting and musical instruments, will host a day-long workshop for aspiring musicians on Saturday, June 23rd 2012.  “Making It in the Music Biz” is a special gathering of music professionals who will share insights and advice on the practical and business aspects of performing music.  The event, based on the popular Launchpad music program, is free to all participants.

Mark Spencer talks about rigging and animating in Motion 5. He shows Steve Martin of Ripple Training how to work with multiple parameters within Motion and have the rigged parameters change at the same time to create fluid, animated objects.