NAB: Final Cut Server, Final Cut Studio 2, ProRes 422, IO-HD

[MacRumors]

Apple introduced a number of updates at the National Association of Broadcasters conference today:

Final Cut Server
- $999 for 10 concurrent users
- $1999 for unlimited users

Final Cut Studio 2
- Final Cut Pro 6, Motion 3, Soundtrack Pro 2

Apple ProRes 422 Format
- Next-gen Post Production format
- Uncompressed HD quality at SD file sizes
- 10-bit, 4:2:2, full raster, VBR

IO-HD
- Hardware box that provides realtime conversion into ProRes 422
- Available in July
- $3495

Event is ongoing, live coverage at Engadget

[Freg3000]

Did MacRumors coverage drop out? Is the event over yet?

Anyway, the NAB conference is great because Apple introduces stuff that is fun for me to pretend I can one day use.

It looks cool for me, and I know it must be cool for someone else to use.

[amac4me]

Awesome new features. Looks like it was well worth the wait.

[Multimedia]

Very worthwhile FCS 2 upgrade. $499 from FCS1 and $699 from any version of FCP all the way back to the beginning so no penalty for doing the FCP to FCS upgrade for $199 and everyone who missed it can now jump to FCS2 for only $699 which is really great for all who missed the $199 deal during this past year which did not include FCP 1, 2 & 3.

Only Academic 4 owners who didn't upgrade to FCS1 lost this time as they can only buy FCS2 for $699 academic and not get commercial FCS2 for $499 like those who did.

[nuckinfutz]

Nice.

FCP6 and Motion 3 are beasts! STP2 sounds nice.

Perhaps we'll find out about DVD Studio Pro 5 during the week at NAB.

[failsafe1]

Now we need pricing info on the software

OOps never mind the endgadget article says $499 upgrade from FCS2 and $699 from any FCP system.

[mkjellman]

yeah just looked like Block there from Engadget was just doing a really good job and macrumors.com either didn't have soemone there, or they were doing a kinda crappy job.

too bad..but, as always the interface for macrumorslive.com is amazing and needless to say every other apple event for the past few years has been me and my eyes glued to macrumors

thanks arn and crew for a great job almost all the time

[indiekiduk]

Its still going on:
http://www.engadget.com/2007/04/15/a...from-nab-2007/

[zap2]

why MR dropped the living feed?

NVM...still I liked not having to refresh

[longofest]

Originally Posted by Freg3000

Did MacRumors coverage drop out? Is the event over yet?

Anyway, the NAB conference is great because Apple introduces stuff that is fun for me to pretend I can one day use.

It looks cool for me, and I know it must be cool for someone else to use.

Our feed was just too flakey. we had to rely too much on summary statements from our contact rather than transcribing the feed itself like we normally do, so we just pulled the plug. Kudos to Engadget for doing a great job. They beat us out (this time).

[iSee]

Can someone in industry explain the significance of the IO-HD and ProRes 422 format?

Are these revolutionary things or just Apple's entry into an existing market?

[whenpaulsparks]

where is DVD studio pro?!?!

perhaps waiting on blu-ray or HD DVD drives in Macs?

[Cult Follower]

Finally an Apple software update! And that hardware thing looks cool.

[hoop]

Apple ProRes 422 Format
- Next-gen Post Production format
- Uncompressed HD quality at SD file sizes
- 10-bit, 4:2:2, full raster, VBR

How on earth is this possible?!

[thegoldenmackid]

no final cut extreme, no monitors, no 17 mbp...this was clearly a professionals only event.

[BigPrince]

Still good job to all parties.

[jonharris200]

Credit to MR for the link to Engadget. Their coverage is, again, impressive. The only thing I don't like is that you have to refresh their page and new updates appear at the bottom, not the top. MR's method combined with Engadget's content would be ideal!

[SWC]

no new dvd studio features?

[iamcrazyed]

G2g, me and my credit card have a date with FCS2!

[EricNau]

Originally Posted by thegoldenmackid

no final cut extreme, no monitors, no 17 mbp...this was clearly a professionals only event.

Which is exactly what the NAB is.

[MrTed]

Where is logic pro 8 ?

[inkswamp]

Interesting that the Apple store is still down.

Edit: Ah, nevermind. I thought the keynote was over.

[whenpaulsparks]

Originally Posted by iSee

Can someone in industry explain the significance of the IO-HD and ProRes 422 format?

Are these revolutionary things or just Apple's entry into an existing market?

Uncompressed HD is near impossible with ordinary macs because of HD transfer rates... it's way too high. you need an eSATA or Fibre Channel RAID (i.e. XServe RAID) to be able to do much with it. this compresses the video to i think 1/8th of the original size or so, so that it's more manageable. during the event they said with the IO-HD (which encodes to ProRes 422) you can do 4K video editing on a macbook pro, which is unreal.

and the IO-HD supports format conversion as well, so you can ingest at 1080i60, and output at 720p without blinking an eye. if you have an HDV camera, this would be great, because you can ingest at ProRes 422, then do your editing, because HDV is a very lossy format and is horrible for many image manipulations.

[sdhollman]

Can't wait to get my hands on Motion 3, I have been looking for a reason to leave AE in the dust, I hope this is the killer update.

[Cameront9]

Originally Posted by thegoldenmackid

no final cut extreme, no monitors, no 17 mbp...this was clearly a professionals only event.

Well it's not over yet, but...uh...Could have told you so.

It's the National Association of BROADCASTERS convention. It's for Pros only...Duh...

Anyone expecting any sort of consumer announcment was just foolish.