SYPHAnews - 31st May 2002

Welcome to SYPHAnews - a newsletter designed to keep you up-to-date with nonlinear audio and video, and digital video camera news, as well as developments at http://SYPHAonline.com (incorporating http://NLEguide.com and http://DAWguide.com).

We will deliver this service to you free of charge every month - unless there is some major news or event which we think you should know about sooner.

New at SYPHAonline.com

STOP PRESS!! Welcome to our new subscribers who signed up at the AES Convention in Munich and The Production Show in London. For those interested in numbers, we currently have over 10,700 subscribers to this newsletter and there were over 7,500 visitors to SYPHAonline.com in May 2002. Thank you for your support in our first year online and please keep the feedback coming.

As requested, an archive of these newsletters dating back to April 2001 is now available at http://SYPHAonline.com/SYPHAnews.html.

NLE news

Avid Announces Pan-European Support for Experience Avid|naked Tour
Avid Technology Europe has announced that Sony, Panasonic, Snell & Wilcox, Anystream, Compaq, Open TV, Sonic Solutions, Telestream, Boris FX and Tektronix will be participating in the Experience Avid|naked Tour taking place across Europe throughout 2002. This pan-European initiative is replacing Avid's presence at IBC this year. Each event will be made up of sessions specifically developed to focus on the broadcast, post production and new media markets and will include panel discussions on industry topics incorporating views from customers around Europe, technical seminars covering topics such as standards for interchange and streaming, and Avid In Practice focusing on real life installations and how they operate. To register visit http://www.avid.com/experience_naked.

Quantel Implements AAF-Based Archive for generationQ
Quantel has implemented a full AAF-based archive for its generationQ range of post production products comprising iQ, eQ, gQ, QEffects, and QPaintbox. The AAF archive facility enables all project information, both essence and metadata, to be archived to a data infrastructure. The information is saved transparently in a standard format and so can be accessed by any AAF-compliant system. All of the Quantel generationQ post products share the same AAF-based data archive format, allowing every aspect of a project to be saved and shared - both the 'horizontal' (timeline) and the 'vertical' (compositing) content and relationships of frames/clips, as well as any other metadata about those clips - ownership, dates etc. See http://www.quantel.com.

MacroSystem Releases Casablanca Avio DV Pro
MacroSystem US has released Casablanca Avio DV Pro. This latest entry in a line of standalone video editing systems has twice the video storage capacity of previous models, as well as built-in IEEE 1394 FireWire connectivity and a package of expanded video capabilities. Features include MPEG-2 and direct DV compression, up to 9 hours of SVHS quality storage, 10 separate projects, 6 stereo audio tracks, scrub audio with waveform display, realtime 2D transitions and an array of effects, advanced titling and full-screen preview display with on-screen, realtime controls. Casablanca Avio DV Pro is priced at US$1995 and is available throughout the US, Canada, Mexico and Central and South America. See http://www.casablanca.tv.

MacroSystem Upgrades Casablanca Kron and Releases Picture-in-Picture Studio For Casablanca Avio and Kron Systems
MacroSystem US has upgraded the Casablanca Kron video editor to include a built-in DVD burner and double the storage capacity with an 80GB hard drive and has lowered the price to US$3995. MacroSystem US has also released Picture-in-Picture Studio for the Casablanca Avio and Kron standalone video editing systems. This software allows video scenes to be shown within another scene as one or more small windows. The user controls the size, shape, colour, shadow and transparency of the windows, as well as the movement of the windows into and out of the scene, and the fade-in, fade-out and duration of the picture-in-picture window. Picture-in-Picture Studio is priced at US$199. See http://www.casablanca.tv.

Digital Voodoo Introduces New Uncompressed 10-bit Cards for Macintosh
Digital Voodoo has added to its range of uncompressed 10-bit cards for Macintosh platforms. These new cards support PAL or NTSC standards and are compatible with Mac-based editing and compositing applications. Iridium AD offers two SD-SDI outputs with genlock, 6 channels of AES/EBU digital audio, as well as analogue composite, component and S-Video outputs, and is priced at US$2495. Zenith offers one SD-SDI input and two SD-SDI outputs, genlock, 8 channels of AES/EBU digital audio via the Junction audio breakout box, as well as analogue composite, component and S-Video input and outputs, and is priced at US$5695. Dual Zenith offers two SD-SDI inputs but otherwise has the same features as Zenith, and is priced at US$5995. Availability of all cards is planned for Q2 2002. See http://www.digitalvoodoo.net.

Bluefish 444 Introduces New Uncompressed 10-bit Card for Windows
Bluefish 444 has introduced Deepblue LT to its range of cards for Windows platforms. Deepblue LT is aimed at broadcast designers and visual effects artists who want to output uncompressed 10-bit SD-SDI video. It features dual SD-SDI SMPTE 259M outputs which are selectable between video and video, video and key 4:2:2:4 or 4:4:4:4 (dual link) via two BNC connectors for live key environments. As with the other Bluefish 444 cards, it supports PAL and NTSC, the QuickTime native file format, and is compatible with Windows-based editing and compositing applications such as Adobe Premiere and After Effects. Deepblue LT is due to ship in Q2 2002 with a price of US$1495. See http://www.bluefish444.com.

Camera news

Datavision Introduces Portable DV Drive for DV Shoot and Capture in the Field
Datavision has introduced the Datavision DV Drive, a portable digital video device that allows video from a DV camcorder to be captured to its hard drive via IEEE 1394 FireWire without having to connect to a computer. It features a record/stop button, a 20GB high performance hard drive for up to 100 minutes of storage, and a built-in rechargeable battery enclosed in a case about the size of a PDA. It also incorporates a 6-4 pin FireWire cable, 6-6 pin FireWire cable, power supply and belt clip. When connected to a computer, it is immediately detected as a drive volume and can be used as a portable external storage device or for data back-up. The Datavision DV Drive will be available mid June with an estimated street price of GBP£499 including VAT. See http://www.datavision.co.uk.

Photon Vision Systems Integrates QuadHDTV into Camera Development Platform
Photon Vision Systems has integrated its 8.3 million pixel QuadHDTV colour image sensor into a high performance camera development platform for applications such as digital cinematography and studio broadcasting. It operates at 30 full frames per second progressive or 60 fields per second interlaced, and supports multiple standards including SMTPE-292, Camera-Link, DVI, video standards such as HDTV and film formats. The system integrates the PVS Active Column Sensor technology for low noise video, PVS-Bus technology for high-speed video data rates, high performance colour image processing algorithms, and other proprietary technologies. See http://www.photon-vision.com.

DAW news

WaveFrame Inc Ceases Operations and Merging Technologies Offers Rescue Package for WaveFrame FrameWorks Owners
WaveFrame Inc has apparently ceased operations. Creditors and other interested parties are referred to Max Cline, Attorney at Law, 1300 Clay Street Suite 600, Oakland, CA 94612, USA. Email max@maxcline.com, telephone +1 510-464-8068, fax 510-464-8069. Merging Technologies has offered a rescue package for WaveFrame FrameWorks owners in the form of a software upgrade to the Merging Technologies Pyramix system. Merging Technologies designed and manufactured the hardware platform for the Waveframe/7 and FrameWorks systems under an OEM arrangement, and the FrameWorks software was also a slimmed down and rebadged version of the Pyramix system. See http://www.merging.com/frameworks.

SADiE Announces New Developments for its SACD Mastering Editor
SADiE has announced a number of new developments for its SACD Mastering Editor. Among the new developments is input level metering control to Annex D&E standard. This offers the mastering engineer full multiband metering - a major benefit for monitoring of the extended frequency range of the format with the level of accuracy necessary for full mastering confidence. The level meters can be selected to show either a block or a waveform display. See http://www.sadie.com.

Merging Technologies Launches Major New Developments for Pyramix
Merging Technologies has launched an array of new developments for its Pyramix digital audio workstation. These include Virtual Transport which allows Pyramix to synchronise and control third party applications such as MIDI sequencer programs, independent video files and other third party software running on the same PC, over networks and to external timecode based machines using TCP/IP, RS232 or RS422. An integrated IEEE 1394 FireWire video solution eliminates the need for third party video capture cards by using AD-DA DV converters to digitise and playback high quality composite, S-Video or component signals in the system and with playout to an external video monitor or projector. The Film Sync Converter allows Pyramix the option to slow video files down to true 24fps from a video source that has been telecined up and digitised PAL at 25fps, or in NTSC at 29.97fps, and independently of the audio speed and frame rate. A new editing model has a completely new advanced crossfade editor, multi-point source/master facilities, PQ coding and enhanced track management, including the ability to group and collapse tracks for easier editing of multitrack recordings. See http://www.merging.com.

Merging Technologies Releases the 48 Track Pyramix Portable
Merging Technologies has released a 48-track portable laptop version of its Pyramix digital audio workstation for on-location live multitrack recording. Weighing only 4.8kg, the Pyramix Portable utilises a modified Magma single or dual slot PCI expansion unit to house the Mykerinos DSP audio and I/O cards. The choice of I/O card includes AES/EBU, TDIF, SDIF, ADAT, MADI, or Dual, and an analogue plus AES/EBU card with in-built mic/line levels and phantom power. There is also the option of an external FireWire drive. The Laptop models recommended for the system include the DELL Inspiron and IBM Think Pad. See http://www.merging.com.

Steinberg Announces Version 1.6 of Nuendo
Steinberg Media Technologies has announced Nuendo 1.6 for Mac and Windows platforms. New features include VST System Link, support for the AES31 interchange standard and 24-bit/192kHz audio. VST System Link is a system for networking computers using Steinberg Virtual Studio Technology (VST) software and Audio Stream Input Output (ASIO) hardware. It enables the transfer of synchronisation, transport, and audio data between two or more workstations over standard digital audio cabling systems such as ADAT, TDIF, AES/EBU, S/PDIF etc. Synchronisation is completely sample accurate, even across multiple workstation configurations. VST System Link allows you to use the full CPU and disk power of several computers simultaneously regardless of platform. See http://www.steinberg.net.

Steinberg Announces Surround Sound Encoding for Nuendo
Steinberg Media Technologies has announced the availability of the Dolby Digital Encoder software plug-in for Nuendo. This allows Nuendo projects to be encoded into Dolby Digital, also known as AC-3, and supports encoded bitrates from 56 to 640kb/s and channel configurations from mono to 5.1 channel surround sound. The Nuendo Dolby Digital Encoder has an RRP of Euro 853. Steinberg has also announced that the DTS Encoder software plug-in for Nuendo will be available in Q3 2002. DTS is an alternative format for surround sound developed by Digital Theater Systems. The encoding will be integrated as DTS file format in the Nuendo export dialogue. The necessary routines will be automated so that the user merely needs to define which 6 files should be DTS encoded - ready for use in the authoring stage. The DTS encoded audio can be saved as a WAV file to directly burn a 5.1 mix to CD. See http://www.steinberg.net.

CreamWare Announces Two Recording Packages to Celebrate its 10th Anniversary
CreamWare has announced two recording packages to celebrate its 10th anniversary. Bundle 1, the Luna II EXtreme I/O with 36 I/Os, of which 18 analogue I/Os can operate simultaneously at 24-bits/96kHz, comprises the Luna II EX recording card plus ADAT/Z-Link expansion, and the A16 Ultra 16-channel AD/DA converter. Bundle 2, the Luna II Analog Breakout with 12 I/Os, of which 10 analogue I/Os can operate simultaneously at 24-bits/96kHz, comprises the Luna II DSP-based recording card, and the Luna 2496 I/O breakout box. Both bundles are complete solutions for 24-bit/96kHz recording on Windows or Mac platforms, and include an extensive software package of DSP-supported effects and mixers and the OptiMaster intelligent mastering processor plug-in. These anniversary bundles are available until 31 August 2002, and cost Euro 1598 for Luna II Extreme I/O and Euro 798 for Luna II Analog Breakout. See http://www.creamware.de.

Euphonix Ships Updated TransferStation bundled with Steinberg Nuendo
Euphonix has begun shipping an updated version of the TransferStation, a hardware and software option for its R-1 multitrack digital recorder. TransferStation is now also bundled with Steinberg Nuendo for audio editing and processing. The TransferStation translates R-1 formatted files to the industry standard AES31 file format, retaining all edits, crossfades and time-stamped information within a multitrack session, and offers enhanced compatibility with current and future DAWs. See http://www.euphonix.com.

Sonic Solutions Launches Sonic Studio, LLC
Sonic Solutions has announced the formation of Sonic Studio, LLC, to accelerate development, marketing and sales of its SonicStudio line of professional audio workstations. The new company, formed in partnership with industry veterans Jeff Wilson and Eric Jorde, plans to expand development of the SonicStudio HD digital audio workstation line and its underlying technologies. Sonic Solutions will support the new venture in a number of ways including providing engineering, marketing, logistical and manufacturing support. Sonic Studio, LLC will be headquartered in Plymouth, Minnesota, with additional offices in Novato, California. See http://www.sonicstudio.com.

AMS Neve Announces Third Party DSP Processes for AudioFile
AMS Neve has announced its partnerships with a number of third party plug-in application vendors. The first to be completed are with mSoft and Synchro Arts. AMS Neve Serversound integrates the sound effects library and search engine developed by mSoft into the AMS Neve StarNet environment, and allows sounds matching the search criteria to be instantly incorporated into the current project. Any sound effects then used become tied to the project within the StarNet metadata. The Synchro Arts VocALign plug-in is launched directly from the editor interface and is designed to quickly synchronise 'good' post sync dialogue to the 'bad' original. See http://www.ams-neve.com.

Digigram Releases VX442 Linear Multichannel Sound Card
Digigram has released the VX442, a linear multichannel sound card with analogue and AES/EBU inputs and outputs as an addition to its VX series. The VX442 has 4/4 balanced line inputs/outputs, 96kHz 24-bit converters, low latency architecture, and an additional stereo AES/EBU input/output. It supports Windows 98, ME, 2000, and XP platforms with DirectSound, WAVE, ASIO2, GSIF, EASI drivers, and MacOS 9 and X platforms with SoundManager, ASIO2, and CoreAudio. A comprehensive and intelligent control panel provides easy routing and digital mixing of inputs and outputs. See http://www.digigram.com.

Rocket Network Announces RocketDelivery, DigiDelivery with Digidesign and RocketPower with SADiE
Rocket Network has announced the introduction of RocketDelivery which allows users to send any type of file, or folder of files, via its banking-level secure network. RocketDelivery is tightly integrated with RocketControl Version 2.6 so existing users can take advantage of the delivery functionality without deploying new systems. Files are automatically encrypted and compressed with a proprietary bit-accurate lossless codec. RocketDelivery can be accessed independently of an audio application and is capable of handling any type or size of file - from a DAW file to Word documents or graphics. For a free download see http://www.rocketnetwork.com. Following this release, Digidesign and Rocket Network have also announced DigiDelivery, that allows users to securely send Pro Tools sessions, video, graphics, text, etc, to anyone with an email address. DigiStudio Control 2.6 with the new DigiDelivery functionality is available to both current and new DigiStudio users as a free download from http://www.digipronet.com. SADiE has also announced that it will launch a RocketPower application for its ARTEMiS, 24:96 and RADiA workstations. Data sent by the SADiE RocketPower application will also be interchangeable with RocketPower products from Emagic (Logic Audio Platinum) and TASCAM (MX-2424, MM series of digital dubbers, and other products that support the TASCAM native file format). The application will be available Q2 2002 from http://www.sadie.com.

Contact us

We welcome your feedback. Please forward your comments to sypha@syphaonline.com

To SUBSCRIBE to this free service, please complete the registration form.

To UNSUBSCRIBE, please send an email to unsubscribeSYPHAnews@SYPHAonline.com. If there are any problems, please send a list of your email addresses and aliases to sypha@syphaonline.com.

To ADVERTISE or have your relevant news stories considered, please contact Yasmin Hashmi at sypha@syphaonline.com or telephone +44 (0)20 8761 1042.

SYPHAnews is sponsored by:

Avid Technology, Inc.
delivers the solutions that "Make, Manage and Move Media!"

IBC 2002
The World's Electronic Media Event
13 - 17 September 2002
RAI Amsterdam