NAB 2008 ended with a whimper on Thursday with little to say about the revolution in the industry AWAY from traditional broadcasting. Not very surprising. My perspective is obviously skewed, not being a "traditional broadcaster" myself, but here's what I found interesting:

Sony PMW-EX3 - USD$13,000

This is one of the big announcements this year, the Sony PMW-EX3. With essentially the same 3 CMOS censors, the big update here is interchangeable lenses. There are some other tweaks and changes, but, honestly, if you don't have another lens to use, then this is too much camera, especially at $5,000 more than the PMW-EX1. The real story here is that the EX3 is a complete package for full-on cinematic productions, with the $30K player/recorder, solid-state memory, lenses bringing the entire package over $50,000 - which is really quite reasonable for large-scale productions. For those of us solo shooters/editors, the PMW-EX1 is still the high-end at $8,000.
* Phillip Bloom's Review
* DVUser Review

Canon XL H1S and XL H1A

Nothing surprising or radically new, but almost certainly solid performers: the Canon XL H1S HD camcorder is scheduled to be available in early June for an estimated retail price of $8,999, and the XL H1A, which will have an estimated retail price of $5,999, is scheduled to be available in mid-July.

JVC GY-HD200UB

JVC's got new stuff in this class at NAB JVC GY-HD200UB - $6,000 (camera body only) - nothing radically new (solid state memory, 1080i) but a hell of a lens on this one (please add $10,000 to the price):

Panasonic AG-HPX170

Panasonic's AG-HPX170 looks like a minor update at first glance, going totally tapeless, but with new CCDs and even new DSP, who knows? Could be a big change, probably not revolutionary. And then there's the HMC150, which will be available this fall at a suggested list price under $4,500.

Sony Vegas and Adobe Premiere 64-bit

Long anticipated and leaked announcement of Vegas 64-bit for Vista only, to be released in September 2008. I'll believe it when I see they're shipping! Adobe announced Premiere was going 64-bit too, but only on the Windows platform. Huh?

Avid's Still Alive and Kicking

The venerable Avid announced support for both Sony XDCAM HD and Panasonic P2 HD with new versions of Media Composer, NewsCutter and Symphony.

Matrox RT.X2 $1,095

If you like hardware assisted renders for mostly real-time editing in Premiere, Matrox's RT.X2 is always a good solution. Not a fan myself, but folks who like these cards swear by them!

NAB Storage 2008

Every company that makes hard drives, RAIDS, network storage and so on announced new solutions for broadcasters. Yawn. Sorry, I know it's important, like, really, really important, but for consumers, not so much.

Red Scarlet - no news?!

Looks like Red isn't going to tell us much other than "Early 2009" about Scarlet at NAB. Red isn't really a traditional company, so this isn't surprising. And comparing the EX3 ~2K 3x 1/2-inch CMOS at $13,000 to Scarlet's 3K single 2/3" Bayer-filtered "Mysterium" at $3,??? is literally impossibly wild speculation. Too many variable to compare, but it'll really all come down to price and positioning in terms of marketing.

Tim Robbin's Keynote

Tim Robbins' keynote at NAB was described as "controversial" and "explosive." I listened to it. Meh. It's Tim Robbins. Wot didja expect? It's a good rant (I really liked the "Satan's Trident" part), but it'll only be a shock for traditional broadcasters or for anyone who believes right-wing propaganda about "The Liberal Media" or the evils of the "MSM." {mxc}