InPhase Technologies is showing a commercial holographic storage device that is scheduled to come to market later this year. The InPhase Tapestry has a capacity of 300 GB, (the equivalent of 35 hours of broadcast-quality video) on a single disk. This is the first generation of holographic storage to come to market, and the company plans to follow it up with a family of holographic storage disks ranging from 800 GB to 1.6 TB. The company recently demonstrated that it can reach a storage density of 515 gigabits of data per square inch, shattering previous records.Based on this new technology, InPhase will also announce a 3 TB holographic storage autoloader, with capacity up to 6 TB, a holographic video recorder (HVR) as well as a holographic ROM (H-ROM) handheld video playback device.Snell & Wilcox is introducing Helios, a software-based conversion platform that optimizes content and transcodes between video formats, global standards, and new media display devices, including broadcast television, iPods, and mobile phones.Helios harnesses the company’s Ph.C motion estimation along with its FormatFusion technologies to analyze the component parts that make up the video picture, ensuring that users of mobile devices get an equally satisfying viewing experience to that produced on conventional television displays, resulting in artifact-free pictures on any viewing platform.Bluefish 444 is showing its new Symmetry v3.0—a multi-resolution, multi-format DI I/O card for 4:4:4 DPX 10-bit RGB I/O. The company has announced support for Adobe and Avid.BOXX Technologies will debut its BOXX Apexx 8 workstation—a system that was specifically designed for visual effects. With up to 128 GB of memory, and 16 processing cores, it is capable of handling 2K and 4K files.Harris, which acquired Leitch last year, is showing the Leitch VelocityX software-only, nonlinear editor. It offers the same interface as Leitch’s hardware-based editing systems VelocityQ and VelocityHD. VelocityX is being positioned as a cost-effective, standalone, software editing system.Virtual Katy is exhibiting the new VK2 release at the Avid Partner Pavilion. It offers Pro Tools users a comprehensive “change management” environment. Its Preview mode gives audio post editors a visual overview of picture edit changes without committing to specific changes.Boris FX is demonstrating its new Boris Blue version 1.0 and Boris Red version 4.0. Red is a an application that integrates with more than 20 NLEs, including Apple Final Cut Pro, Adobe Premiere Pro and Avid systems, giving editors 2D and 3D compositing tools, software DVEs, 3D extrusion and animation, native vector titling, motion tracking, vector paint, rotoscoping, and Adobe Illustrator file animation, all in a single plug-in. Boris Blue is a new standalone 3D compositing and motion graphics system based on the Boris Red plug-in.Matrox Graphics is introducing Extio F1400, an external graphics unit with remote multi-display graphics capabilities. With this system the user interface of the computer—the keyboard, mouse, monitors, audio peripherals, and graphics hardware—can be separated from the host PC by distances of up to 250 meters (820 feet) of fiber-optic cable. It offers Matrox’s multi-display technology across a four-monitor workstation and has passive (fanless) cooling for silent operation.GenArts, developer of VFX plug-ins, is showing its Sapphire Plug-ins version 2 for Avid editing systems, with 46 new effects and new features.Blackmagic Design is showing off the 2K capabilities of its Multibridge Extreme, unlocked with a free driver update. The system gives real-time uncompressed 2K, 10-bit RGB playout for Apple Final Cut Pro on Mac OS X or Adobe Premiere Pro 2.0 on Windows XP. This new driver also features 2K real-time preview for compositing and paint applications.
Written by Scott Lehane
