digital video

universal binary woes

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as apple transitions from freescale and IBM powerPC processors to intel core duo processors, mac OS X developers must deliver universal binary versions of their applications, which allow native processor performance on both the powerPC and intel platforms. it all seems fine, except once you consider that if you have legacy powerPC version of an application, it becomes completely obsolete once the developer moved to the hybrid universal version.

apple computer has announced a crossgrade program for their pro apps including, final cut studio, logic, and aperture. when these application ship, if you do no fork over the crossgrade fee, your application version will be retired. developers will not continue to support three customers: powerPC only, intel only, universal. that’s too much work to test, so you’ll need the universal version to work properly. most likely major applications will move to the universal code on the next major revision to avoid these upgrade issues. hopefully at NAB 2006, apple will revise all their applications to the next version to make moot the move to universal unnecessary for powerPC workflows.

adobe revises video production studio

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for the mac user, any announcement from adobe use to receive the same cheers and shouts that an apple product release would receive. that was before apple began releasing products built from the ground up for the mac. apple has more mac developers than anyone on the planet, trying to make the mac the most relevant platform for media production and creation. because apple does not worry about operating peculiarities (worrying about apple quartz extreme as compared to microsoft directX technology), they can customize their applications to sing on mac, instead of concern themselves about a dueling operating system strategy.

when it comes to media development, the mac is the way to go with final cut pro, motion, DVD studio pro, shake, logic pro, soundtrack pro, and aperture. adobe has after effects professional, premiere pro, photoshop, audition, encore DVD, and illustrator. of the adobe production studio, only after effects, photoshop, and illustrator work on the mac. if one needs to edit sound using audition, or authoring a DVD using encore DVD, or even editing a project using premiere pro, you have to use a windows based PC.

the lines are blurring in the coming year as both the mac and windows PC will utilize the same GPU (NVIDIA or ATI), CPU (intel core duo), and motherboard architecture (intel chipsets), so the apples to oranges comparison will no longer hold. no more will we have to guess what operating system based on the powerPC or intel core duo will reign supreme. when we have similar applications that run equally well natively on microsoft windows as well as apple mac OS X on the more or less the same hardware, we will know who makes the better machine.

i look forward to seeing where adobe takes its mac development, as the operating systems will determine the moves and motivations of customers, instead of the decisions of IBM versus intel, or freescale versus AMD. It’s an intel world now. May the best OS win.

CES 2006 preview

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two years ago medialive canceled the annual trek to the las vegas strip for comdex, the largest gathering of IT professionals on the planet. no one event has taken it’s place, but the heir to the event this year will be the international CES 2006. historically, panasonic, samsung, cisco systems, and HP gave keynotes, but this year intel, sony, yahoo, and google deliver addresses.

intel has already reshaped their company logo and processor line for what looks be be an incredible year of product introductions. yahoo and google move outside of internet search to offer a whole slew of web services and applications, some may say only now at a nascent level. computer processors and graphics engines have already exceeded the expectations of the average user generating e-mail, simple documents, and balancing a spreadsheet, but with the introduction of high definitions video and multi channel audio, even the consumer wants a few processors to rev up the music rips, transfer of photos on to portable viewing devices, and simple HD editing. What a year 2006 will be.

apple in 2006

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if you wait long enough, everything comes to los angeles. dvexpo west opens at the LA convention center from 7-9 december 2005, and panasonic has prepared a presentation on the DVCPRO HD AG-HVX200 camcorder. so 2006 will usher in a new generation of affordable hidef, along with other computational milestones in the mactel world.

if you would have asked me a few months ago about the intel platform, i would say it was good for the x86 operating systems (solaris, linux, irix, windows), but did not have much of an impact, since i was a mac user. this summer everything changed and i’ve become a intel fan.

intel has some work to do to improve the energy efficiency and performance of their silicon, but in about a year, there stuff will rock our world. they’ve been working on a few initiatives ever since andy grove left the company. they’ve botched up a few items like itanium and the calyley (LCOS) microdisplays. grove lead intel for almost 20 years, replacing gordon moore, until craig barrett took the reign for a short 7 years, and now we have paul otellini. otellini took over in may 2005, and for his debut announced that apple computer is their latest customer. then came the woodcrest, conroe, and merom stuff in september at IDF, and next month otellini will keynote at CES 2006 in las vegas releasing the viiv platform.

i wonder when apple will keynote at CES? so 2006 will be a great year for intel and apple as their partnership may start as early as january at macworld expo 2006 in san francisco, and i can’t wait for some great products. sometime in 2006 we should hear about mac OS X leopard, the successor to mac OS X tiger, which should ship around the same time as microsoft windows vista (Q1 2007). never before, in my recollection have apple customers been privy to such long term planning, and budgeting so we should know when to upgrade systems and applications.

apple has a fantastic digital media platform based on final cut pro. in this suite of products called final cut studio, we have DVD studio pro, soundtrack pro, motion, and complementary shake and logic. these applications make staying on the mac platform worth the long wait, since these apps are so tightly integrated into the OS. they perform well, have regular upgrades, and have a devoted user community. in los angeles, i get to go to three monthly user group meetings:

motion graphics los angeles
los angeles final cut pro user group
los angeles logic pro user group

the future is bright. apple will lead the way into the intel transition. apple consumer electronics like ipod and future stuff will lead in new growth and dominance.

so as the year closes out, merry Christmas and happy new year to all. 2006 should be the true transitional year from powerPC to intel, NTSC (SDTV) to ATSC (HDTV), AG-DVX100B to AG-HVX200, and war to peace (i pray).

video ipod revolution

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apple delivers a knock out blow to VC-1 and other proprietary standards. AVC, or advanced video codec, also known as H.264 by the ITU and MPEG-4 Part 10 by ISO/IEC is an open standard developed my many patent holders. VC-1, the public face of microsoft window media 9, along with flash video 8, or on2 video are both welded shut boxes of technology with one patent holder to take the reins.

multiple companies including apple, IBM, Barco, Dolby Laboratories, Fraunhofer Institute, HP, Motorola, Panasonic, Philips, Samsung Electronics, TANDBERG television, and Texas Instruments have all joined forces to give consumers product choice and unlimited possibilities. the fruits of that partnership were the first successful H.264 or AVC product, the sony playstation portable device, and now the second mass consumer product, the apple ipod.

north american disney TV shows are only the start of what is possible in AVC. the codec can scale from mobile phones at 128 pixels all the way to 1080 pixels high definitions images. all media is going to AVC for content delivery for quality, compression efficiency, and broad support through the consumer electronics industry, information technology industry, and broadcast industry.

mac joins GPU future

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when apple moved to an open standard operating system, BSD UNIX, most developers and users saw the potential of using GNU license open source software on the mac. slowly, the same transition is happening on the hardware side, as apple will be moving the entire mac line, including powermac, imac, powerbook, and ibook to intel chipsets.

today, apple announced the latest imac, and aside from the wonderful home technology hub, the most significant move in my mind is the retirement of the accelerated graphics port( AGP graphics). most high end graphics subsystems require not AGP 4X or 8X, but higher end PCI-express (PCIe), and now the fall 2005 imac includes a radeon PCIe for access to next generation GPU’s.

sometimes apple surprises the mac community by launching newer technology into the imac in advance of the workstations like the powermac or servers like the xserve. i hope PCIe makes it to xserve and powermac lines very soon, so anyone can access highest ATI or NVIDIA technology.

end of mac 3D?

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to my amazement, autodesk has made a definitive agreement to acquire Alias. autodesk acquired discreet some years ago and acquired 3ds Max. Now maya and motion builder may die since they directly compete with autodesk products. only the future will know the actual outcome, but this is not good for competition.

maya and motion builder were also the power players on mac OS X, so maybe 3ds Max may move to OS X too, but maybe they’ll drop support on my platform of choice.

resfest LA 2005 volunteer

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over the last week, i was a resfest 2005 volunteer at the los angeles egyptian theatre. for a few days and a few hours, i got to see inside a film festival, wander the various theaters, and get a feel for the management of the sales, will-call, and preparation for this unique electronic visual jaunt. the res media group personal are on to chicago for the final leg of the north american tour.

since the festival is digital, all a city really needs is a digital theatre and a input device, be it a tape, hard drive array, or satellite receiving station. the majority of images were HD, but some where at SD resolution. the star of the show was the new technology exhibits from panasonic and canon. resfest not only exhibited the latest in motion capture, motion graphics, animation, avant-garde cinema, and documentary, but previewed for the first time affordable high quality 720p and 1080p motion video capture. what used to cost $125,000 yesterday will be under $10,000 tomorrow. stay tuned.