Amazon’s fifth cloud computing conference, AWS re:Invent, begins this week in Las Vegas, showcasing the impact of Amazon Web Services on corporate information technology. About 32,000 people are expected to attend. In the five years since its debut, AWS has offered a more price-conscious, subscription services-based alternative to on-site servers, storage, networking and software. As a result, Amazon’s AWS has grown 55 percent in Q3 to $3.2 billion, due in part to some large companies that recently came on board. Continue reading Amazon Expands Cloud Offerings, Big Firms Sign On to AWS

Extensive, in-depth coverage of CES 2017 by ETC@USC begins the week of December 5th with a series of preview stories exploring the top CE trends and technologies — and their significance to the entertainment industry. CES, the global gathering place for innovation and tech, is presented by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA) and runs January 5-8 in Las Vegas. CES 2017 marks the 50th anniversary of the conference. Since the first Consumer Electronics Show in 1967, more than 700,000 products have debuted in what CTA calls “the world’s gathering place for all who thrive on the business of consumer technologies.” Continue reading December Previews to Launch ETC’s Coverage of CES 2017

During a keynote address at Pubcon in Las Vegas last week, Google’s Gary Illyes explained that the company is planning to create a separate mobile index soon that will serve as the primary index the engine uses for responding to search queries. There will also be a separate, less up-to-date desktop index maintained. The plan was first announced at last year’s SMX East. “It’s unclear exactly how the mobile index will work,” reports Search Engine Land. “For example, since the mobile index is the ‘primary’ index, will it really not be used for any desktop queries? Will it only contain ‘mobile-friendly’ content? How out-of-date will the desktop index be?” Continue reading Google to Divide its Index, Enabling Improved Mobile Searches

ConductorIO VP of business development and operations Monique Bradshaw talked about the paradigm change from local, on-premise infrastructure to the cloud. “The paradigm shift means a fundamental change in approach of underlying assumption,” she said during an ETC Cloud Innovation Conference keynote at NAB. “We’re seeing a big change in the ways that companies are looking at their rendering.” In five years, she noted, 90 percent of respondents to a survey think they’ll have at least some of their rendering in the cloud, up from close to 60 percent today. Continue reading Cloud Conference: Moving From Local to Cloud Infrastructure

“Being There – Virtual Reality News and Documentaries” was the title of a panel on VR journalism at the NAB Show in Las Vegas. Panelists included senior journalists from Sky, RYOT, Condition One, and USA Today Network, as well as one of Google’s lead VR evangelists. Lessons learned include the importance of proximity (e.g. close-ups), making sure that everyone on the team has experience with the key steps in the workflow so they understand the process and can fill in for others, and the need to experiment and fail. The panelists hope that post-production tools improve soon so a greater portion of their time can be spent planning and shooting stories. Continue reading NAB Panel Addresses Impact of VR on News, Documentaries

At NAB 2016, RED Digital Cinema president Jarred Land gave the press an overview of progress the company has made with the 8K Vista Vision sensor for its Weapon Cinema camera. Land reports that “Guardians of the Galaxy 2” is shooting with sensors, which are not yet widely available. RED is also carving a new path of openness to third party manufacturers, including the announcement that its Weapon, Scarlet-W and RED Raven cameras can now shoot in Avid DNxHR and DNxHD recording formats via a free firmware update. Continue reading RED on 8K Production, Third Party Tools and Avid Integration

At NAB 2016, at the VR Pavilion in the North Hall, Assimilate introduced new tools for VR production, marking an ongoing maturation of the production workflow. The company’s big news was the introduction of user-friendly review and approval, which up until now has been a cumbersome and complex process. Also new from Assimilate for VR is real-time output to the Oculus Rift, support for mono and stereo footage, to output a secondary monitor in 360-degree mode, and some new VR grading tools. Continue reading Assimilate Introduces Client Approval Tool for VR Production

Sony DADC NMS (New Media Services) CTO and head of strategy Andy Shenkler keynoted ETC’s Cloud Innovation Conference at NAB 2016 in Las Vegas. Rather than talk pure technology about the cloud, Shenkler preferred a more unique angle: piracy. “The place I want to start is around competition in the OTT space specifically,” he said. “When we talk about OTT, the usual suspects are Hulu, Netflix, iTunes, Amazon, HBO GO, and so on. But we’re not really looking at the biggest competitor out there: piracy.” Continue reading Cloud Keynote: Sony Exec Recommends Learning from Piracy

At ETC’s Cloud Innovation Conference at NAB 2016, Variety editor David Cohen led a discussion with Avid chief executive/president Louis Hernandez Jr. “It’s been a remarkable journey,” Hernandez said. “With Avid Media Central, we wanted to connect people. We took our standalone applications and put them where they could be shared. Now you’re seeing a rapid expansion of the apps you can purchase: We have a record number of third party apps indexed on a common operating system. This is the direction that things are going.” Continue reading Avid Chief Talks Third Party Apps at ETC Cloud Conference

Deluxe began as a film laboratory in the early 1900s. The company has gone through numerous transitions, and today is focused not just on traditional post services, but on those rising to the surface, including virtual reality. Deluxe VR executive Malte Wagener says the company started paying serious attention to VR when Oculus started its Kickstarter campaign. In February 2015, the company first opened a VR unit with four employees. Last week, explained Wagener at NAB, Deluxe VR officially launched its full service offerings with a staff of 35 and growing.  Continue reading Deluxe Officially Opens Virtual Reality Creative Services Unit

At Sony’s NAB 2016 press conference, the company unveiled a new HDR monitor, portable memory recorder, and, most significantly, its new Ultra High Frame Rate 4K Sports and Live Entertainment camera. The new camera is a follow-up to the HDC-4300 4K live production and studio camera with HDR and high frame rate that was introduced at last year’s NAB and has since become a widely used solution for live sports and events. The new HDC-4800 is the “next leap” in Sony imagery, offering 4K recording at a whopping 480 fps. Continue reading Sony Introduces New 4K Camera for Live Sports Applications

Snell Advanced Media (SAM), which is the rebranded combination of Snell and Quantel, outlined solutions for its broadcast/cablecast customers to adopt IP networks, 4K, HDR, software virtualization, monitoring and news/sports solutions, as described by chief executive Tim Thorsteinson. 2016 is looking up, said Thorstseinson at NAB in Las Vegas, adding that, “2015 was the worst year in the market I’ve ever experienced in this industry.” The company is also a founding member of a consortium, AIMS, to standardize the implementation of IP networks. Continue reading Snell Advanced Media Stresses Interoperable IP Solutions, 4K

Autodesk and Google have partnered to offer Maya compute services on the Google Cloud Platform, which developed Google Cloud Platform ZYNC Render, an integrated cloud-based storage and rendering solution for the VFX industry. “We’ve been in discussions with Autodesk for quite some time,” said Google product manager Todd Prives. “It’s been a collaborative effort to bring Maya to Google.” With the ZYNC service for Autodesk Maya 2016 software, users will be able to render 3D scenes on the Google Cloud Platform. Continue reading Autodesk and Google Cloud Platform Bring Maya to the Cloud

Korean grad students are developing an Environmental Modeling Scanner that takes an interesting approach to detailed scanning of complex and crowded environments. Their hardware/software capture volumetric architectural and décor details and, in post-processing, extract people and any other moving or unwanted elements from the model. The approach creates a model by scanning an environment, the result of which can be combined with other capture sessions. They are demonstrating their solution at the NAB Show’s VR Zone in the North Hall of the Las Vegas Convention Center. Continue reading Researchers Demo Environmental Modeling Scanner at NAB

When Ang Lee was asked about his opinion of VR, at the conclusion of a panel at the NAB Show focused on the technical aspects of making “Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk,” he demurred that he was still very focused on making his way through the highly experimental process of creating a movie that combines 3D stereoscopy with 4K and 120 fps. The result, as seen in an 11-minute clip, is so immersive that some viewers compared it to VR. Lee didn’t dismiss VR, and believes it might eventually encompass theatrical experiences. Continue reading NAB: Immersive Films Present Possibilities, Face Challenges