Warren’s NAB report 2019

Saturday

I arrived in Vegas on Saturday afternoon after running ICA classes in both Burbank and Brooklyn with AbelCine. This meant jetlag had already been dealt with, I even thought about going to the afternoon Flamingo pool party!

Saturday night saw me catch up with friends from home at the Aussie/Kiwi/APAC evening at the Paris casino, great to see so many guys and girls making the long trip.

 

Sunday

The focus for me was the 7th Colorist Mixer. Patrick Inhofer and myself had got 20 folk together in the corner of the ‘Pub’ bar in the Monte Carlo hotel back in 2013. Jump to 2019 and The Mixer is now co hosted by Mixing Light, Tao of Color and the ICA and we were expecting 300 people at Virgil’s Bar and Grill!

The Mixer is funded by multiple sponsors and a small admission charge. What I love about the night is that the attendees are a great mix of old and new. Big name colorists and industry executives rubbing shoulders with new color graders from smaller, not known for color locations. People traveled from all over the globe making this a truly international event.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Monday

I got to the show just after the opening and headed to the Frame io booth. I wanted to see Alexis Van Hurkman talk about the integration of Frame io into Resolve 16. As a user of both products it was a feature I had been calling for. I was especially pleased to see the seamless integration, no pop up external window, very nice.

On to the huge Blackmagic Design booth for a quick demo from my good buddy Joey D’Anna of Resolve 16. Things I liked straight away, new scopes, (long time overdue) the new Cut Page adjustment Layer, and the increased playback performance of Resolve. Not blow your mind color features but lots of little things that will make my day easier and faster.

 

The afternoon saw my first presentation at Post Production World, ‘How to make money as Colorist’ I had been joking all week that it would be a very short presentation!

Luckily around 40 attendees thought otherwise and heard me talk about, Clients, showreels, working for free, DPs and how often to post to Social Media etc.

I then made a quick dash to the north Hall for the CSI Hosted ‘Birds of a Feather” HDR workflow event.

A panel of 7 moderated by Kevin Shaw discussed HDR Color Managed Amazon and Netflix workflows in front of a packed audience. Great discussions that were followed by after session drinks. Thanks to Kevin and the Colorist Society for hosting.

 

 

The evening saw me part of a Resolve Power Tip panel with Jeff Greenberg, Scott Simmonds, Jason Bowdach and Singaporean Colorist Junbin Chen. We all had 15 mins each to show our favorite tips. Very interesting to see that out of the 60 attendees 20% were now use Resolve for everything!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tuesday

I was really excited that Post Production World 2019 has asked myself to co host the PPW Color Day with Jeff Greenberg.

We invited Kevin Shaw, Katie Hinsen, Alexis Van Hurkman and Ayumi Ashley to present a complete day on Color. The day started with an attendee survey. They all got out their phone went to our Color Day survey link and entered answers based on location, main job, things they liked and wanted to see discussed in the event.

We all had around an hour plus Q & A. I used the survey to gauge what the audience of 80 people wanted to see. The main requests were grading skin tones, matching  shots and RAW workflows. This enabled me to customize my presentation to suit.

The evening saw the first ‘Faster Together’ event  hosted by Lumaforge in the Rio which has taken the slot from the old Supermeet event. I caught a few workflow presentations including one from good friend Robbie Carmen. Put this event on next years go to list.

 

 

 

 

Wednesday

This was my first real day on the show floor, Kevin Shaw (ICA Co Founder) and myself did the rounds meeting existing sponsors and also checking out potential new ones.

I liked the name change from Portrait Displays, new logo and no reference to SpectraCal.

FSI showed the excellent HDR XM311K now down to $35,000. Kevin and I both agreed that no one HDR monitor is perfect for everybody, which is very different to SDR where the FSI CM250 OLED was a standard for a number of years.

 

 

 

 

 

 

In the afternoon, I had to make the 20 min hike across to the North Hall to be interviewed by RedShark News. I gave my thoughts on how HDR had impacted the show and what were my thoughts on the move to HDR delivery.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I also checked in with ZOOM who make the H5 recorder that I record all my Color Tour Podcasts on. I always make a point of thanking manufactures, they really appreciate it.

 

Thursday.

It was my first chance to see the new PA32UCX ASUS monitor. They claim 1000nits and 93% of P3. Not released yet but with a price point of around $3000 this could be a great HDR pre grade monitor. As Colorists, especially as freelancers we don’t get access to the higher end monitors so the chance to practice grading in HDR is limited. Due for release in July this could really make a difference. Look out for one at the ICA Hawaiian Colorist Summit in October.

Stops at Filmlight and SGO to discuss new features and ICA training opportunities rounded out the day. Fantastic people and great features coming from both of those companies.

2pm I was on the bus and heading to the airport.

NAB is a fantastic way of not only seeing the new tech first hand it is also a great networking opportunity. If you get the chance to go, do so you won’t regret it.

PS. Just remember to pack your comfy shoes!

Warren