Interview with Dave C. Hill of Sony by Eugenia Loli-Queru

Following the recent release of Sony Vegas Pro 8 video editing suite, today we host an interview with Sony Media Software’s VP of Technology Dave C. Hill who talks to us about the new product, the engineering hurdles his team faced and more.

1. What’s the most important new feature in Vegas Pro 8 in your opinion?

Dave C. Hill: All the new features are important but because Vegas has such a broad user base it is hard to prioritize them. We’re very excited about the new creative options that the ProType titler brings, 32-bit float processing allows very high end image processing, digital signage we expect to be a growth area (at least within our own company), we’ve got some very interesting new AVC related technologies, the audio console and rotuing enhancements will really benefit the pro audio people, we’ve got new formats and workflow improvements like multicamera and smart MPEG HD rendering…but again, what matters most is going vary per user.

2. Which feature was the most difficult to implement and why?

Dave C. Hill: Float processing involved quite a bit of intensive math, the titler obviously is a massive undertaking, smart rendering MPEG was not particularly easy, all of the under the hood multithreading improvements to a lot of work, and let’s not forget the Vista port- that didn’t just fall out of the sky. Really everything we do requires a ton of collaborative effort, and “most difficult” would be hard to pin a badge on.

3. What about a 64-bit version of Vegas? Was Vista a hurdle?

Dave C. Hill: 64-bit Vegas is still in development, and we expect to begin the beta period later this year.

Vista was a challenge, perhaps the most challenging new OS port we’ve done in our history. However there really are no “issues” with using Vista in Vegas 8- it works very well in every way even at this early date in the Vista lifecycle.

4. Some say that Photoshop has brought image processing to its highest point of maturity regarding editing. Do you think we have reached that point yet with video editing?

Dave C. Hill: No we haven’t reached full maturity in video, and I’d argue that we haven’t in still image processing either. What’s “the best” today will be an also-ran down the road a few years- history has proven this out in every area of technology. In parallel with that we’ll also see demand for “vintage processing”- just like we do with film, or sound- people grow fond of the old style, or they want it for creative reasons.

5. Do you believe that AVCHD will eventually eclipse HDV, or the other way around?

Dave C. Hill: The market will decide that as it always does. Both have their plusses and minuses, but in skilled hands, with the right tools, exceptional results can be had with either.

6. What is your take on the RED camera?

Dave C. Hill: It is quite interesting of course- we’ve followed it fairly closely and I checked in on their booth at IBC in Amasterdam last week to see the latest and greatest. I think it’ll take some time to dial in a complete workflow for it, but what they’ve developed look quite promising. Red marketing is really great as well- you can’t help but be impressed by what they’ve done there.

I’ll add that I saw some other very intersting acquisition products at IBC as well- RED isn’t the only thing that’s innovative at this point in time.

7. Any plans to add full 1080p and 24p support in the Movie Studio Platinum line, as many consumer cameras as of late shoot as such?

Dave C. Hill: That’s TBD- but if the market demand is there and it makes sense from a business standpoint, you may see this in a future version. VMS used to be Standard-Def only, but we added Hi-Def to the consumer product in VMS PE, so there’s certainly precedent for the capabilities of a consumer product to absorb yesterday’s pro-only features.

FreshDV guest-contributor Eugenia Loli-Queru is a Senior News Editor at www.OSNews.com. You can catch up with her online at eugenia.gnomefiles.org.