NAB 2008 - LAS VEGAS

This past week, Chris and I traveled to Las Vegas to attend our first NAB conference. For those of you who aren’t familiar with NAB, it is the largest trade show in the universe for those of us in the production industry. With companies representing nearly every facet of the creative industry, we were like kids in a toy factory. As I described to someone recently, it was a million square feet of geeks and it was wonderful.

Seriously though, this was a really worthwhile trip, even though it was in Vegas. We were able to discover many new innovative products and services that will help us to serve our clients more effectively. For example, the Indie Dolly, which allows all of us indies to achieve incredible camera movement without the massive expense of a Matthews or Fisher. Or the very cool products over at Zacuto, which we will be purchasing soon. We even had the first chance to play around with a Red, which I promise you completely lives up to the hype. Founder Jim Jannard was even in the booth shooting new footage while we were there. We stayed at the Hilton which adjoins the convention center and we were able to walk from our hotel to the show.

Among the highlights from the trip was the chance to see the 103″ Panasonic Plasma, which I assure you is absolutely insane. The rep we talked to said the new 150″ makes the 103 look like a baby, but it is hard to even imagine since the one we saw was so incredibly big. We also had a chance to see all of the new advancements in lighting technology - specifically LED’s and ceramic offerings from ARRI. And, we had the opportunity to meet the folks at EZ FX, who really make a fantastic jib for the money. We even stopped by the K-Tek booth and gently recommended they produce a more rigid shock mount that can actually stand up to the abuse of traveling. They assured us the newest model can, and whet our appetites with a promise of an upcoming case that can receive a complete boom setup with shotgun attached. This will certainly be most welcome when it is announced.

The only low of the trip was the food we consumed. Our first dinner was at Benihana - otherwise known as MSG and a show. Chris called it when he said it felt like his head was detached from his body. The next morning brought the quality selections at the Paradise Restaurant in our hotel. Who knew there was a VIP line for the wannabe Denny’s? Only in Vegas. The only saving grace was when my old college friend, Scott came to take us out to Sushi which was very good. This was the only decent meal the whole trip.

All in all, it was a great time and the plane ride afforded the rare opportunity to forward think after all of the stimulation of the conference. I probably wont attend every year, but it was a very positive experience this year. I even stuck to my “No Starbucks” policy!