LAS VEGAS, NV (April 15) -- So you didn't feel like making the trip to Las Vegas this year? Or, as far as you're concerned, NAB is a pack of cheese crackers you buy out of a machine? Well, in case you haven't heard, there was a big convention last week in that sleazy desert town, and I'm here to tell you what was hot and was not.

The week started off heavy with anticipation as Apple called a press conference on Monday morning with two unlikely bedfellows: Matrox and Pinnacle. What's this? New editing cards for Mac and Final Cut Pro? You bet! First, oohs and aahs prevailed as Matrox techno-ace Alain Legault showed Matrox's newest member of the RT family, Matrox RTMac. Finally, dual stream editing is here for the Mac side, with an awesome $999 price tag. Available the third quarter of this year, RTMac is a real time, native DV editing board that was spitting out some great-looking video. Finally, Final Cut with two streams, no waiting. Too bad Matrox couldn't replicate its RT2000 feat for the Mac, though -- RTMac has real time DVE effects, but unlike the PC-based RT2000 they're only 2D so far. For 3D effects, Matrox promises them in a later release of RTMac.

But that was just for DV footage. The real show-stopper was next, when Pinnacle stepped up to the plate with its new Targa Cine board, said to ship in June of this year. You want your video on the Mac uncompressed? Here's the card that will be able to do this magic for you. The uncompressed video was clean as a whistle, and if that weren't enough, what's this? They're scaling this hot rod card up to HD, folks. Starting out with 720p, 1080i and 1080 at 24p, the card edited and played back some awesome-looking HD footage. Sharp-eyed observers noticed a couple of dropped frames, however, but hey, this is a beta version and after all, that is uncompressed HD footage up there. Word has it that the chip responsible for all this gargantuan pixel pushing is the main reason Pinnacle bought Truevision. Nice way to spend a few million! Now if we can just get those breathless Mac PR flacks to stop using the word "incredible" (which is just a little too close to denoting lack of credibility for my taste), then maybe it'll be a bit easier to put up with their chipper enthusiasm.

By the way, Mac flacks are publicly still clinging to the OS X release date of "this summer" while behind closed doors all around NAB many are saying the release date has slipped well into the late Fall. On top of that, Apple says these cards and Final Cut Pro won't be running on OS X until well into 2001. Uh-oh. Don't hold your breath for that one.

Meanwhile, at a FAST press conference we discover that the new name for six-o-one is now "silver."(with a period after it). Same great MPEG editing system, though. Too bad the PR folks didn't tell us the real reason for the name change: Does the brand name "Bose 601" mean anything to you? Thought so. Anyway, in addition to the fine silver. technology on display, FAST showed a great suitcase editor with everything you need to edit on the road. What's next? Editing on a wristwatch?

Strolling down to the Puffin booth, we find Commotion 3.0, with lots of new compositing features. Keep an eye on this app, because it's starting to give After Effects a run for its money. Originally a rotoscoping helper, now this speedy program is easing into AE territory. It won't be replacing the stalwart compositor from Adobe yet, though, until it's able to nest effects. Insiders tell us that's coming soon, too. Should be interesting.

Just down the aisle from that is Intergraph, showing off its new Wahoo technology. Wow. Here's a company that's doing more behind the scenes than it is on stage. Intergraph is working with lots of the big editing names in the biz, getting HD ready for prime time. Can't reveal much here, but there are some big things on the way, with Intergraph making them happen. And, with heavy bandwidth like that on display here in the desert, Intergraph will certainly be a player.

Next on the tour was Media 100, the editing company that now proclaims itself a streaming video company. To prove it, in addition to showing its awesome line of iFinish products, Media 100 is putting its money where its mouth is, launching a nonprofit Web site that'll show you how to shoot/edit/compress/publish your content for the Web. It's camera to Web, and here's how to do it. Check it out at iCanStream.com.

Now let's duck into a back room and take a look at some new horses from Softimage. The new Softimage|DS 4.0 was revealed, with HD features everywhere. Here's where some of that Intergraph technology mentioned before is coming into play. Set to ship this Fall, DS continues to develop into a Swiss Army Knife for high end finishing work. Interesting, too, that it'll be DS, not Avid Symphony that will be first out of the gate with HD for Avid, Inc. Expect to see DS/HD coming in at around $300K -- a lot of money, but considerably cheaper than lots of the other HD editing systems starting at around a cool million.

So what were our overall impressions of this year's NAB? Well, HD is taking a back seat to the number one buzzword: Streaming. "We're streaming, we're an Internet company" -- that's what we were hearing everywhere. Is this for real, or is it all about the money-drenched Internet investing frenzy? Can you spell I-P-O?

Anyway, there were some real improvements in lots of editing products on the show floor, notable examples were discreet's Edit 6, its painting/compositing app called Combustion and improvements to its high end line of editors and compositors called Smoke, Fire, Flame and Inferno. Aside from that, a startling newcomer to the edit arena is Sonic Foundry's Vegas Video, a seemingly driver-free nonlinear editor that came upon us out of the blue. No wonder Sonic Foundry's stock is so hot!

Another phenom worth noting is the wonderful display technology for HD shown by JVC and others. I'm here to tell you, it's every bit as good as film, if not better. So even if HD did play second fiddle to streaming this year, it's still a force that must be reckoned with, and will prove itself to be well worth the trouble. Meanwhile, creative companies will be making it easier for all of us to shoot, edit, compress, and Webcast all kinds of video. And we'll be here 24/7 to keep tabs on all of it for you.

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Charlie White has been writing about digital video editing since it was the laughingstock of the post-production industry. He's an Emmy award-winning producer and director for PBS, and producer of this Web channel. Have comments or questions? Send Chazz a note at cwhite@digitalmedianet.com.