AMSTERDAM: Day three of IBC. The highlight was the screening of the 3D movie Monsters and Aliens in the evening. It was quite a sight to see techies queuing up to pick up their 3D glasses, don them and squat in the auditorium to watch the animated film. 2,000 of them took time out to watch the animated feature. And they went away more than sated. The idea behind the screening: reemphasise the fact that 3D is upon us and close to 10 per cent of all Hollywood films are being crafted in 3D.

The floor was also used pretty welll by companies which displayed their abilities to put together 3D broadcasts live. At the EVS booth 3Reality displayed a pretty competent image of their 3D initiative by making visitors don 3D glasses to watch live 3D broadcasts and see themselves on the screens. And the experience was worth it, with there being hardly any jitter. The experience at the Fraunhoffer Digital booth was not comparably as good with there being some jitter while showing people in motion.

The evening saw Hindustan Times editorial advisor Vir Sanghvi take part in a panel discussion which debated whether the broadcast journalist has a future. And the consensus was that change is upon us. Citizen journalism and the hard times print groups are facing have meant that investigative journalism is no longer a viable proposition with costs being cut. Journalists are also being forced to hog air time on TV - that is fill in with "bollocks" (as one panelist put it) and jabber away. With that increasingly happening and the internet offering a very good option to listners - but a non-paying one - journalists and journalism are being challenged.

"The current generation is simply not interested in either TV or print news," said Sanghvi. "For them it is the internet and it is instantaneous."

The consenus was that very definition of news these days is undergoing a change. "It has always been more about being local and community, but with the internet, this is further being emphasised," said one of the panelistis. "The internet is making that possible and how. This will definitely impact broadcast news."

Additionally, Grass Valley launched its new T2 Intelligent Digital Disk Recorder (iDDR), the next generation of its popular iDDR family of playout and record devices for file-based SD/HD production and A/V presentation environments. The new T2 iDDR brings improved efficiencies for live and staged production and expanded I/O support for all of the most common production formats. This allows the new T2 to operate seamlessly within any type of tapeless or baseband environment: as a standalone device or as part of a large multi-camera production.