We asked Jeromy Young, CEO of Atomos for his thoughts on their latest recorders and what happens next for the company.**
- What do you feel sets the Atomos Shogun apart from its competitors? What are its key features?**
Atomos was the company to revolutionize the external monitor-recorder market with the Ninja 1. We have continued to innovate and the Shogun is the latest in a line of products that we are proud to put the Atomos name to. We have been dedicated to high quality material build and recording, with affordable non-proprietary media. We have been able to design products for everyone; from professionals in the broadcast and cinema industries down to the weekend hobbyist. Due to this strong history our customers and partners trust the quality of our products. Working with Sony, for example, on the launch of their mirror-less full sensor A7s camera is testament to this implicit trust.
The Shoguns key features are its 4K recording in Apple ProRes, Avid DNxHD and Cinema DNG Raw. It also boasts a 1920 x 1200 325PPI IPS touchscreen panel for monitoring and playback, monitor assist functions, waveform, balanced XLR inputs for Audio, 12G SDI and HDMI in/out for recording and genlock for multi camera shoots. All for US $1995.
*** Any cool clients that have used Atomos products?**
Probably one of our more famous customers has been James Cameron who kitted out his Deepsea Challenger sub with 30 Atomos Samurai's on his ground breaking exploration of the Mariana Trench a few years ago. The Samurai was chosen because it is both compact and rugged - key attributes for recording 11km below sea level. And because of Atomos' Continuous Power Technology the Samurais could be powered indefinitely and still have back-up battery power.
Our customers never cease to amaze us with productions often in extreme situations, intense heat or sub-zero temperatures. One of our main aims is to develop equipment that allows cameramen to be creative and not waste time worrying about whether their equipment will stand up to the job.
*** What additional events will Atomos be attending this year? Any upcoming news or products our readers should be on the lookout for?**
In addition to the the big US shows such as NAB and InfoComm, we exhibit at a number of international shows such as IBC in Amsterdam in September and Inter BEE in Japan in November and others throughout the year. But we also exhibit at more local shows such as CineGear in LA next month and we’re always happy to support educational and training roadshows such as the Vincent Laforet's "Directing Motion Tour" which visits 32 cities in the US. We appreciate that not everyone has the time or the travel budget to attend all the exhibitions but we try to exhibit at as many as possible regardless of the size or global location.
We announced the Shogun at NAB and we're aiming to ship towards the end of the year and before that the Ninja Star (also shown at NAB) will be shipping in May. But we keep pushing development forward and have just released new firmware AtomOS 5.11 for the Samurai Blade and Ninja Blade and we also have a new accessory, the Contentious Power Bar under development.
*** What trends in the production industry do you see on the horizon?**
Main recording will move away from the camera to external recorders such as our products as 4K and higher formats become more popular. Professionals will shy away from high compression formats such as AVCHD/MPEG for more edit friendly codecs such as Apple ProRes as it makes for a more efficient workflow and better quality footage.
