07 Sep. 2021 -- just received via email:

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Sony Electronics has chosen to withdraw from tradeshows in October, including NAB Show and InfoComm. We look forward to connecting with you virtually to update you on our business. Please see the following statement from Theresa Alesso, Pro Division President, Sony Electronics.

“Sony Electronics has been closely monitoring the evolving situation of the COVID-19 Delta variant. With October on the horizon, we’ve considered the unprecedented circumstances and made the difficult decision that we will not be participating in person at next month’s NAB Show or InfoComm. While these events are an important forum to reach our customers and introduce new products, this is a choice we made to ensure we’re putting our employees’ and our partners’ health and well-being first. As the world continues to grapple with the pandemic and businesses adopt digital alternatives and online opportunities to prevent the spread of the virus, Sony Electronics will continue to communicate and engage with our customers and partners in interactive, accessible ways that allow us to safely deliver exciting product news and updates to a wide online audience. We’ll continue to monitor the situation and look forward to participating at industry events in-person at some point in the future.

Additionally, we’re excited to announce that Sony will be hosting a press conference at NAB Show, in conjunction with the NAB, prior to the show’s opening. Please join our online event on Sunday, October 10 at 9am PT/12pm ET at NABShow.com/Live and pro.sony, where we’ll unveil and showcase Sony’s latest professional innovations.”

Thank you,

Allison Mandara | PR Manager | Sony Electronics |

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update: 10 Sep. 2021 -- just received via email:

It’s hard to believe that it’s already September, which means NAB 2021 is right around the corner. As you prepare for the event, I want to provide an update on Panasonic’s plans for the show.

After careful consideration of several key factors impacting the show, including the current conditions of the COVID-19 pandemic, we have made the decision not to attend the event in Las Vegas.

In place of participating in-person, we’re planning to meet and connect with our valued customers via our digital platforms where we look forward to sharing our exciting announcements. We are confident a digital experience will be effective, similar to events we’ve hosted over the last 18 months. We will be in touch with updates on event specifics over the next few weeks, but please reach out directly with any immediate questions.

We continue to appreciate your business and look forward to connecting outside of the show!

Thank you,
Carter Hoskins
Director, Professional Imaging

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update: 10 Sep. 2021 -- just received via email:

Due to the ongoing health and safety concerns presented by the COVID-19 Delta variant, Canon has made a carefully considered decision to withdraw from this year’s NAB and InfoComm Shows. The communities that NAB and InfoComm represent are something that we will greatly miss this year, but the health and safety of our team members, customers, and potential show guests is our number one priority. Canon will continue our plans to communicate exciting new products and innovations in virtual and remote settings, and our teams all over the world will share our news and updates in the coming weeks. We are continuously monitoring the situation and we look forward to attending events in the future.

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update: 15 Sep. 2021 -- just received via email:

To Our NAB Show Community:

For more than a year we have worked tirelessly to bring our industry together safely in Las Vegas at NAB Show. Unfortunately, the pandemic and surge of the Delta variant has presented unexpected and insurmountable challenges for our global community.

As we have always kept the best interest and safety of the industry as our priority, it has become apparent in the face of these challenges that we can no longer effectively host NAB Show or our co-located events, the Radio Show and Sales and Management Television Exchange, in person.

NAB Show is the premiere destination for the media and entertainment industry and we will not move forward with a show that delivers anything less than the excellence our community has come to expect and deserves from us.

While we are disappointed that we will not be together again in person next month, we look forward to converging at the 2022 NAB Show, April 23-27, 2022, to reignite our passion for our business and focus on a bright future ahead.

Totally understandable given the circumstances. Even if it were on we couldn't go it as we are blocked from leaving Australia unless you have a very hard to get an exemption certificate. Stay well all!

Chris Young

I'l left wondering if the old trade show concept has passed it's sell by date and Covid is now an excuse to chop it from the calendar. The PLASA show in London used to be huge - Lighting and Sound in a big exhibition centre and it got smaller and smaller, then started stand sharing and this year was a single floor, not completely full. NAB was huge - I even went one year a long time ago, for the experience if I am being honest. Once one big name pulls out, others follow quickly. In the moving light industry the market leader one year was a little un-exciting, another moved in and sponsored the show and had massive stage set size demonstrations. The number one player got wiped out, and never recovered. The video shows in the UK have been getting smaller for years, and I don't think they will survive. Panasonic usually follow Sony, as do the other Japanese brands - so Sony's decision will be the start of the slide.

My friends who go always say its to get to put hands on the new gear as opposed to just hearing/reading about it. I dont see how you’d ever replace that aspect.

Josh makes a good point, putting one’s hands on the new gear, and talking to the factory rep, is very informative, much more so than someone in the local camera shop. There is a cost in doing that, though. On the other hand, while very nice, a trip from Texas (or almost anywhere, especially the UK!) to Vegas is not cheap. Not only for the trip itself, but also the lost time.

Blog “OM”; do a search for an article titled “Camera sales are falling sharply” at “om dot co”. [didn’t want to post the url here]

Graph; “Total Worldwide Digital Camera Unit Sales”; very interesting.

Halfway down is a graph that spans the years from 1978 > 1918. The graph compares the shipments of film and digital cameras for those years, and then starting in 2005, the graph includes smartphones. The picture (i.e., graph) “is telling”; especially when one reads the post that explains what is hapening.

At the bottom of the post are some related posts, and the one titled “iPhone vs Camera: No Contest”, is another good read. Note that “Sony” is mentioned.

The relatively recent rumor about the iPhone 13 camera is that it will be more “cinematic” (term used by rumored articles) because its SOFTWARE (in caps on purpose) will allow the background to be out of focus as compared to the subject. This, without buying a really espensive lens, or even having to change lenses!

Note: I haven’t been following the news on this becasue, after all these years, I finally broke down and got the iPhone 12 so won’t upgrade now. The handwriting is on the wall; because the smartphone is getting more powerful it may do an end-run around the expensive, so called, cinematic lenses.

Because the resale value of the old iPhone 6 is so low, the plan now is to re-purpose it for use as a remote for one of the cams or the Tascam recorder. This is something that can’t be done with an old cam (using it as a remote) so the old phone still has residual value. In fact, the old phone makes a better remote than the Sony cam remote because there are more functions visible, including the picture of what the cam is looking at or recording.

Guess the question is: What’s in the future?

I don't know nuthin' 'bout nuthin' but there is always going to be a very low end client base that would indeed go for a "good enough" smart phone camera over a pro camera/videographer, but I have a hard time imagining the type of clients that we want to work with making that choice. If you're spending the money for lighting and pro sound, plus whatever else, the rental cost for a camera will only be a relatively small amount more (and will probably still give better results, unless that phone cam AI just becomes spectacular). And the simulated DOF won't mean anything if everything else about the image and audio is trash.

My old Nikon DSLR died awhile ago and I got an iPhone 12 Pro Max, thinking that the camera would be good enough for most of my still photo needs. That has worked out fine, I was using the DSLR very little anyway and the "computational photography" on the 12 Pro Max is really quite impressive, as are the three lenses and LIDAR scanner.

Did a fun family video shoot last month and used the 12 Pro Max as an extra camera, just to see how I liked it. Bottom line was, I hated it! Was surprised how disturbing the extreme depth of field looked compared to my trusty old XDCAM EX1. Ended up not using most of the phone footage at all. I was shooting a little stage show and both the phone and XDCAM were about 15 - 20 feet away.

Now, I also have my old iPhone 6s Plus and I got a wide adapter lens for it from Moment. One nice thing about the older phones was that all the lenses were on sale so it only cost about $50 which was about $100 less than the new version of the same lens. Now, that footage looked very good - on a wide shot you expect to have lots of depth of field. But it seems like something else was going on there, the 12 Pro Max footage just seems to have been processed more, like excessive sharpening or contrast enhancement. Was using the Filmic Pro app, and I need to spend some time learning more about it.

Anyway, there's little doubt that phones are seriously eating into consumer still and video camera sales. The same thing has happened to the GPS market - dedicated GPS devices are all but dead, Garmin is the only company still making handheld/outdoor models now. Actually spending most of my time developing my own GPS web app now, it runs on phones and computers on all platforms.

I have a couple friends that do lighting for the big trade shows like NAB and CES. The pandemic has really been rough on them, also for my many IATSE friends. And my own field of opera design/technology has also been wiped out. Glad that I retired before all this happened, it's very sad. Wish I could feel optimistic about the future, but things seem to be getting worse instead of better and I really don't see an end in sight. But let's hope for better days - we could sure use them!

Thread title changed from "Sony pulls out of NAB2021" to "Sony and Panasonic pull out of NAB2021."

First post amended to include the official announcement from Panasonic declaring their withdrawal.

update:

Thread title changed from "Sony and Panasonic pull out of NAB2021" to "Sony, Panasonic and Canon pull out of NAB2021."

First post amended updated to include the official announcement from Canon USA declaring their withdrawal.

Thread title changed from "Sony, Panasonic and Canon pull out of NAB2021" TO "NAB2021 altogether cancelled, hope to see you next April for NAB2022."

First post amended updated to include the official announcement from NAB stating that they've cancelled their October trade show in Las Vegas.

Galaxy, iPhone, etc smart phone cameras are great for snap shots and quick and dirty video. Arguably better than many traditional cameras/camcorders have done in auto and program shooting modes. They become another tool in the tool box - not a full blows replacememt. for serious shooters. For Joe and Jane Sixpack vacation shoots they are a viable replacement.

Trade shows are very expensive - travel for all participants, booth space and related PR costs for exhibitors. But they were a great perk for those who could get funding to go. Vendors went because their competition went. Once a big name dropped (e.g., Sony) the rest fell in line because the competitive factor was gone. The old "Canon isn't here - are they out of business?" risk goes away.

Some years back I attended a number of trade shows focused on IT especially desk top PC and networks. I garnered a lot of good loot as well as information I could get from the from the trade press the next day or two.

I suspect they will be scaled back if not replaced replaced to some extent by regional (e.g., major city) vendor events at major dealers combined with virtual demonstrations.

A related question is how many people will jump to a different vendors product line as a result of a trade show demo, or will they tend to stay with the same vendors line upgrading when essential new capability is added, or gear ages out.

A major portion of my work has always been in the corporate convention/meeting/trade show audio visual market. It is all completely wiped out. Flat gone and over. No matter what happens to the world's health and economy it will take many years for that industry to recover. And if and when it does it will never be the same. Corporations are in no hurry to pack 1000 employees into a ballroom for 5 days to hold an annual sales meeting.

Every audio visual technician I know has been out of work since the beginning of COVID.

There is one exception to them being out of work. Industry in general has been quick to turn to technology to work through the world being upside down. Everyone knows what ZOOM is now even if they never heard of it 2 years ago. That is popular on the consumer end. On the profesional side of video conferencing and meetings a software called V-Mix exploded on the scene and rose to the top. I know guys mixing live video feeds from all over the world and "switching live shows" from a home office. These are corporate shows on a much higher level than ZOOM.

When the world calms down and humans aren't afraid to interact with each other again it still will not go back to the way things were. I agree with Don. It will be a combination of some face to face mixed with video. The virtual world is here to stay. It will be a huge financial success for many companies. The potential for targeted audience viewership vs. cost per head is staggering.

Kind Regards,

Steve

I agree Steve but on the positive side, my late dad used to tell me that after the 1929 depression, things got going fast, the world was fed up and got back to work asap. After the mid 1980s recession here same thing happened, our studio work returned faster than I thought it would, and while it was down we upgraded some of our gear.

While the downturn is on now, folks should learn how to use the new tools that have appeared. Eg: couples will still want a video of their wedding, but the new tools are, streaming the ceremony live on YouTube, or if you’re warned about what’s coming, recording it, editing out the drunken uncles and streaming it later for the time related relatives.

Also learning how to sell adv. time, bought to you by Wendys wedding dresses, or Warrens Wedding Cars and slipping these ads in where appropriate. I’m not trying to be funny, friends here tell me how serious this is but - think positive, your competition is.

Cheers.