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Continuation of our NAB coverage - Apple's Final Cut Studio 2 announcements from this AM:

Motion 3
The new features in Motion are really sexy and some of them may also be useful:
-Vector Based Paint
Very useful - so glad this is something that's in motion; the pulldown menu of brushes and drawing options looks so gorgeous within the interface it makes you want to go back to school and take a drawing class so that you can live up to the capabilities of the feature set.
-Pervasive 3D
I need to see this and "drive" in person to believe it.
-Match Moving
Rumor has it this is insanely processor-intensive, and not really usable right now...unless you have a 8core Mac, I imagine. While beneficial to certain commercial editing workflows, this is a feature that represents a concept in compositing that many might not grasp initially - but it's definitely something compositors and vis fx artists use all the time in After Effects and hardware driven fx systems like Flame or Smoke; so it's certainly nice to have.
-Retiming Behaviors
There was a former feature in FCP that attempted a more primitive version of this feature and it never worked perfectly, so again I'd like to see this working myself before getting too excited.
-Audio Behaviors
Cool, fun - but a bit gimmicky in my opinion. It controls animations based on volume and frequency; I like the idea but I'm not sure people will actually use this except in music videos or experimental graphics/arts projects.

Soundtrack Pro 2
what's new here...

Multi-Take Editor - Advanced Take Management
For those who do dialog editing, you need to create fades and mix multiple takes from your talent or interviews on a daily basis. This happens in documentary as well as features, so now you can streamline dialog replacement, bring in multiple tracks from multiple sources and create cross fades between them. You still have to know what you're doing in a real way but the icons and mixing tools are so intuitive it's pretty easy to grasp...without an audio engineering degree.

Surround Mixing
Using a single project for both a Dobly 5.1 and Stereo is so amazing, for pro's. Having all your mixes in one place, with no need to have multiple mixes or tracks for the same cut is something the pro community has been asking for from Avid for years.
Additionally, the surround mixing features include an "Intuitive panner with automation" so the visual feedback you see will "wow" clients in the editing room; it also makes it really viseasy to see where your speakers are and where to assign the sound source for maximum audience-impact.

Frequency Spectrum View
This is magic. It's so visual and allows you to isolate problems, and non-destructively fix them. Again, with this one it's almost too good to be true so I'll have to visit the booth on the show floor before I start to champion this feature as a practical breakthrough.

Scoring and Adding Music
STP 2 has added over 150 license-free, royalty-free music beds into the applicaiotn as well as a library of 100's of sounds fx. So if you're trying to edit to a temp track you can really benefit from having these different genres at your finger tips. Most post houses have a library of their own but if you're working independently, this can be really useful.

Synchronizing Sound FX to Picture
This is a major detail-oriented task; it's tedious, but necessary for a polished finish. The way you can drag the sound fx and match it to picture eliminates the tedium associated with the synching. Again, this is one of those things where it's easier to see it than describe it; when you do see it, you'll understand.

New Conform Feature
Making track changes in this thing is "as easy as it would be in a word processor." That's the marketing pitch, at least. But the conform tab (which, when it appeared on the big projector screen everyone leaned forward in their seats to take a peek at it) seems to actually allow you to be super-organized and efficient. This is the type of practical feature that's not very sexy to promote but makes the process of conforming completely streamlined and managable, even for the uninitiated. You can also audition different options and then accept or override the changes. For version control, this is a major time saver.