For "October Country," the grand jury prizewinner at the 2009 AFI/Discovery Channel SilverDocs documentary festival, co-director Michael Palmieri developed a Final Cut Pro workflow that depended on AJA's KONA 3 video capture card for playback during editing. Shot on DVCPRO HD, "October Country" documents the multigenerational story of a working-class family coping with poverty, teen pregnancy, foster care, child molestation and war.

"The AJA KONA 3 is one of those tools that works so well you end up relying on it in ways that you don't expect," comments Palmieri. "The main thing it provides is speed—you can edit in a native codec without having to down-res footage or wait for long render times."

Wishbone Films, Palmieri's production company, has used AJA products for years. "As an independent filmmaker, it's essential to work with tools that are dependable without breaking the bank," Palmieri says. "AJA solutions are invaluable because they allow me to do so much without working in an environment that is cost-prohibitive."

Palmieri began his directing career working with Garry Trudeau, the Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist and writer of "Doonesbury," and has shot, directed and edited award-winning videos for popular musical acts such as The Strokes, The Foo Fighters, The Bravery, Belle and Sebastian and The New Pornographers. His commercial work includes spots for Converse, Coke, MAC Cosmetics, and ESPN.

"Most recently I've been using the KONA 3 on projects shot with the RED camera," continues Palmieri. "The card helps to speed things up on every level in terms of playback and renders. In that respect it's priceless. When you are trying to cut really fast and make decisions on the fly, you don't want to wait for the computer to render."

"The KONA 3 is amazing. It allows me to edit in the same resolution I'm working in at all times," Palmieri concludes. "You don't even notice how much you begin to depend on it until you sit down at someone else's workstation and they don't have it."

KONA 3 is the ultimate uncompressed capture card for seamless operation with Apple Mac Pro systems and Apple Final Cut Pro. Supporting any uncompressed SD or HD format, including Dual Link 4:4:4 HD and 2K, KONA 3 captures and plays back uncompressed 10-bit and 8-bit digital video and 24-bit digital audio, providing unparalleled power and workflow efficiency. KONA 3 also includes a variety of 10-bit broadcast-quality features, such as hardware-based up-, down-, and cross-conversion to and from HD, and adds a live hardware HD/SD keyer for compositing bugs, live clips, and other elements over video.