July 2007 Archives
The Episode encoding tool lets you analyze the frames of your encoded video file. In the Job Batch you can select the applied preset of an already encoded video and hold down the Control key and choose Open in Preview from the contextual menu.
When the Preview window opens you will see three tabs Source, Preview and Encoded. Choose the Encoded tab and you will see the result of the encoded video plus a graph of all the encoded frames.
Telestream, a leading provider of encoding-based media workflow solutions, announced availability of a major version 6.0 software release for its flagship FlipFactory transcoding workflow automation product line. Versatile, enterprise-class FlipFactory v6.0 software includes simultaneous transcoding while ingesting from tape with the company's new Pipeline network encoder, support for HD commercial and syndication workflows, a new Screen Subtitle option for open subtitling, auto-publishing of metadata with media to more video sharing websites, integrated 2-pass Flash 8 encoding, plus support for even more formats. FlipFactory continues to respond to the rapidly changing marketplace as more content owners deliver higher volumes of media in a greater number of formats to both traditional and new media distribution platforms.
If you are trying to upgrade to Media Composer and you are currently running Avid Xpress Pro you need to follow a few simple steps to get up and running with Media Composer. Before you can upgrade, you need to uninstall any older version of Avid already installed on your computer. Newer versions of Media Composer and Xpress Pro have separate applications, Avid Uninstallers, that make this process very easy. But older versions didn't have separate uninstaller applications. This includes Xpress Pro 4.8.x and Media Composer 1.8.x. So, make you sure check out the step-by-step instructions on how to uninstall your older version of Avid and don’t forget to sign up for one of our up and coming Avid training classes, seats are limited.
Net briefings is part of the next web video revolution with Proclaim. Proclaim is a tool that can be used to create archived presentations that contain PowerPoint and roll-in videos in MOV, .MP4, .WMV, .MPG and .FLV format. This can all be done in playlist form. You can also create live presentations or meetings with individuals that have web cams. The tool has some powerful features, especially for those that want to record themselves and then upload the videos to the web. The Proclaim tools takes advantage of the web cam and computer microphones that folks are using. This tool is a must see. Make sure you sign-up for a demo and watch the Proclaim training video.
Users of Cleaner Have a Chance to Switch to Telestream's Episode. Until August 31, 2007 owners can get a $100 discount for Episode and a $300 discount for Episode Pro.
Why switch to Episode Series?
BET is leading the way by providing a great on-line experience for streaming content. The network has figured out a way to deliver a successful ad-based model through a video portal called BET on Blast. The portal allows viewers to watch a complete TV show which is periodically interrupted by commercials, similar to a normal commercial break when viewing thieves. Statistics show that on-line viewers don't mind watching commercials if they can view the video content for free.
Here's what's unique about the video portal provided by BET:
What happens to your original file after you delete it from Avid. A student of mine asked me this today and he brings up a good point. What he is referring too is he had a QuickTime file that we imported into Avid and it from that import Avid created one OMF file and two AIFF files. The OMF is the video and the two AIFF files are the left and right audio files. We ended up not needing this particular file so we deleted it from our system, but he still needed the QuickTime file for another project. What happens when you tell Avid to delete the one master clip and the three media files?
Having the ability to get your sequence back out on to tape as quickly as possible is very important. If you shoot in DV 50 or DVCPRO HD you are in luck. You can output DV 50 or DVCPRO HD sequences directly to a DV device. This lets you output without any loss due to compression and decompression.
You just need to make sure you are working in one of these following formats:
You can output:
DV 50-in any SD Project
DVCPRO HD-in this and only these projects: 720p/23.976·
720p/59.94·
1080i/50·
1080i/59.94
When it comes to learning shortcut's for Final Cut Pro, there are hundreds of them. If you are new to the software, it is going to take some time to learn keyboard shortcuts.
I'll focus on a couple of important 'keyboard shortcuts' that are easy to understand, and immediately useful.
Creating a 'speed ramp' effect with Avid Xpress can be a little tricky. Especially since you must create all speed changes directly within the Source Window.
This tutorial will walk you through on how to change the speed of a clip at a certain point, and then return to its original speed. Before, you begin I reccomend that you create an entirely new Avid sequence and practice this exercise using a single clip.
If you are looking to find the Read Me Files for and version of Avid there is one page that has them all. The Read Me files are great for configuring, determining compatibility, and what fixes have been made from the previous version. Avid has included PC, Mac and Mac Intel. The list spans from version 4.6 up to the latest 5.72. You will also find some extra documents at the bottom for Mojo and Mojo SDI. Now you can look up and see your documentation or see if upgrading to the next version is in your future.
Mapping your Avid keyboard is a critical step in becoming efficient with the Avid software. Important commands such as match frame, replace edit, and fit-to-fill are crucial commands when becoming an efficient editor.
Did you also know you can map any menu command to a keyboard shortuct with Avid Xpress or Media Composer? This is very useful for menu commands such as:
- Turning on-off the Audio Waveforms (Sample Plot)
- Creating Freeze Frames
- Displaying Media Relatives
- Full Screen Playback
- Activating Customized Workspaces
Every menu command can be mapped to a single key by using Avid's command palette.
Harmonic Inc., a leading provider of broadcast and on-demand video delivery solutions to service providers around the world, today announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Rhozet Corporation, a privately-held company based in Santa Clara, California. Rhozet offers software-based universal transcoding solutions that facilitate the creation of multi-format video for Internet, mobile and broadcast applications. The addition of Rhozet's software transcoding technology is expected to enable Harmonic's existing broadcast, cable, satellite, and telco customers to seamlessly create and deliver high quality Internet and mobile video programming. It is also expected to expand Harmonic's presence into the online video service provisioning market, where Rhozet's transcoding solutions are today in use by leading Web video content providers including Amazon.com, MSN and Yahoo!.
The $15.5 million dollar purchase price is comprised of cash and the value of approximately 1.1 million shares of Harmonic stock, as set forth in the definitive agreement. The acquisition is subject to customary closing conditions and is anticipated to close by the end of July 2007. Excluding charges for the amortization of intangibles, the transaction is expected to be neutral to Harmonic’s earnings per share for the second half of 2007.
Those interested in Streaming Media should download the latest Streaming Media magazine.
Some of the articles from the latest issue include:
The MPEG Industry Forum (MPEGIF) will present an informational Master Class at IBC2007 focused on "Next Generation Television Technology and Business Models."
Operators of new IP-based television services and the technologists enabling them will exchange their views on trends and technologies that are changing the way digital multimedia is created, compressed, stored, delivered and monetized. IP is the technology that is finally creating the converged information delivery infrastructure and an ecosystem is emerging, with new video and audio codecs, new middleware and content protection methods and completely new viewing experiences.
I am so excited to let you in on a great new product from Adobe. It is called OnLocation and you need to take a good hard look at this before you go out on your next shoot. Adobe OnLocation CS3 (Windows only) is powerful direct-to-disk recording and monitoring software to help you produce superior-quality results from your video camera. Designed to run on a laptop or workstation, Adobe OnLocation CS3 gives you an impressive array of production tools to help you shoot better and faster while saving you time and money. The previous version of Adobe OnLocation was the award-winning DV Rack HD software sold by Serious Magic.
Imagine if you are working on your Mac using Final Cut Pro or Avid as you receive the dreaded error message 'Disk Not Readable on this computer' What do you do?
I reccommend that you keep a program called 'Disk Warrior' from AlSoft in your arsenal of troubleshooting tools. It will fix most disk directory problems. It will also fix most many OS X problems. You can download a full version directly from Alsoft's website.
Internap Network Services Corporation, a global provider of fast, reliable end-to-end Internet business solutions, today announced the completion of its origin point of presence (PoP) in London, improving Internap's ability to provide content delivery services on a global scale. The build-out offers superior content delivery to Internap's global customer base, such as BuyTV.com, Disney and Salesforce.com, utilizing high-capacity redundancy. Internap's content delivery network (CDN) is enhanced by its unique intelligent architecture, which is the industry's only solution that routes Internet traffic across the best path to improve end-to-end performance.
There's a new beta version of MPEG Streamclip available for those that want to give it a test drive. Note: The 1.9b3 beta version has not been fully tested.
Many folks will be interested in this version as it provides the following:
Further increasing its commitment to support IPTV service providers in China, Envivio Inc. introduced the world's first multichannel IP video encoder supporting AVS (Audio Video Coding Standard). In 2006, AVS was approved as the Chinese national standard. Available today, the telco-grade, quad-channel 4Caster C4 will be demonstrating encoding in AVS at IBC2007 in the Envivio stand #4.260.
QUICKTIME 7.2 and Avid Editing
I always want to download and take advantage of the latest release of software. This is not a good idea for Avid editors. Avid engineers spend many hours testing and making sure that software works with Avid. If you download an untested version of Quicktime or another software you may run into many problems that seem unrelated but they will make your editing life a disaster. Recently, Apple released the 7.2 update to their popular media player, Quicktime. As always, it is not recommended to upgrade to the newest version until Avid has been able to test and qualify this version with our editing products. Do not download the latest versions of Quicktime. Once Avid has been able to test the 7.2 release, and code any required patches for it, another Tech Alert will be posted on the Avid knowledge base web site. It is advised that you turn off "Automatic Updates" for Quicktime to prevent unexpected / undesired updates from happening. This is a way for you to control when you want to update.
If by surprise you are receiving either red or green lines througout your video in the canvas, you have probably pressed Control and Z by accident. When you see these zebra lines, Final Cut Pro is checking the luminance levels of your video, this is called Range Checking.
Along with these stripes you will also receive one of three symbols at the top of the current clip located in the Canvas Window. A checkmark in a green circle signifies that luminance levels for the current frame are safe and below 90 percent. There are usually no zebra lines present when this lone checkmark is present.
The next symbol is a checkmark in a green cirle with an arrow pointing upwards. This signifies that some of the luma levels are between 90 and 100 percent and you will see the suspect areas shrouded in green zebra stripes. This is also an acceptable level.
The next symbol is a yellow warning icon, which means your levels are over 100 percent. This icon is accompanied with red stripes over the problem areas.
Press Control Z to activate this function and press them again to deactivate it.
On2 Technologies, Inc., a leader in video compression software and solutions, announced that it has released a new version of its flagship Flix Engine video encoding software designed for servers with multi-core processors. Through On2's new TrueCore technology, Flix Engine can use multiple processor cores to encode video in parallel, resulting in substantially faster video transcoding speed with a single Flix Engine. With TrueCore technology, a 720P high-definition video file can be encoded at 1.4 times faster than real-time on a processor with eight cores.
MyOutdoorTV.com, the world's largest internet video network for outdoor television shows, radio, video, and conservation information, announces the official launch of its website, complete with a state-of-the-art, searchable video player and programming
by many of the top names in outdoor television. The official launch caps a
year of development in beta version and venture capital investment funding
of the website created by three cable television veterans from the former
The Nashville Network (TNN).
StreamingMedia.com is now accepting nominations for the First Annual 2007 Streaming Media Reader's Choice Awards. This is a chance for subscribers and their web visitors to have input on what they think are the best products, services, and tools in the industry. The nomination form for vendors is available on StreamingMedia.com.
When you begin work on a Final Cut Pro Project, the first thing you should do is give your project a name and save it so that the autosave function can work. Autosave will not work until you have named and saved your project first. If your machine should happen to crash or if FCP should happen to unexpectedly shut down, you can always restore the last autosaved version of your project.
Restoring an Autosaved Project
1 Click on a project tab in either the Browser Window or the timeline to make it active.
2 Go to File > Restore Project and an autosave dialog box will appear.
3 Choose the autosaved project from within the autosave box, then click OK to restore the latest autosaved version of that project. Make sure you save this restored file immediately by pressing Command S or going to File > Save.
A very important link is the end action override. This is an optional setting that can override the end action of the destination. The standard link sets the next destination; the override sets the end action of that destination, replacing its default end action. Overrides give you dynamic control over the navigation through a DVD. You can change the path through the DVD according to what the viewer has just watched.
Understanding how to create navigation in a DVD can sometimes be overwhelming and confusing. Well one of the greatest misunderstood navigations is the end action. There are many ways you can navigate after your clip or menu ends. The end action specifies what happens when an item finishes playing, or when you have specified a duration for a menu and the viewer takes no action within that time.
All video editors and multimedia professionals need to have QuickTime Pro available at their displosal for format conversion and other cool functions that help with multimedia. Here's a good reason to upgrade to QuickTime Pro. In QuickTime Pro you can go to the Window drop-down menu and select Show Movie Properties under the Windows drop-down menu.
Envivio Inc., the leading technology provider of IP video convergence solutions from mobile to HD, is unveiling the latest version of its multichannel IP encoder for IPTV and Internet TV at IBC2007 in its stand #4.260. Part of the Envivio Convergence Generation headend supporting an all IP infrastructure, the 4Caster C4 encoder can now support both IPTV standard definition video resolutions as well as CIF (Common Intermediate Format) Internet TV resolutions, simultaneously. The C4 can also simultaneously encode in AVC / H.264 as well as in the Windows Media and QuickTime formats. The 4Caster C4 is available today.
If you are looking for a quick way to get the letterbox 16x9 look fro your projects then Avid has a quick solution. It is called the 16:9 mask. This is treated just like any other effect and is a quick way to make your footage a have the HD or film letterbox. This effect is under Film>16:9 mask. There are a couple of way sot apply this effect to your footage and I have the best way is to put it on it’s own video line so you can turn it on or off. I put this effect on the upper most video line. The great thing is that if you have graphics or titles it will only mask the whole region and not reformat every line like the reformat effects do. This is a quick way to get the 16x9 look with minimal effort. Make sure you check out our latest Avid bundle class, seating is limited!
The makers of the very popular Democracy Player have reinvented themselves and changed the name of their media player. The former Democracy Player is now called Miro.
Their new website at www.getmiro.com has been updated throughout with better, more focused, and more up to date info. The forums are totally new and much better. The channel guide has moved to miroguide.com and has a whole new look
There was a new codec implemented at the release of Sorenson Squeeze Compression Suite 4.5. The codec is called the Apple AVC Codec and you will see many improvements when using this codec. One area where you will see significant improvements is for encoding video for the video iPod. All users should be using the Apple AVC Codec for iPod Video in Sorenson Squeeze 4.5. If you're encoding video that you want to keep at 29.97 or 30 frames per second with high quality then you need to use this codec. If fixes some of the noise that might be introduced using other H.264/AVC codecs at 29.97 and 30 frames per second.
To get the highest quality use the Multi-pass mode which uses 5-6 passes when encoding video.
Once nice feature of QuickTime Player 7.2 is that it provides viewing in Full Screen Mode. Previously this feature wasn't available for the 7.1 version of the software so this provides a nice incentive to upgrade. Another interesting change to the application is that the Show Movie Info window is now referred to as the Show Movie Inspector.
Would you like to be able to quickly export a QuickTime movie from your timeline or from a subclip ? Well, look no further Avid Express Pro makes this task simple. There are a few simple steps to accomplishing this task so here is the quickest way to export a QuickTime file:
Itiva Networks, the on-line Video Content Delivery Solution for high quality digital assets, today announced that its QMesh software supports Apple MAC OS X for full platform compatibility.
"The Mac community is well represented in several of our key markets, including media and entertainment, sports, gaming, and advertising delivery, and we're pleased to offer our rich media delivery network to them," said Michel Billard, CEO of Itiva. "This opens the door to many new advanced users who prefer the Mac. Now Mac OS X customers can access a powerful high definition video streaming solution that would otherwise not be available to them."
Telestream, the media encoding workflow specialists, announced new bundling and pricing specials for its flagship FlipFactory transcoding workflow automation product line. Telestream's FlipFactory summer specials include FlipFactory New Media, a new bundling priced at $4,995. FlipFactory New Media targets the rapidly growing new media market and its requirement for high-volume publishing and distribution of video and audio in multiple formats for today's diverse viewing audiences on the web, podcast, DVDs and mobile devices.
Final Cut Pro 6.0 introduces a new remarkable fx-plug filter called smooth cam. Smooth is an amazing filter that stabalizes a shot without a bunch of complicated settings and adjustments.
This processed can be done in the background. After clips are analyzed, you can seamlessly adjust the smooth cam parameters without rendering.
Usually, when you hear of setting markers in Final Cut Pro, you are simply marking a single frame to signify that something should happen at this point in your sequence, such as a soundeffect or the beginning of a music track. Did you also know that you can set a duration for a marker, enabling it stretch across multiple frames? You can set a marker duration for notation that an area is marked for a change in color correction or that audio needs to be tweaked in a certain area.
Creating A Duration For a Marker
1 Create a marker at the head of the area that you wish to mark by placing the playhead at that position and pressing the M key on your keyboard.
2 After you have created the marker, move the playhead to the right of the marker, where you wish for the duration to end.
3 Go to Mark > Markers > Extend and it will stretch the mareker to the playhead position.
If you are a Final Cut Studio 2.0 owner, don't forget that you still have the power of using LiveType.
Livetype is often overlooked, because all of the LiveFonts, objects and backgrounds are now readily available in Apple's Motion 3.0
It is important that LiveType handles text differently than Apple Motion. Perhaps in a future release, Motion will incorporate all of LiveType's features.
For the time being, here is an easy tutorial on how to use Livetype to create a streaming glow effect.
The latest update for Episode 4.3.2 is now available from Telestream.
New Features 4.3.2
Episode and Episode Pro
Enhancements in 4.3.2
For users of Sorenson 4.5 there is an update available from Sorenson Media. Some of the features of the update include Demuxing for MPEG-1 and 2 source files on the Mac for Hinting 3GPP files. The latest software is "Apple Device Compatible" which means that it's been tested with all released versions of apple devices such as iPod and Apple TV. Squeeze 4.5.6 is also current with the new Quicktime 7.2.
The upgrade is free for 4.5 users. Squeeze 4.5 is a paid upgrade from 4.3.3 or lower.
Wowza Media Systems, an emerging streaming server software leader, announced today that NetMasters BV, also known as FlashHosting, the top streaming media service provider in the Netherlands, has deployed Wowza Media Server Pro as the standard for their Flash Video Platform, offering a suite of market-leading streaming services for live and on-demand Flash video through their Content Delivery Network. The scalability of Wowza Pro enables NetMasters to cost-effectively build-out their Flash video CDN and effectively respond to the exploding customer demand.
Telestream, the leading global provider of media encoding workflow solutions, announced that its Episode Series desktop media encoding software products are now available for purchase at the online Apple Store in 15 countries in Europe. Products being offered include Episode, Episode with Flash, Episode Pro and Episode Pro with Flash.
Get FlipFactory, the industry's leading transcoding workflow automation solution for less
Here's what it can do:
Provides a powerful Windows-based server solution
You can copy and paste the video and audio attributes of a clip such as: any applied filters, speed changes, basic motion and more, to other clips within a sequence.
Copying And Pasting Clip Attributes
1 Select a clip in your sequence that has a filter applied to it.
2 Copy the clip.
3 Select the clips that you want to appy the filter attribute to.
4 Go to Edit > Paste Attributes or Right/Control click and choose Paste Attributes
5 Take note of if the filter you are wanting to paste is a video or audio filter, then select the filter option from the Paste Attributes dialog box . Click OK.
The MPEG Forum will to host a session at IBC 2007. In this full-day tutorial session, operators of new IP-based television services and the technologists enabling them will exchange views on trends and technologies that are changing the way digital multimedia is created, compressed, stored, delivered and monetized.
The Episode and Episode Pro software is loaded with features and one of the unique benefits is the ability to encode Bumpers and Trailers to videos. The Bumpers are videos which can be commercials, announcements, or other videos that are to be viewed before the main video plays. Trailers are videos with can also be commercials, TV program closes or other videos that are played back after the main video plays.
Learn more about adding Bumpers and Trailers and other cool features of Episode and Episode Pro in the upcoming 1-day Episode Pro training class in Orlando Florida.
Digital Rapids, a leading developer of scalable solutions for content ingest, encoding, transcoding, protection and delivery has two significant releases in the Stream Transcode Manager family of distributed media transcoding software. The new Stream Transcode Manager LE software offers the exceptional performance, load balancing intelligence and ease of use of Stream Transcode Manager in a lower-cost configuration tailored for customers without enterprise-level requirements. The full enterprise-level Stream Transcode Manager software also gains enhancements with new version 1.1, adding features such as server-level failover, extended database integration capabilities and clip manipulation.
Wowza Media Systems, an emerging streaming server software leader, announced that StreamGuys Inc., a leading provider of professional streaming media services, is using Wowza Media Server Pro to launch a set of Flash streaming services without the "Flash premium". According to the CDN 2006 - 2007: Market Size, Share, Metrics and Analytics, a report just published by AccuStream iMedia Research, "Flash streaming video contracts are typically priced up to 35% higher than standard bandwidth contracts, …" Wowza's economical licensing model and low total cost of ownership eliminates this premium and opens the way for Internet broadcasters to attain the maximum audience for their content, reaching over 98% of all PCs.
I recently ran across a problem importing P2 files off a FireStore drive. I am unfamiliar with P2 files and when I tried to import them could not find anything to import so I blamed the cameraman for the error. Well come to find out Avid has a cure for this:
When attempting to import P2 media from a FireStore 100 drive, the Import P2 Clips to Bin or Import P2 Media commands do not find anything to import. The FireStore has an application command called "Organize P2;" this places all of your P2 media into a folder structure that most NLEs can understand. However, this command places the Contents folder on the root of the drive. When navigating to the drive through an Avid application, the application can not recognize the Contents folder as a P2 source, nor can it recognize the root level of the drive.
After running the "Organize P2" command on the FireStore, navigate into the drive through your OS and create a new folder on the root of the drive (the name of the folder can be anything you chose.) Place the entire Contents folder (and everything in it) inside this new folder. Now, when using the Import P2 commands in Avid, select this folder but do not navigate further into it. The application will recognize your clips and/or media and complete the import command.
This is very similar to how we had to handle the old OMF files on our first FireStore hard drive and it is a very simple fix!
With the popularity of Apple Macintosh, you may find the need to have a hard drive that can be used with both PC's and MAC's.
The latest version of Mac OS X can read standard PC hard-drives that are formatted as NTFS or FAT 32. However, there is a catch.
If you have a hard-drive that is formatted as NTFS which stands for (New Technology File Ssytem), Mac OS X can only read the partition. It cannot write to it.
If you have a hard-drive that is formatted as FAT 32, Windows XP only allows a maximum partition size of 32 Gigs. This can be particularly annoying if you are working with large drives, such as a 1 TB drive. You'd end up with over 30 partitions on your desktop.
The trick is to use your drive manfacturer's disk-formatting software which will allow you to format your drive as one large partition. Formatting your drive as one large FAT 32 partition is the easiest way to make a drive so it can be used with both PC's and Mac's.
Another option is to purchase third-party software that allows PC's to read Mac formatted drives. This requires that you install the software on your PC in order to read Macintosh formatted hard-drives.
With the introduction of the intel based iMac's and Mac Pro systems, you may have the opportunity to use your Avid software in conjunction with many of the video editing applications that are available for Macintosh.
This is particularly true for authoring DVD's. I have yet to find an easier DVD authoring program than Apple's iDVD. For sounds effects, and sound design I prefer Apple's SoundTrack Pro.
Better yet, if you are lucky enough to have Apple's Final Cut Studio, you can use the best of both worlds! For myself, I prefer to edit my content with Avid Media Composer, but then I'll use DVD Studio Pro for my DVD authoring. I also use Apple Motion and LiveType for effects and compositing.
You can even import Motion or LiveType project files directly into an Avid bin window without ever having to export the file from Motion or LiveType.
Better yet, the Avid software will build a real-time moving matte for you, which will enable you to make keyframe adjustments in terms of your objects position. Here's how it all works.
