Reaper DAW By Mike Jones
Much like video editing systems, the tools for crafting, mixing, and multi-tracking digital audio projects - be they music, audio or sound for video endeavours - have reached a very mature stage in their development and evolution as technologies. The Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) market has grounded itself in all-digital workflows and common production practices whilst, at the same time, diversified into an array of major players.
...Read More »
Telestream's ScreenFlow 2 By Kevin McAuliffe
As an instructor and online trainer, I need a screen capture program that will not only be very easy to use, but also produce excellent looking end results. Windows users have a ton of options, but for us Mac users, the outlook was pretty barren. More than a year ago when I started doing video tutorials I came across ScreenFlow, and liked it a lot. Well, Telestream is back with version two of this great program. Let's see if it's worth the upgrade.
...Read More »
Sorenson Squeeze 6 By Kevin McAuliffe
These days, it seems as though every company has an application for taking your edited files and processing them for the web, and many of those applications are included with the editing bundle you purchased. Adobe has Adobe's Media Encoder, Final Cut Studio has Compressor, and there are the standalone applications such as Episode, and even QuickTime can do it as well.
...Read More »
X-Rite's Color Munki Photo By Joshua Virata
Ever had the problem where you have a picture on your computer and then print it out and the color doesn't turn out the same? I can tell you from experience that that has happened to me many times before. But now I don't have to worry about this problem thanks to ColorMunki Photo by X-Rite. ColorMunki lets you calibrate displays, projectors and printers so that the colors in your pictures or media are accurate every time.
...Read More »
MAXON CINEMA 4D R11.5 By Ko Maruyama
MAXON Computer released their newest version of CINEMA 4D, the 3D application that has quickly become the favorite of broadcast designers and animators. The name of the newest version, R 11.5 gives the illusion that the update is a minor upgrade from previous R11.2 version. However, the multitude of new features in R11.5 makes the upgrade feel like a integer release.
...Read More »
Coremelt Complete V2 By Kevin McAuliffe
You can never have enough plug-ins. Trust me, as an editor/graphic designer you always have clients that want something "cool," but have really no idea what they are looking for, so you end up finding yourself going through the plug-ins on your system to try and put something together to really "wow" them, your plug-in collection needs to have three traits.
...Read More »
Book Excerpt: MacMost.com--Guide to Switching to the Mac By Gary Rosenzweig
So you've decided to buy a Mac. Congratulations! Macs are great computers and your Mac will soon be a valuable tool for work, recreation, and communication. Perhaps, however, you're not sure which Mac to buy.You are not alone.There are many choices.Most people who switch to Mac have this same question. Which one? You've got three major choices in a desktop machine: the Mac mini, the iMac, and the Mac Pro. And you have three choices in a notebook: the MacBook,MacBook Pro, and MacBook Air.
...Read More »
Trapcode's Particular 2 By Kevin McAuliffe
As editors and motion graphic designers know, there are a lot (and I mean a lot) of plug-ins out there, and you often find the same type of plug-in across many different plug-in packages, and a very, very popular plug-in is the Particle Generator. Just about every plug-in package has one, and even After Effects itself ships with a few.
...Read More »
Third Party Plug-Ins/Apps For Final Cut Pro By Heath McKnight
Time for another edition of my third party plug-ins and software apps for Final Cut Pro (FCP). This time around, I take a look at the powerful and easy-to-use (with a ton of codec options) iFunia Video Converter Pro, FxFactory 2.1 and idustrial revolution's Volumetrix 2 transitions, and FxFactory 2.1 and DVShade's EasyLooks 2.5 and LiveToon 1.0.
...Read More »
Toolfarm's Professional After Effects Camera Training By Ko Maruyama
The 3D world in After Effects has always been a difficult composition space to navigate. Even if you are familiar with world navigation in a 3D application, working with the camera in After Effects may not behave the way you might expect. Like any application, there is a workflow which will make working with these tools easier to understand. Toolfarm's new training shows you how.
...Read More »
Apple's Color 1.5 By Kevin McAuliffe
As everyone knows, the inclusion of FinalTouch (renamed Color by Apple) into Final Cut Studio 2 was shocking. A few months before Apple announced it, I looked at purchasing FinalTouch as a separate, stand alone application for a post facility I was working for.
...Read More »
Adobe Story First Look Preview By Heath McKnight
Adobe Story is the newest application from the company that brought us Photoshop and other great apps. Adobe Story is a great new way to develop and write screenplays, teleplays, and video scripts. It's a fully featured app that is highly compatible with many of the popular screenwriting and pre-production software. Best part? It works "in the clouds," ie, it's Internet-based as well as a standalone app.
...Read More »
Apple's Soundtrack Pro 3 By Kevin McAuliffe
Soundtrack Pro 2 was a great application. You could harness its power for not only Final Cut Pro timelines, but for any editing application that could export an OMF file. What Apple had essentially given us was a professional, production-ready application to take any audio project to the next level. But, I had one concern. Where would it go from there?
...Read More »
Final Cut Studio's Motion 4 By Kevin McAuliffe
Star Wars Episode 1 and Apple's new Final Cut Studio have something in common, and that is the hype. Final Cut Studio has been hyped for more than a year, and every time someone blogged about its release coming up, nothing happened. Well, mid-way through July, Apple snuck Final Cut Studio (not called 3, just Final Cut Studio) onto its website, and needless to say, the tidal wave began.
...Read More »
Snow Leopard (Mac OS X 10.6) By Heath McKnight
Snow Leopard (Mac OS X 10.6), the new version of Apple's 8+ year old operating system, Mac OS X, is an impressive upgrade from Leopard (10.5), which came out in late 2007. While it doesn't sport many new features as in years past, it does feature many "under-the-hood" improvements that make it worth the upgrade.
...Read More »
Wacom Intuos4 graphics tablet system By John Virata
Wacom graphics tablets are the standard to which all other graphics tablets are judged, and for the most part, there aren't a whole lot of competitors that can match the usability and fit and finish of a Wacom. The Intuous 4 is a medium size tablet that features an 8.8 x 5.5 inch drawing area on a 14.6 x 10 inch platform. It sports 2048 pressure levels with +/- tilt sensitivity of 60 degrees.
...Read More »
Apple Compressor 3.5 By Heath McKnight
With the long-anticipated update to Final Cut Studio, Apple has introduced an upgrade to Compressor. Not a full new version, but still a significant update, nonetheless. However, you need to consider that while Compressor is a stand-alone application, it's now a major part of Final Cut Pro 7, and that is where its strengths lie.
...Read More »
Apple Final Cut Pro 7 By Heath McKnight
A little more than two years after Final Cut Pro 6 introduced the ProRes codec, Background Processes, Smooth Cam, and many other functions, Apple debuts Final Cut Pro 7 (FCP), part of the third version of Final Cut Studio. There are more ProRes options, export settings that can be done in the background without Compressor 3.5 open, iChat Theater support (an excellent collaboration tool), and much more. FCP is 10 years old this year, and they've been listening to us, the editors! Let's just dive in and take a look at all the new stuff.
...Read More »
Verbatim SureFire 500GB Firewire 800/USB 2.0 external hard drive By Joshua Virata
In today's world of digital cameras, home movies, music, and all of our other media, storage is everything. Convenience and reliability are two big sellers when it comes to storage, and this is where the Verbatim SureFire line of portable hard drives comes in. Sleek, portable, fast and large capacities are some important aspects to portable drives and the SureFire has all of those aspects.
...Read More »
Autodesk's Mudbox 2009 By Kevin McAuliffe
The world of 3D design and animation has always had a "what came first, the chicken or the egg" mentality. What I mean by that is when it comes to someone getting into the world of 3D animation, normally (not all the time), they are either strong at the computer/technical aspect, or strong in (classical) animation, and they end up having to bulk up on either one or the other.
...Read More »
Create amazing VFX with GenArts Sapphire™ Now YOU can use the same VFX plug-ins utilized in 12 years of Academy Awards® nominated films for outstanding visual effects! CLICK HERE to learn more about renting Sapphire
Perfect your production with iStock video and audio Create your next production for less with video from iStock. Our royalty-free footage is available for web, NTSC/PAL and as large as 1080 HD. You can also find soundtracks for your masterpiece with over 50,000 iStock audio tracks. CLICK HERE!!!
AV-HS450 16+ Input HD/SD Switcher w/ dual screen MultiViewer This 16+ input switcher is the best value in its class. Its exclusive dual screen MultiViewer lets you view up to 20 windows on just two displays. CLICK HERE!!!
Bluetooth headsets have become more and more popular throughout the years and now more and more cell phones have been able to take advantage of this technology. In this review we'll be looking at a brand new Bluetooth headset from iTech, the SolarVoice 908, one of the first solar charging headsets on the market.
Read More
Thank goodness you're a pack rat! You know, have to grab, keep everything that flies by...ok everything except that report or news item or YouTube yuck you saw last week and now desperately need. Can't find it it save your behind. And still you don't have enough storage...there are new worlds to conquer, new worlds to destroy or take home with you. Don't worry Flash will always be there for you Dale!!!!
Read More
On this Veteran's Day 2009, as we honor those who served and gave their lives for America, there are stories about man's best friend being told by those who fought alongside their "War Dogs of the Pacific." Most Americans have no idea that dogs were trained to sniff out the enemy during World War II, 549 to be exact fought with the U.S. Marines on Guam, Saipan, and other battlegrounds of the Pacific Theater.
Read More
Did you hear? Microsoft is releasing a new version of Windows - should you buy it? Windows 7 is here. In this article you will find out if Windows 7 is worth the wait and whether or not you should upgrade. Or is Windows 7 just another Vista?
Read More
@ Copyright, 2008 Digital Media Online, All Rights Reserved
Reaper DAW
Much like video editing systems, the tools for crafting, mixing, and multi-tracking digital audio projects - be they music, audio or sound for video endeavours - have reached a very mature stage in their development and evolution as technologies. The Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) market has grounded itself in all-digital workflows and common production practices whilst, at the same time, diversified into an array of major players.
...Read More »
Telestream's ScreenFlow 2
As an instructor and online trainer, I need a screen capture program that will not only be very easy to use, but also produce excellent looking end results. Windows users have a ton of options, but for us Mac users, the outlook was pretty barren. More than a year ago when I started doing video tutorials I came across ScreenFlow, and liked it a lot. Well, Telestream is back with version two of this great program. Let's see if it's worth the upgrade.
...Read More »
Sorenson Squeeze 6
These days, it seems as though every company has an application for taking your edited files and processing them for the web, and many of those applications are included with the editing bundle you purchased. Adobe has Adobe's Media Encoder, Final Cut Studio has Compressor, and there are the standalone applications such as Episode, and even QuickTime can do it as well.
...Read More »
X-Rite's Color Munki Photo
Ever had the problem where you have a picture on your computer and then print it out and the color doesn't turn out the same? I can tell you from experience that that has happened to me many times before. But now I don't have to worry about this problem thanks to ColorMunki Photo by X-Rite. ColorMunki lets you calibrate displays, projectors and printers so that the colors in your pictures or media are accurate every time.
...Read More »
MAXON CINEMA 4D R11.5
MAXON Computer released their newest version of CINEMA 4D, the 3D application that has quickly become the favorite of broadcast designers and animators. The name of the newest version, R 11.5 gives the illusion that the update is a minor upgrade from previous R11.2 version. However, the multitude of new features in R11.5 makes the upgrade feel like a integer release.
...Read More »
Coremelt Complete V2
You can never have enough plug-ins. Trust me, as an editor/graphic designer you always have clients that want something "cool," but have really no idea what they are looking for, so you end up finding yourself going through the plug-ins on your system to try and put something together to really "wow" them, your plug-in collection needs to have three traits.
...Read More »
Book Excerpt: MacMost.com--Guide to Switching to the Mac
So you've decided to buy a Mac. Congratulations! Macs are great computers and your Mac will soon be a valuable tool for work, recreation, and communication. Perhaps, however, you're not sure which Mac to buy.You are not alone.There are many choices.Most people who switch to Mac have this same question. Which one? You've got three major choices in a desktop machine: the Mac mini, the iMac, and the Mac Pro. And you have three choices in a notebook: the MacBook,MacBook Pro, and MacBook Air.
...Read More »
Trapcode's Particular 2
As editors and motion graphic designers know, there are a lot (and I mean a lot) of plug-ins out there, and you often find the same type of plug-in across many different plug-in packages, and a very, very popular plug-in is the Particle Generator. Just about every plug-in package has one, and even After Effects itself ships with a few.
...Read More »
Third Party Plug-Ins/Apps For Final Cut Pro
Time for another edition of my third party plug-ins and software apps for Final Cut Pro (FCP). This time around, I take a look at the powerful and easy-to-use (with a ton of codec options) iFunia Video Converter Pro, FxFactory 2.1 and idustrial revolution's Volumetrix 2 transitions, and FxFactory 2.1 and DVShade's EasyLooks 2.5 and LiveToon 1.0.
...Read More »
Toolfarm's Professional After Effects Camera Training
The 3D world in After Effects has always been a difficult composition space to navigate. Even if you are familiar with world navigation in a 3D application, working with the camera in After Effects may not behave the way you might expect. Like any application, there is a workflow which will make working with these tools easier to understand. Toolfarm's new training shows you how.
...Read More »
Apple's Color 1.5
As everyone knows, the inclusion of FinalTouch (renamed Color by Apple) into Final Cut Studio 2 was shocking. A few months before Apple announced it, I looked at purchasing FinalTouch as a separate, stand alone application for a post facility I was working for.
...Read More »
Adobe Story First Look Preview
Adobe Story is the newest application from the company that brought us Photoshop and other great apps. Adobe Story is a great new way to develop and write screenplays, teleplays, and video scripts. It's a fully featured app that is highly compatible with many of the popular screenwriting and pre-production software. Best part? It works "in the clouds," ie, it's Internet-based as well as a standalone app.
...Read More »
Apple's Soundtrack Pro 3
Soundtrack Pro 2 was a great application. You could harness its power for not only Final Cut Pro timelines, but for any editing application that could export an OMF file. What Apple had essentially given us was a professional, production-ready application to take any audio project to the next level. But, I had one concern. Where would it go from there?
...Read More »
Final Cut Studio's Motion 4
Star Wars Episode 1 and Apple's new Final Cut Studio have something in common, and that is the hype. Final Cut Studio has been hyped for more than a year, and every time someone blogged about its release coming up, nothing happened. Well, mid-way through July, Apple snuck Final Cut Studio (not called 3, just Final Cut Studio) onto its website, and needless to say, the tidal wave began.
...Read More »
Snow Leopard (Mac OS X 10.6)
Snow Leopard (Mac OS X 10.6), the new version of Apple's 8+ year old operating system, Mac OS X, is an impressive upgrade from Leopard (10.5), which came out in late 2007. While it doesn't sport many new features as in years past, it does feature many "under-the-hood" improvements that make it worth the upgrade.
...Read More »
Wacom Intuos4 graphics tablet system
Wacom graphics tablets are the standard to which all other graphics tablets are judged, and for the most part, there aren't a whole lot of competitors that can match the usability and fit and finish of a Wacom. The Intuous 4 is a medium size tablet that features an 8.8 x 5.5 inch drawing area on a 14.6 x 10 inch platform. It sports 2048 pressure levels with +/- tilt sensitivity of 60 degrees.
...Read More »
Apple Compressor 3.5
With the long-anticipated update to Final Cut Studio, Apple has introduced an upgrade to Compressor. Not a full new version, but still a significant update, nonetheless. However, you need to consider that while Compressor is a stand-alone application, it's now a major part of Final Cut Pro 7, and that is where its strengths lie.
...Read More »
Apple Final Cut Pro 7
A little more than two years after Final Cut Pro 6 introduced the ProRes codec, Background Processes, Smooth Cam, and many other functions, Apple debuts Final Cut Pro 7 (FCP), part of the third version of Final Cut Studio. There are more ProRes options, export settings that can be done in the background without Compressor 3.5 open, iChat Theater support (an excellent collaboration tool), and much more. FCP is 10 years old this year, and they've been listening to us, the editors! Let's just dive in and take a look at all the new stuff.
...Read More »
Verbatim SureFire 500GB Firewire 800/USB 2.0 external hard drive
In today's world of digital cameras, home movies, music, and all of our other media, storage is everything. Convenience and reliability are two big sellers when it comes to storage, and this is where the Verbatim SureFire line of portable hard drives comes in. Sleek, portable, fast and large capacities are some important aspects to portable drives and the SureFire has all of those aspects.
...Read More »
Autodesk's Mudbox 2009
The world of 3D design and animation has always had a "what came first, the chicken or the egg" mentality. What I mean by that is when it comes to someone getting into the world of 3D animation, normally (not all the time), they are either strong at the computer/technical aspect, or strong in (classical) animation, and they end up having to bulk up on either one or the other.
...Read More »
Perfect your production with iStock video and audio
AV-HS450 16+ Input HD/SD Switcher w/ dual screen MultiViewer
