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Videowave provides that rare combination of ease of use and power features.
In contrast to the tabbed workspace approach of Ulead Videostudio 7 and Pinnacle Studio 8, the Videowave workspace is flanked on the lefthand side by a long toolbar. This provides access to Videowave's editing modes which include a cutting room, darkroom, special effects, text animator, video mixer, transitions, audio studio, output, capture, publish to web, scene detector, time warp and DVD author.
A library window displays video content, audio clips, transition and effect presets or other content, depending on the current mode. Mode-specific controls are then provided in a panel at the bottom of the screen. A resizable monitor window occupies the left-hand side of the workspace and, just for a change, the storyboard is ranged across the top.
The capture mode can be set to acquire just the video, audio, or both from a DV camcorder or analogue device or to record music from an audio CD in wav format to use as a soundtrack. Videowave has the most configurable scene detection algorithm, which can be run during capture, or on imported clips. A separate dialogue box allows you to add scenes manually as a clip is played, or have the software detect scenes on the basis of the brightness of the clip content - radical changes here are determined to be indicative of a scene change. A slider is used to adjust the sensitivity of this mechanism.
Applying and editing transitions provides a good illustration of how Videowave can be highly intuitive. In most video-editing applications you can drag and drop a transition between two clips on the storyboard, but in Videowave you have to drag it to the small transition box located between the two clips at the bottom of the screen.
Once this is done, adjusting the transition duration is a piece of cake - you just drag the icon with two overlapping filmstrips, or for greater accuracy enter a numeric value.
Although there are only 27 preset effects filters, Videowave successfully combines them with customisation options. In special effects mode the options panel is split into three tabs: start, hold and finish, with a slider used to vary the level of the effect for each section of the clip. This isn't as versatile as true keyframing, but it is simpler to apply and the results are almost as impressive.
The title editor or 'text animator' strikes a similar balance between control and ease of use. The 18 preset text styles can be edited using font, outline, drop shadow, transparency and colour controls. A 3 x 3 grid is used to position the text, and animation presets allow you to produce rolling titles and fly-ins. With only nine to choose from, you may not find exactly what you need, but using the same start, hold and finish pseudo-keyframing for effects you can create your own title animations and these can be saved as custom presets.
DVD authoring is carried out in a separate, loosely integrated application that is launched from the Videowave toolbar and shares the same interface design. This provides everything you need to create DVD menus and add content with chapter points.
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