Ulead claims HD DVD authoring first for VideoStudio 10 Plus

[Bob Crabtree]

The headline claim for the latest version of Ulead's VideoStudio - V10 due in early May - is that it's the first consumer video editing program able to author high-definition discs in the new HD DVD format (though the fact that this requires an optional extra - a yet-to-be launched "burning pack" - doesn't figure high in Ulead's publicity material nor the good news that it will be free) .

The program - running only on Windows 2000 SP4 and higher, including XP Pro x64 Edition - can, though, edit video from high-definition consumer HDV camcorders as standard. So, when HD DVD writers do finally turn up, users who've installed the burning pack will be able to create high-definition DVDs of their high-def footage where as, currently, they can only create standard-definition versions.

HDV footage uses a complex group-of-pictures MPEG-2 standard. Untangling that complexity usually means that editing is very slow and laborious unless using a very fast PC and getting assistance from an HDV-editing card. To try to work around the problem, V10 creates lower-res/non-MPEG-2 proxy versions of the captured files. Ulead claims - we suspect rather optimistically - that doing this makes the editing of HDV as easy as that of standard definition, even on mid-range machines.

More in this HEXUS.headline.

[DR]

I wonder how many people actually buy these applications now? Meaning I know most of them launched as pro-sumers - but with the number of people with Digital Camcorders (myself included)... I am concerned as to who actually uses them and plays around with the content they have captured - I don't.... and if I did I wouldn't spend ages on it to be fair