Pinnacle Systems' Studio MediaSuite is one of the most powerful and complete consumer video-editing applications on the market. Based around the company's brand-new video-editing program, Studio Plus v.9, the updated software adds Picture-in-Picture (PiP) capabilities, pan and zoom controls for still images, and chroma key effects. It also adds a second timeline and useful audio options, including Dolby Digital Stereo encoding, which further help to make it one of the best value-for-money video-editing packages. Pinnacle also bundles a 5x6ft. green sheet backdrop for creating chroma key effects, which is an added bonus, and further adds a range of useful software applications, including Steinberg's WaveLab Lite for editing audio, Corel's PhotoBook for editing and sharing photos, as well as Pinnacle's Instant CD/DVD for burning, copying and backing up data to CDs and DVDs (Studio Plus v.9 can also be purchased on its own for £59.99 ex. VAT). With this latest release, Pinnacle has extended its lead with easy-to-use video-editing software that continues to set the standard in consumer video technology.

Pros: Powerful; easy to use; packed with features
Cons: Disappointing chroma key quality; prone to crashing


Designed for both beginners and high-end end users, Studio MediaSuite extends Pinnacle's range of home movie-making software. More than just a video-editing application, Studio MediaSuite is a comprehensive suite of software which includes a main video-editing program (Pinnacle's Studio Plus v.9), photo-editing software (Corel's Photobook), an audio editing utility (Steinberg's WaveLab Lite), CD and DVD duplication tools (Pinnacle's InstantCopy), and direct video burning tools that let you record from a tape to a DVD disc with basic menus (Pinnacle's Instant DVD Recorder).

The package also includes a media management application (Pinnacle's MediaManager), DVD playback software (Pinnacle's InstantCinema), a CD and DVD burning application (Pinnacle's InstantDisc), as well as basic backup software (Pinnacle's InstantBackup). Pinnacle has also made room in the box for a 5x6ft. green screen background sheet so you can add special effects to your videos using chromakeying.

The core program in the suite is Pinnacle's Studio Plus v.9, an advanced consumer video-editing and disc authoring application whose intuitive interface and seamless workflow provide you with on-demand access to hundreds of professional-quality features. Studio Plus v.9 is an enhanced version of Pinnacle's Studio that gives you more powerful tools to create movies and slideshows. Besides its range of features and authoring options, the major benefit of Studio Plus v.9 is its ease-of-use and simple, three-step movie-making process.

If you're an existing Studio user, you'll appreciate the updated software's new features, such as a second video track for A/B-style editing, as well as PiP effects, support for chroma key effects, Dolby Digital Stereo encoding (5.1 surround sound), enhanced slideshow capabilities with additional effects such as red-eye removal, rotation, as well as pan and zoom animation controls that turn still images into moving pictures.

Studio Plus's new PiP controls are comprehensive. You can place a customisable border around the inset picture, defining its colour, edge softness, shadow colour, and transparency, and output quality of PiP effects is very good. Unfortunately, whilst the software's chroma key controls are equally robust, output quality is disappointing compared to Adobe's Premiere Elements (£59.99 ex. VAT).

Another key feature of Studio Plus v.9 is its ability to create a professional looking movie with just a few clicks - complete with titles, transitions, and special effects - all synchronised to the beat and duration of the background music selected. Its audio and video enhancement features that restore and enhance video and audio are good too, and the ability to create movies with surround-sound audio and 16:9 support will be lapped up by budding directors.

We also liked the software's background rendering technology that uses spare processing power to create temporary preview files, giving high-quality previews as you work, and its stabilise effect is really useful for counteracting wobbly camerawork.

With Studio Plus v.9 you can capture from DV, Digital8 and MicroMV camcorders or VCRs (requires DV/FireWire port on your PC), as well as from analogue camcorders (8-Millimetres, VHS, Hi8 or VCRs), and compress directly from DV and Digital8 camcorders to DVD-quality MPEG-2. It's worth noting at this point that video-editing is very resource intensive and you'll need at least 120MB of hard disk space for every 20 minutes of DV video captured at preview quality (4GB for every 20 minutes of finished movie).

The software also allows you to output to DV or Digital8 tape (requires camcorder with DV input port and a PC with a DV/FireWire port), output to analogue videotape (requires DirectShow compatible video device or video card with TV-output), Video-CD (VCD) or Super-Video CD (SVCD). Output formats supported include MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4, AVI, RealVideo 8 and Windows Media 9 and import formats supported include MPEG-1, MPEG-2, AVI, WAV, MP3, BMP, JPEG, PCT, TGA, TIFF, and WMF. The software now also supports Dolby Digital Stereo audio encoding and Double-Layer DVD+R discs.

BIOS, Jan 20, 05 | Print | Send | Comments (0) | Posted In Graphics