DVS Creative Blog

Taking the Jump: What to expect upgrading from Adobe CS4 to CS5

A new version of Adobe CS5, and subsequently an updated After Effects (our primary compositing tool) is due to arrive in less than a month. There are some pretty exciting features that make the CS4 to CS5 upgrade much more viable than the jump Adobe took into CS4 from CS3 with their VFX tool. What can you expect out of the new Adobe After Effects? I'll break it down in order of importance:

1) 64 bit operating support: While some may need to update hardware, this is a significant push to make After Effects a faster compositing tool, utilizing your computers processor speed for faster previewing. Previewing a project with many layered effects can be one of the most time consuming stops on the production line. Also, keep in mind if your library of plugins are 64-bit compatible. Red Giant, makers of the industry standard particle emitter Particular and other widely used effects like Form and Shine, have opted for small fees for upgrading your plugins through them for a less painful jump to a new version. A 30% improvement is said to be typical.

2) RotoBrush: Adobe has opted out of the "cut-out" for the "paint-in." The cleanest, fastest way to rotoscope today is keyframing masks, frame by frame. Although this allows for ultimate control it is extremely time consuming as the compositor is breaking down a video into thousands of images and painting elements in/out individually. The new Rotobrush is a practical effect that is a brush driven rotoscope, see John Dickinson's (Motionworks) tutorial exploring the tool here: http://bit.ly/aKfTTV

3) Color lookup tables. Lookup tables are derived from hardware devices that transform the range of the colors in your video stream for representation and display on your monitor. A modified Color Finesse (which has become our main grading solution) interface will allow for a more consistent, and faster workflow. Color correct and grade across projects with many different scenes (balances) by applying a color treatment across the different layers in our outside of After Effects. The tables can be shared with different users on a network and even on different programs. And while we are on color, After Effects had also made an upgrade to encode and decode the Quicktime codecs that are imported in for a more accurate interoperation across many different softwares (think Final Cut Pro.) Read even more about After Effects CS5 here from the project manager himself:  http://blogs.adobe.com/keyframes/2010/04/introducing_after_effects_cs5.html

The Return of the Format War: CBHD vs. Blu-Ray?

 

Most people know the Blu-Ray vs. HD-DVD format war ended with the unceremonious concession of HD-DVD to Blu-Ray in January of 2008.  This was evidenced by the production of HD-DVD players and discs ceasing within the following six months.  What most people don’t know is that the war is not over yet.  CBHD, also known as China Blue High Definition, has risen from the ashes of what was HD-DVD.  CBHD is very similar to HD-DVD in disc size and manufacturing techniques, with some differences in how the video is encoded and played back as well as programming format.  Now what is it about the new Blu-Ray vs. CBHD battle that you should know, and is CBHD a real contender?

First of all, Blu-Ray is expensive to manufacture. There has been no real competition to Blu-Ray since HD-DVD went bust, but by the same token, Blu-Ray hasn’t been exactly flying off the shelves either.  Since winning the format war the price of some players have dropped (more due to the influx of vendors than direct competition), but the discs are still fairly expensive to manufacture and as a result, purchase.  Studios aside, hardly anyone is willing to pay the exorbitant fees that come with Blu-Ray replication.  There was an expectation that the media would have been cheaper after being on the market so long but the price really hasn’t changed much.  At a corporate level Blu-Ray has an audience mostly for tradeshows and other large format presentations, but when it comes to large-scale manufacturing the costs have been too prohibitive for most corporate uses.

Second, CBHD is less expensive to manufacture.  Like HD-DVD, existing replication machines can be retro-fitted in order to make the cost of manufacturing cheaper than Blu-Ray, which requires all new equipment. 

Third, the Chinese government is backing CBHD over Blu-Ray in order to provide cheaper entertainment to the Chinese people in these tough economic times.  Warner Brothers, realizing that English is a 2^nd language in China, started creating some of their titles in CBHD and as of September 2009, Universal Studios and National Geographic followed suit with announcements that Paramount and BBC/Discovery will be doing the same.  At this point CBHD is already ahead of Blu-ray sales in China.

 

Most assuredly this got the attention of Blu-Ray, which decreased the cost to manufacture in June of 2009.  So does this make CBHD a real contender?  Possibly, but only time will tell for certain.  Of course, it is also only a matter of time before HVD (Holographic Versatile Disc) is on the market with its uncompressed video and enough storage to hold 200 DVDs worth of content, but that is a blog for another day.

DVS Creative Creates Complex Training DVD for Latin American Market

Here at DVS Creative we recently completed work on a complex DVD based training program for an international corporation. Looking to educate new and existing employees within their Latin America market, this corporation came to DVS Creative to solve a need that they knew was beyond the scope of many other vendors.

The DVD works in conjunction with an online course that was built simultaneously. Both the DVD and the online course consist of three different lessons and an assessment. The lessons cover everything from the introduction of the company, to selling tips and customer service scenarios. Within the lessons there are many different small quizzes, utilizing multiple choice, true/false and other learning techniques. When taking the assessment, users locally record their answers and use the SMS (text messaging) function of their cell phones to text the answers in.

Even though planning covered the better part of a year, actual development occurred in just a month and a half! Using the online course as a template, initial menus were created in English for reference and then translated to Spanish and Portuguese. Next came motion menu development, complete with audio and full interactivity. For the final step in the process, the disc was mastered and thoroughly tested by a team of eight test participants.

Different than most DVDs, this DVD contains no video, and is completely menu based. In total there are approximately 400 menus per language, with an average of 8 buttons per page. That’s roughly 6,400 buttons that needed to be authored and tested to make sure everything worked correctly.

Always up for a challenge, DVS Creative developed this unique use of two different types of media (DVD and SMS) to allow our client to reach an audience with no practical access to the internet. This is just one of several challenging DVD authoring projects that DVS has recently completed, with more on the horizon!