The
latest Pinnicle Liquid Edition version 7 is
presented in a box on a single DVD, The box has
some attractions, the first is that it now belongs
to Avid, Those of you familiar with online edit
suites will no doubt have heard of the Avid product
range it was and is the software specification that
many professional setups are running.
This recognised name has an added bonus, I like the idea that I can market my system as an Avid suite (Maybe not in the true sense of the available systems).
Looking at the back of the box, I couldn’t really see any major differences from the current version 6. It seems to advertise quite strongly HDV, but version 6 also has this format.
The next thing was that on the DVD the serial number says next to it title deko pro, does this mean it has the pro version, the side of the box only says title deko rt, the answer to this is a disappointingly no.
On installation I found the single DVD easy to use and the setup straight forward, “My saying is real men don’t read manuals”. And I didn’t. After a couple of questions like Jog shuttle options the programme finished loading and an AVID icon appears on the desktop. The initial project opens with a demo, it’s those racing cars again (same as version 6) not a patch on the demo sequence in pinnacle 5.5 where you see sky diver falling out of planes, pole volters and skiers and all that. In My opinion the demo shows little use of the effects available with the package. My guess is that someone in AVID likes to go to the races and is working some kind of angle on the filming. In all seriousness I believe this is a missed opportunity the sequence in the liquid 5.5 which showed variations on extreme sports; to me, revealed a more exciting approach to the software and included better use of the multilayered edit sequence, I think this gave the customer a more immediate grasp of the concept of the software and revealed more of the special effects available without overloading the sequence with transitions. I was much more willing to persevere with the software to mirror the quality of the edit when confronted with the high colours and tasteful push threw wipes from 5.5. Initial glances across the screen I see that it’s aspect ratio is set up for 16.9 on the preview monitors. Anyone with HD cams will like this. There’s a couple of added icons set as defaults on the tool bars, these are TC (time code) upon pressing, a nice window opens up to shown the timeline TC its adjustable so you can make it nice and big. I wonder if I can burn Time Code in vision on a playout that would be useful. (More on that later). Initially I can’t see any difference, but wait! open up the library and there’s something that’s immediately eye catching, Commotion Clip FX and Magic Bullet,
Magic Bullet has a filters which allow your production to take on various movie looks. There are about 55 filters some are just tints but there’s some nice ones that enrich the colours and put that movie look on a production. I really liked the buffalo filter; with it I was able to restore the colour to an overexposed project. In commotion there’s ten folders and some really useful tricks and tools for enhancing your production there’s a nice Broadcast safe, this reduces the luminance and clears all the peaks which would blow the transmitter should they get past the technicians, If your into sending your projects into the networks this is a great tool, and what’s more it will present a professional control on your material. My only comment on the filters and tools is the actual rendering time required for the conversion process. I understand that a lots going on but it took 36 hours. The results were worth waiting for and a project that was shelved, I managed to resurrect and send of to be considered for transmission.
That surely would have been worth the cost of the upgrade.
There are some great additions not immediately recognizable until you start digging around. In the file menu I found smart sound which has lots of unlicensed music, which have a professional mix on the sound. I have always been cautious of unlicensed music but the sounds are great. The link to the website allows you to expand on an already large library of sounds.
Additionally a large number of Hollywood effects are available, Transitions and filters that will put your head into a spin; if you like the animated transitions then go out and buy this version.
One major bug bear and I say this with the great caution at the risk of never being allowed the opportunity to review a product like this again, is the requirement to download a patch for the software. I must have spent hours in transferring a timeline to DVD and after a couple of failing attempts I had to resort to technical support, after clicking on downloads I found a 140 Mega Bite file which was a patch for various (too many to mention) Bugs in the system. If I had actually paid for the software I think I would have been fairly “peed off” with this requirement. I found little difficulty in opening an old pinnacle 6 project up in Liquid 7, but a note to beware of, is that there’s no backwards compatibility, so once you’ve made the jump you’ll have to stick with it. I rendered and burnt off a couple of old 2 hour projects which needed to be rendered down to fit on a 4.7 G disc. I used to see the transitions pixilate down when downsizing the bitrate the results seemed to be better this time around, any information on this I would be pleased to hear from Avid. One thing I did notice is that you don’t seemed to have as much control over the burn process, the ability to downsize the bitrate is no longer an obvious option, maybe this is to do with providing a better quality in the rendering process. The rendering view is still available and keeps a nice record of the progress of transfer to DVD for your project.
There’s a great number of export options available, which allow you to convert to the various formats such as, Mpeg 1,2, and 4, Windows Media, AVI, QuickTime, I pod and PSP to name but a few. I needed to transfer the project to another standard (NTSC), I found this available by opening another project, and using the time warp function to 100%. “Great” a universal standards converter at my finger tips, (although the rendering time has to be factored into the equation).Other conversions are available this way and allow you to convert Standard Definition into High Def formats, it’s worth mentioning though that unless the quality’s there in the first place you not going to see it in the second place. When playing out to Tape the platform creates a nice smooth and reliable export, I was a little disappointed that I couldn’t export time code in vision to the project, maybe this is something there saving for Avid 8.
In conclusion this Software is versatile and more than capable of delivering the professional standard to a production company, and when looking at PC based editing software it stands head and shoulders above anything else I’ve seen. I am disappointed that I needed to download and patch a 140 Mega Bite file and would expect this to be a serious consideration to anyone without broadband; although an upgrade disc is available free of charge this should have been included in the software.
Would I go and buy the full Avid 7 product if I had never used it before ?
Answer. Definitely
Would I go out and buy the upgrade for my Liquid 6 ?
Answer. Yes
This recognised name has an added bonus, I like the idea that I can market my system as an Avid suite (Maybe not in the true sense of the available systems).
Looking at the back of the box, I couldn’t really see any major differences from the current version 6. It seems to advertise quite strongly HDV, but version 6 also has this format.
The next thing was that on the DVD the serial number says next to it title deko pro, does this mean it has the pro version, the side of the box only says title deko rt, the answer to this is a disappointingly no.
On installation I found the single DVD easy to use and the setup straight forward, “My saying is real men don’t read manuals”. And I didn’t. After a couple of questions like Jog shuttle options the programme finished loading and an AVID icon appears on the desktop. The initial project opens with a demo, it’s those racing cars again (same as version 6) not a patch on the demo sequence in pinnacle 5.5 where you see sky diver falling out of planes, pole volters and skiers and all that. In My opinion the demo shows little use of the effects available with the package. My guess is that someone in AVID likes to go to the races and is working some kind of angle on the filming. In all seriousness I believe this is a missed opportunity the sequence in the liquid 5.5 which showed variations on extreme sports; to me, revealed a more exciting approach to the software and included better use of the multilayered edit sequence, I think this gave the customer a more immediate grasp of the concept of the software and revealed more of the special effects available without overloading the sequence with transitions. I was much more willing to persevere with the software to mirror the quality of the edit when confronted with the high colours and tasteful push threw wipes from 5.5. Initial glances across the screen I see that it’s aspect ratio is set up for 16.9 on the preview monitors. Anyone with HD cams will like this. There’s a couple of added icons set as defaults on the tool bars, these are TC (time code) upon pressing, a nice window opens up to shown the timeline TC its adjustable so you can make it nice and big. I wonder if I can burn Time Code in vision on a playout that would be useful. (More on that later). Initially I can’t see any difference, but wait! open up the library and there’s something that’s immediately eye catching, Commotion Clip FX and Magic Bullet,
Magic Bullet has a filters which allow your production to take on various movie looks. There are about 55 filters some are just tints but there’s some nice ones that enrich the colours and put that movie look on a production. I really liked the buffalo filter; with it I was able to restore the colour to an overexposed project. In commotion there’s ten folders and some really useful tricks and tools for enhancing your production there’s a nice Broadcast safe, this reduces the luminance and clears all the peaks which would blow the transmitter should they get past the technicians, If your into sending your projects into the networks this is a great tool, and what’s more it will present a professional control on your material. My only comment on the filters and tools is the actual rendering time required for the conversion process. I understand that a lots going on but it took 36 hours. The results were worth waiting for and a project that was shelved, I managed to resurrect and send of to be considered for transmission.
That surely would have been worth the cost of the upgrade.
There are some great additions not immediately recognizable until you start digging around. In the file menu I found smart sound which has lots of unlicensed music, which have a professional mix on the sound. I have always been cautious of unlicensed music but the sounds are great. The link to the website allows you to expand on an already large library of sounds.
Additionally a large number of Hollywood effects are available, Transitions and filters that will put your head into a spin; if you like the animated transitions then go out and buy this version.
One major bug bear and I say this with the great caution at the risk of never being allowed the opportunity to review a product like this again, is the requirement to download a patch for the software. I must have spent hours in transferring a timeline to DVD and after a couple of failing attempts I had to resort to technical support, after clicking on downloads I found a 140 Mega Bite file which was a patch for various (too many to mention) Bugs in the system. If I had actually paid for the software I think I would have been fairly “peed off” with this requirement. I found little difficulty in opening an old pinnacle 6 project up in Liquid 7, but a note to beware of, is that there’s no backwards compatibility, so once you’ve made the jump you’ll have to stick with it. I rendered and burnt off a couple of old 2 hour projects which needed to be rendered down to fit on a 4.7 G disc. I used to see the transitions pixilate down when downsizing the bitrate the results seemed to be better this time around, any information on this I would be pleased to hear from Avid. One thing I did notice is that you don’t seemed to have as much control over the burn process, the ability to downsize the bitrate is no longer an obvious option, maybe this is to do with providing a better quality in the rendering process. The rendering view is still available and keeps a nice record of the progress of transfer to DVD for your project.
There’s a great number of export options available, which allow you to convert to the various formats such as, Mpeg 1,2, and 4, Windows Media, AVI, QuickTime, I pod and PSP to name but a few. I needed to transfer the project to another standard (NTSC), I found this available by opening another project, and using the time warp function to 100%. “Great” a universal standards converter at my finger tips, (although the rendering time has to be factored into the equation).Other conversions are available this way and allow you to convert Standard Definition into High Def formats, it’s worth mentioning though that unless the quality’s there in the first place you not going to see it in the second place. When playing out to Tape the platform creates a nice smooth and reliable export, I was a little disappointed that I couldn’t export time code in vision to the project, maybe this is something there saving for Avid 8.
In conclusion this Software is versatile and more than capable of delivering the professional standard to a production company, and when looking at PC based editing software it stands head and shoulders above anything else I’ve seen. I am disappointed that I needed to download and patch a 140 Mega Bite file and would expect this to be a serious consideration to anyone without broadband; although an upgrade disc is available free of charge this should have been included in the software.
Would I go and buy the full Avid 7 product if I had never used it before ?
Answer. Definitely
Would I go out and buy the upgrade for my Liquid 6 ?
Answer. Yes
Avid Liquid Pro 7.0 Software Review