Free Software Upgrade Expands Uncompressed Format Options for Video Editors

Users of Assimilate Scratch 8, Avid Media Composer 8 and Adobe Creative Cloud—including After Effects CC, Speed Grade CC, Audition CC and Prelude CC—can now support SDI/HDMI playback when using Bluefish 444's smaller form-factor Epoch 4K Neutron and Epoch Neutron uncompressed video cards. Version 5.13.0 of the driver is available in a free installer download for Windows 7 and 8 64-bit and Windows Server 2008 and 2012.

The Bluefish 444 Epoch Neutron is a portable, streamlined PCIe video card that works well with rackmount and Thunderbolt systems and is aimed at video editors and SDK developers. The cards offer robust I/O options for such a small size; the Epoch 4K Neutron alone includes 1.5G and 3G SDI I/O, dual-link SDI, 3D stereoscopic, a 12-bit video processing pipeline, HDMI 1.4 output, 4x1D LUTs, and a low-latency video keyer. The Epoch 4K Neutron starts at about $2,000 street, depending on configuration.

Epoch 4K Neutron users on Scratch 8 can now output HDMI and 2K/4K 48fps and 60fps SDI at 8-, 10- and 12-bit in RGB and YUV color space. The upgrade enables Adobe CC users to live capture 4K/2K/HD/SD SDI at up to 4096×2160 60fps from digital cinema cameras and output 4K/2K/HD/SD from the current version of Adobe Premiere Pro CC. (The Bluefish444 ASIO 64 driver provides video and audio monitoring through Adobe's Mercury Transmit plug-in.) The upgraded card supports dedicated HD 1080p 30 YUV/RGB SDI I/O in Avid Media Composer 8 and Avid Symphony and adds HDMI preview.

The driver can be downloaded at the Bluefish444 website.