Recent releases of some major 3D programs just don’t deliver the WOW! factor that they once did. Not long ago, every release introduced at least one exciting tool, such as subdivision surfaces, global illumination, and cloth and fluid simulations. With so much fabulous technology already under the hood, the current trend in releases just tweaks existing tools to increase performance.... »
Like many of you, I’ve been a long-time user of Cakewalk music production software. During the past few years the program’s just been getting better and better with each new release. The latest bundle, Cakewalk Pro Suite, includes Sonar 7, Project5 and the company’s two award– winning software synthesizers, Rapture and Dimension Pro.... »
The press release may promise something that’s "revolutionary," but that’s rarely the case. With the HP DreamColor LP2480zx 24-inch LCD display, however, the product really could live up to the hype.... »
I’ve never been much of a "sungun guy." Most halogen camera-mount lights are blunt instruments at best— the equivalent of shining headlights into the eyes of a deer at night, and hard on ... »
It is hard to overestimate the impact the original NewTek TriCaster made when it was released in 2005. Quite simply put, this $5,000 shoebox-shaped computer gave anyone wanting to do multi-camera video production most of the tools they needed.... »
The Primera family of DVD/CD duplicators has long been recognized as disc production workhorses, but the end of the high-definition optical disc format war has given that family a newly important mission: Blu-ray video disc production. ... »
AJA has been producing some of the best video capture cards in the industry for several years, including the Kona 2 and Kona 3 series, which have been available in several flavors to accommodate differing PCI bus architectures and SD and HD video formats.... »
With so many 3D plug-in effects available, you would think it would be easy to choose the right one. Unfortunately, as the number of plug-ins increases, so does the complexity of the choice. Trapcode Form turned out to be just what I was looking for.... »
Sony takes Vegas up a notch with Vegas Pro 8. This first-rate video and audio editing software package has been revamped to run on Windows Vista, a feat that its Vegas 7 predecessor couldn’t quite accomplish effectively.... »
Visual Communicator 3 is the first release of the product since Adobe acquired Serious Magic. The company has added some very cool new features to VC3 while preserving its powerful core feature set.... »
Not only is Logic Pro 8 full of exciting features, improvements and upgrades, it is now part of its own suite, Logic Pro Studio, which includes Soundtrack Pro 2, a dedicated music performance package called Mainstage, and a bundle of excellent instrument, effects, sound libraries and production utilities.... »
Boris FX plug-ins have been around almost as long as NLEs have. Since the very beginning, the company has put out high-quality, customizable 3D transitions for the most... »
If you’ve read about the new quad-core workstations, you’ve probably wondered if they could substantially speed up your work. I wondered about that, too. So I jumped at the chance to review the latest HP xw8400 Workstation... »
KICKING IN HIGH-END PERFORMANCE FOR HIGH-RES ANIMATION Like many technology markets, the graphics card industry has undergone several significant changes in the last few years. First, pioneer 3DLabs dropped... »
