NewTek VT[4] LIVE!

Is the Competition Toast?

By George Avgerakis

April 1, 2005    Source: Studio Monthly

The NewTek Video Toaster made its debut in 1991 and started the "desktop video" revolution. It’s 14 years later and this product is now in version 4, dubbed VT[4], and is being offered in several different bundles. With an Educational Bundle (for $5,995) or a VT[4] Card and Software Bundle (for $3,995), the most common configuration is what the company is calling the VT[4] LIVE! Integrated Production Suite ($6,495). This includes the SX-84 Switcher Expansion (an elaborate breakout box) and the RS-8 Remote Switcher, which features a fader bar and lighted source buttons.

To help walk you through all of this, the company sends out the VT[4] with a prodigious illustrated guide as thick as a New York City telephone directory. Let’s take a look here at some of what VT[4] LIVE! has to offer.

The Switcher

VT[4] will accommodate live switching of up to eight component, eight Y/C or 24 composite sources with audio support, alpha channel and genlock. If you equip your computer with DV inputs, you can add these sources to the above allotment. The same goes for any SDI source, but of course, the NewTek SDI is about the least expensive you will find.

Although the switcher can be emulated on the computer screen as a virtual device, you’ll find the hardware option easier to use. I found the rack-mountable SX-84 expansion board to be well designed and useful both as a breakout box and as an audio-video patch panel. However, I would have preferred the nine computer cable jacks along the right to have been installed on the back of the unit. Since these installations are more likely to happen just once, they are rather cumbersome cluttering up the otherwise neat front.

I tried installing a non-TBCd S-VHS deck, a BetaSP deck, and a component camera. The system recognized and perfectly synchronized all three signals, allowing me to live switch into VT[4]’s Digital Disk Recorder. Each input is supported by a virtual processing amplifier (proc amp), TBC (time base corrector) and waveform/vectorscope. However, I am told that up to 8 Y/C or component cameras or up to 24 composite cameras can be connected to the switcher, set to color bars and VT[4] will automatically calibrate to whatever camera is connected to Input 1. This is a huge time saver when setting up event shoots. I also would have liked to have seen at least two DV inputs included with the system.

When installed in a suitable host computer, VT[4] includes a live video-source switcher with integrated TBCs, a nonlinear editing system, a 3D animation program, a 3D paint and compositing program, live Internet streaming, DVD authoring and a suite of virtual equipment created in software (monitors, decks, waveform/vectorscope, audio mixer, etc.).

The basic interface of the VT-Edit, the NLE program of [VT]4, shows the Timeline edit mode across the top, a bin of clips across the lower left and the VT-Vision "program monitor" in the lower right. Notice that I’m building a 2-picture-in-picture effect over an American flag background, but obviously, the flag clip is too short.

Here, I’ve made the flag clip longer by opening the Edit Properties window (left side overlay), "untwirled" the "Playback Speed" controller and changed the percentage of speed from 100 to 10. VT-Edit automatically extends the clip to represent the new duration with the Edit Properties panel. In Control Tree view, you have to drag it out as shown here on the timeline. Now the flag overlaps the two clips to be DVE’d over it.

Here the "airplane" clip is now shown in the "Control Tree" mode. Notice the large array of control options on the left, where I have changed the size, rotation, position and edge of the clip. Begin, end and final key frames are indicated as thin, pink vertical lines in the timeline above the Position Panel. Playback is instantaneous.

The 3D animation program in VT[4] is LightWave [8], which is operated in two modes, LightWave Layout (shown here) and Modeler (right). Here is where objects are assembled on a stage and given motion, keyframes, lighting, etc. Notice the timeline at the bottom, where keyframes are stored.

In the Modeler mode of Lightwave, where objects are created, you can load the basic elements of objects into the Layer Controls where cut, paste and other constructive tools are used. The object is shown in four view panels, which can be changed as needed.

The SX-84 Switcher Expansion panel, above, and the RS-8 Remote Switcher, sitting beneath it, complement the VT[4] hardware. Both units plug directly into, and receive their power and signals from, the host computer. The SX-84 might serve better if connections are made at the back of the unit.

The Nonlinear Editor

The NLE system is highly flexible and lets the editor use storyboard editing, timeline editing or EDL list. The EDL includes live picon support, but unfortunately, there is no playback cursor in the EDL mode, which would make this mode even more useful.

Captures go into galleries of picons that play instantly whenever the cursor passes over them. Control-click a sequence of picons and drag the group to the timeline to create an instant storyboard playback. This is the fastest way to start an edit, after which I would switch to the timeline mode for refinement of durations and addition of effects.

I don’t think there’s an NLE out there with more transitions than VT[4]—there are more than 500, some unique.

In addition to prepackaged effects, the user is offered a two-part method of designing DVE picture-in-picture effects. Gross control of DVEs supported by the Positioning Panel, which features the clip in a wider field and allows the user to click and grab keyframeable nodes that control size, rotation and positioning. Once these are set, the user can open a unique Control Tree. This is a hierarchical text outline with "twirlies" like Adobe After Effects that offer an array of parameters, including edge softness, transparency, color and shadows.

Unfortunately, the DVE control does not include skewing or warping. These are offered as part of a complex SDK program that works under the 3D animation software. In other words, you can do warps, but first you have to learn the animation software and the SDK.

The NLE also includes a 4-channel audio recorder with 8-band EQ and a highly professional floating point audio record algorithm that provides 12dB of headroom (nearly eliminating the possibility of distortion on digital recording).

I found the NLE the most valuable part of VT[4], worth as much as half the retail price.

3D Animation Program

If the NLE is worth half the price of VT[4], the animation program, a full-blown version of LightWave [8], is worth the entire price. LightWave 3D is the easiest of the four leading 3D animation software programs popular in feature film and commercial production today (the others being 3ds max, Maya and Softimage XSI). LightWave is a very mature program that lets the user create sophisticated characters, lighting and scenery in a comparatively short time. The end product of LightWave is a sequence of picture files. These can be exported to the NLE for instant playback and output to tape, forming a seamless creation-distribution engine upon which an entire career may be based.

3D Paint and Compositing

NewTek originally developed Aura as a 2D paint and animation program. In VT[4], Aura serves both LightWave and the NLE programs. In VT-Edit, Aura can replace Adobe Photoshop as your favorite paint program, by offering a range of functions, which were designed specifically for video and the ability to animate these functions over time, using keyframes. An Aura scripting language, called George, allows the user to create macros that control any function of Aura, and to recall these routines with one mouse click.

Other Features

Using the switcher, the user can invoke VT-Stream to create live programs and insert pre-edited sequences that are output live to the Internet. VT-Stream uses Windows Media Encoder that provides up to 10 simultaneous viewers without the need for a dedicated server.

The DVD authoring features of VT[4] is a plug-in bundle provided by Ulead, known as DVD Workshop 2. Consider this software a nice throw-in for possible DVD and CD creation, but otherwise, not too remarkable.

The package also includes some virtual equipment for users attempting to build a fully functional desktop video studio, which helps avoid the inevitability of acquiring additional equipment that can certainly double the cost of the basic tape deck and NLE package. These include a keyframeable proc amp and color corrector, waveform/vectorscope, standards converter, chromakeyer and character generator.

While this is an awesome array of tools, I would not suggest that the potential user disregard the eventual necessity of augmenting the edit suite with some professional level support tools such as a professional quality video monitor, audio patch bay, amplifier and speakers.