Viewfinder: New Beginnings: a New Look for a New Year.

As you may have already noticed, Videomaker has a new look. It is important, every so often, for a magazine to change if the marketplace that it serves is dynamic. In our case, we are certain that our marketplace is hyper-dynamic. We report on new products every month and, in the last few years, we have seen entirely new categories of products appear. Our world has changed in the two decades since the launching of Videomaker.

Some changes you may not have noticed. For example, we used to talk about linear (two VCRs) versus non-linear editing (on a computer). Now it's simply editing. Since there are very few people who edit video linearly, we no longer need to qualify the nonlinear aspects of video editing.

How we buy our editing equipment has also changed. These days, most computer manufacturers offer computers with video-editing features built right in, such as FireWire. Video editing appliances are another option. In any case, companies that specialize in video are important to our industry, especially when they offer us advice and support for our complex hobby.

Over the years, we have reinvented ourselves and the magazine, little by little, to adjust to changes in the marketplace. Most people don't like change. We are creatures of habit and we quickly grow accustomed to the status quo. We know our readers, however, so be assured that our redesign won't alienate any of you. For example, you may think it a minor point, but we did not shrink our typeface by even a tiny fraction. None of us is getting any younger, after all, and a magazine isn't anything if it isn't readable.