Reprinted from a CineForm press release:
CineForm, Inc. today is announcing that version 2.5 of its award-winning Aspect HD for Adobe Premiere Pro software will be shipping imminently at a new price of $499. Aspect HD v2.5 adds support for Sony’s new HDR-FX1 HDV camcorder, and will support Sony’s HVR-Z1U Professional HDV camcorder which is anticipated to ship in 1Q05. Aspect HD is widely praised by users and industry experts for its software-based technologies that deliver unmatched visual quality and real-time HD editing performance on affordable Windows desktop PCs running Adobe Premiere Pro.
Additionally, portions of CineForm Intermediate technologies have been licensed to Adobe to enable future support of HDV editing for all users of Adobe Premiere Pro 1.5 through an Adobe plug-in that will be available early next year. Aspect HD v2.5 is further enhanced by additional CineForm Intermediate software technologies to offer more features plus real-time performance for Adobe Premiere Pro users. Aspect HD, as well as the components licensed by Adobe, both rely on CineForm’s Visually Perfect CFHD codec technology which ensures CineForm’s online workflow for all users plus file compatibility for other AVI applications.
About Aspect HD
Aspect HD includes the full suite of CineForm Intermediate technologies, which specifically include CineForm’s Visually Perfect CFHD codec and CineForm’s real-time HD video effects and processing pipeline. These technologies are specially optimized to offer Adobe Premiere Pro users unmatched video quality and real-time performance for HDV post production. Its unprecedented real-time performance is achieved on affordable Windows desktop PCs without specialized hardware, which often causes frustrating compatibility problems for users. On a 3.2GHz P4 CPU, Aspect HD delivers real-time editing — with no dropped frames — on up to three 1080i HDV streams simultaneously, including over 40 HD-optimized real-time transitions and effects, plus color corrections, real-time graphic and title overlays. A threaded version of CineForm’s Visually Perfect encoder is also included for increased performance in multi-CPU configurations. CineForm will offer on- going releases of new real-time features in future versions of Aspect HD.
“We’re excited to work with CineForm to offer our customers a comprehensive, yet affordable solution for HDV editing with Adobe Premiere Pro,” said Richard Townhill, Group Product Manager for Premiere Pro. “Our customers gain substantial workflow efficiencies and broad application compatibilities, which reduces the amount of time and dollars spent in post production compared to other HDV solutions.”
“Our goals with Aspect HD are simple, even if our software technologies are sophisticated,” said David Taylor, CEO of CineForm, “We enable a real- time HDV editing workflow on affordable desktop PCs unmatched by others, while supporting industry-leading editing applications like Adobe Premiere Pro. Our underlying technologies offer an efficient workflow for users because we eliminate both rendering and offline proxy processing. We achieve this at a performance-price ratio substantially greater than competitive offerings. We encourage potential customers to try our trial version of Aspect HD — we suspect they will never want to return to the drudgery of rendering or the expense of specialized hardware.”
Pricing and Availability
Aspect HD v2.5 will begin shipping in early December at new pricing of $499 not including Adobe Premiere Pro 1.5. A bundle with Aspect HD v2.5 that also includes Adobe Premiere Pro 1.5, Adobe Audition, and Adobe Encore will be priced at $799. Both products will be available for purchase from CineForm’s expanding network of resellers, and from CineForm’s website: www.cineform.com. CineForm currently has a fully-functional 15-day trial version of Aspect HD v2.5 available on its website for all users to experiment without obligation.
