TopTenREVIEWS

The Edius 5 in-house effects collection is extremely limited so a collection of third party applications attempt to compensate. The collection consists of ProDAD VitaScene video filters and transitions, ProDAD Mercalli video stabilization filter, NewBlueFX Motion Effects, Art Effects and Filter Effects which offers – you guessed it – video motion and color effects, iZotope VST Audio Plug-ins, Corel DVD MovieFactory SE for authoring (including Blu-ray authoring), and ArtBeats Video Collection, which is a collection of stock footage.

This collection represents a mess of different interfaces, duplicated effects and filters, and an overall headache due to the poorly constructed interface offered by VitaScene.

Interface

The interfaces for Premier and Final Cut have evolved beautifully by incorporating panels and custom workspaces. Edius 5 still uses pop-ups for transitions and effects that quickly create a cluttered and confusing workspace. The look and feel of this release is much better than past versions, but it still seems old-fashioned compared to the competition.

A free 30-day Edius NLE trial is available from the Grass Valley website. You will need to create a GV Desktop User Account before downloading the trial. The user account is also required to gain access to tech support.

New features in Edius 5 include a freeze frame effect, support for clip markers, mouse-base track adjustments, and improved drawing and kerning tools.

Audio editing is all done through iZotope VST Audion Plug-ins, which is simply a collection of 14 audio plug-ins. There isn’t support for 5.1 surround sound, voice over, or automatic volume adjustment. It is a pretty basic audio package with very few bells and whistles, but for minor tweaking it should work.

Native Support

Edius was originally developed by Canopus, who actually develops codecs, not post-production software. So you shouldn’t be surprised to see an impressive list of natively supported formats. Edius 5 provides complete native support for the following:

Grass Valley™ Infinity JPEG 2000
Panasonic DVCPRO 50 and DVCPRO HD
Panasonic P2 (drives and media)
Panasonic VariCam
Panasonic AVC-Intra
Sony XDCAM and XDCAM HD (including 4:2:2 50Mbit)
Sony XDCAM EX
JVC ProHD
Ikegami GFCAM
AVCHD
HDV

You no longer have to upgrade to the Edius Broadcast edition to get all of these formats. They are all included in version 5 and the best part is that you can mix and match these formats in the same timeline.

Following product registration and creating your GV Desktop User Account, you have access to tech support documents – which is basically an FAQ – and email support by completing and submitting a form.

What’s in the Box