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Cyberlink updates its video lineup

Cyberlink has just introduced its latest version of PowerDirector and Media Deluxe Pro. Cyberlink is a wildly crea-tive company and that adjective is chosen carefully. The company draws from a deep well of creative talent in Taiwan who are associated with the University, thanks to the company chairman Jau Huang and his longstanding relationship with the school. For instance, Cyberlink is pushing the boundaries of PC TV to places that TV would never go alone with its new Media Deluxe Pro.

Media Deluxe Pro

The company has put itself out ahead with its new video analyzing and editing features. For people who want to get their video into a viewable form as quickly as possible, Media Deluxe Pro lets users add themes, music and they’re done. Where Cyberlink has -really changed the game is by adding their MagicSports feature. Obviously someone at the company sat down and thought about what people actually do with their televisions. Watching sports is right up there and to serve that audience Cyberlink added a feature that analyzes recorded sports and pulls out the highlights. They have created the software on a game-by-game basis using people who understand the games to identify the patterns that indicate a change in the game—for instance, the roar of the crowd, replays, etc., and they say they’re studying different sports to add them.

Media Deluxe Pro’s MakeDisk feature makes it easy to burn CDs and DVDs with pictures and videos. The model here is that you have people over, you show them the pictures or video of the trip you all took together, and you can run off a CD to take home.

Media Deluxe Pro supports UPnP devices with SoftDMA, a software-based digital media adapter to bring in content from a media server. In addition, Cyberlink has its own Media Server to make content available across a UPnP network. Media Deluxe Pro is available in two versions. The Standard version includes Power DV, MakeDisk, and MagicDirector and sells for $39.95. The Pro version sells for $69.95 and includes adds MagicSports, MagicServer, and SoftDMA.

Power Director

Similarly, Cyberlink has put a wealth of features into the PowerDirector box and they have to. The competition in consumer video software is ruinous. Also, Cyberlink is angling to take advantage of the world’s fascination with homemade video and supporting video uploads for YouTube and VBlogs. In addition, it is supporting media players with MPEG-4 SP, AVC SD, and AVC for HD profiles.

Speaking of HD, Cyberlink has also added HDV support and features the ability to write out edited HD content back to HD tape. It supports 720p and 1080i HD MPEG-2 formats, which, again, is becoming a requirement though it seems likely people will be asounded at just how much storage they’re consuming with these new cameras and formats. Ah, never mind, that’s why the universe told Sony and Toshiba and their friends to go out and create new video formats.

Cyberlink is supporting the new DVD cameras, which, blessedly are becoming better on their own. It also supports DV-to-DVD direct burning backup, which, again, is a good thing for users trying to figure out where to store all the GBytes of video they’re producing almost by accident.

There are also some surprises that the company hasn’t made a really big deal about. For instance, the company has licensed SmartSound content. SmartSound is a clever company that has developed technology that combines the best of audio loop technology and packaged tracks. It offers libraries of tunes for all occasions that can be purchased and manipulated to fit video sequences. Unlike loops, the tunes are complete and can be used “out of the box.” Unlike tracks, they can be adjusted to fit the project. The biggest drawback to SmartSound is that the price for individual tracks is expensive when compared to buying music for a buck a song. Sure, there are copyright issues related to using commercial music as backgrounds for video, but it’s unlikely consumers are planning to sell these great creations.

However, for those who are interested in widely distributing their works of art, or for companies creating presentations, SmartSound is a great answer.

In actual use, Cyberlink’s products are dead easy, and when it comes to basic functions, capturing video, making a video or slide show, the editing features are the best for consumers I’ve ever encountered. And, it’s fast.

As a point of comparison I downloaded and ran Muvee, an excellent instant movie making software. It’s still excellent, but in comparison to Cyberlink, or to the cycle of the earth around the sun for that matter, it’s dead slow.

Okay, so now for the big inevitable buts, it’s easy to get the feeling that Cyberlink’s engineers just wander off in the middle of a project. The magic features are not as easy to use as they should be. It’s not easy to switch to the “magic” features once you’ve gone down the path of doing it yourself. Instead, you’ll wind up creating a different project. There are not enough styles and templates included for the automatic creation tools, and almost all of the effects and templates tend to be a little more cute than many adults would like. Most likely Cyberlink is looking at the vast majority of video consumers and assuming them to be families with small children, but at that, they’re missing wide swaths of the demographic and ignoring the very market segments they identified with support for video blogging, YouTube, and media player support—young users who casually capture video with whatever device is handy, the mobile phone, digital still camera, or video camera.

PowerDirector 6 sells for $89.95.

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