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CNET)
A recent review of Corel Digital Studio 2010 got me close and personal with the consumer-oriented multimedia suite. Corel's studio excelled at providing a consistent, unified look, navigation, and toolset across its applications for editing photos and videos, making movies, burning content, and playing videos. It also copies photos, videos, and music to your mobile device, and can create photo projects like photo books and cards.
All good stuff, but it doesn't come cheap. Multimedia suites like this will put you out about $100. They're worth the price if you frequently use the tools, or if you vastly prefer the convenience and accessibility of a consumer-friendly setup. However, if you don't mind being scrappy, you can cobble together a spread of multimedia tools--your own "suite"--for next to nothing.
Edit and create
FastStone Image Viewer has quick-access editing tools.
(Credit: Screenshot by Jason Parker/CNET)Photo editing, video editing, and making movies are the three largest focal points of multimedia suites like Corel Digital Studio 2010 and Roxio Creator 2010 (unfortunately, no download trial is available for the latter). Google's Picasa is one of my favorite freeware tools for casual users, and one of the closest direct matches to what's offered in a multimedia suite. Its uses are multifarious: organizing your photos and videos into albums, editing images and videos, sharing online, creating projects like collages and movies, and ordering prints.
The image-editing tools are serviceable, with red-eye removal, one-click lighting fixes, cropping and straightening, and finer tools for addressing blemishes and lighting. There are also 12 effects, like sepia tones and soft focus. This contrasts with Picasa's low-grade video editor, which can at least rotate videos and trim them. The movie maker has many more controls, but is basic; it doesn't build in the polished templates of a premium program. Picasa does, however, offer to sell you prints from a choice of providers (choice is good), and can help create a collage.
For standalone photo editing, the freeware applications FastStone Image Viewer, IrfanView, Paint.NET, and GIMP range in features from the accessible to the powerful. Read more about them in this resource guide.
Vista and Windows 7 users can try out Microsft's new Windows Live Movie Maker (review), freeware that can slap photos and video clips into a new movie in seconds. Deeper controls let you tweak transitions, captions, and effects after the automation. Editing tools include splitting, trimming, and applying fade points. As a point of comparison, video editors in these consumer-focused multimedia suites are better-equipped, perhaps with audio-tuning tools and features to adjust video lighting.
Windows Live Movie Maker works on Vista and Windows 7 computers.
(Credit: Screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt/CNET)Creating calendars and photo books are a DIY project within your reach if you have an excellent photo printer and a home bookbinding kit. Otherwise, you can spend your energy on the editing and captioning and get a project printed somewhere else. Retail shops, like FedEx Office in the U.S., will print projects. Online photo albums and services like Shutterfly, Snapfish, and Zazzle will also gladly accept your business. The 12-month calendars run from $15 to $20; large photo books are often in the mid-$30 range (online services often charge for shipping). Corel Digital Studio is similarly priced.
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Vayyoo)
vPost, which launched this week for BlackBerrys running version 4.5 and 4.6*, is a free-to-try application that aggregates your multimedia into one interface and makes it easier to share and post online. (*A version for the Storm is due later this month.) You'll be able to attach up to five separate media files--up to 1.5 MB--including audio and video clips, photos, text notes, and files stored on your internal memory or SD card.
At a lifetime purchase of about $10, the application seems a bit steep for something that can be accomplished, albeit slower, using the regular BlackBerry functions. Still, for serious sharing and social networking junkies, the app offers more than a modicum of convenience. For instance, you can set up one "Favorite" e-mail address to turn into a one-click routing destination (including the CC and BCC lines, you can squeeze out three.) You'll also be able to e-mail your media and notes to any number of recipients, including the pals in your address book and the upload e-mail addresses for social networks such as Facebook, Picasa, Blogger, Utterli, Wordpress, and so on.
vPost shows promise, but we'd like easier ways to post to social networks than adding them into the address book.
(Credit: Vayyoo)If it seems a little ridiculous to pay for the privilege of e-mailing your own multimedia to your own social networks instead of uploading them through a convenient widget, you're not alone, but vPost's publisher Vayyoo tells us that customizable widgets are on the agenda for a future release. However, even without them, vPost isn't devoid of helpful tools. Its integration with the BlackBerry's calendar and e-mail make it possible to open a vPost to respond to a meeting or reply to an e-mail in your in-box using a voice note or images. In addition, if your BlackBerry has GPS capabilities, you'll be able to let others chart and map your location--potentially useful if you're posting from a party.
While the integration, hot keys, and convenience of being able to create and share multimedia clips in one place speak well of the new app, vPost's drawbacks make me hesitant to recommend it for all but the most hardcore media-sharers and bloggers. Still, this is one app we'll keep an eye on as it develops.
Download vPost's two-week trial over-the-air.
If you have a lot of media to browse through, no matter what viewer you use, it's bound to take some time. Whatever the project may be--from picking the best shots from a pro photo shoot to getting the most action-packed movie clips from a birthday party--you need a good way to browse, compare, and sort through your media quickly. The obvious choices on your Mac are iPhoto or iMovie, but if you're looking for a different way to sort through several media file-types with added unique features, check out AtomicView.
An intuitive interface makes it easy to navigate through media quickly.
(Credit: CNET Networks)AtomicView offers a sparse, but intuitive interface for sifting through tons of images and videos quickly. It takes advantage of multicore processors and your video hardware, letting you work even while importing large amounts of high-quality media. Just drag-and-drop a folder full of images to the bottom of the interface and watch AtomicView quickly gather and display all the information about each image--without significant slow downs. From there you'll be able to perform simple changes like batch rotating or batch renaming in only a couple of steps. You also can create groups to make it easier to find media from specific events.
Search using any number of different criteria to find specific images.
(Credit: CNET Networks)AtomicView offers excellent viewing options, letting you go into full-screen mode with movable interface elements and different viewing variations to fit your workflow. A comprehensive search feature lets you search by a number of different criteria so you can find specific media in several ways. AtomicView supports ITPC, EXIF, and XMP Metadata formats and you can create your own fields to make finding specific shots from a subgroup of images extremely easy.
Full-screen views make it easy to sort through and compare similar high-quality images.
(Credit: CNET Networks)While AtomicView doesn't offer the editing tools of other programs, it's the perfect fit for professional photographers and digital camera enthusiasts who need to sort through and analyze big folders of media. The image-analysis-friendly interface, simple tools, and customizable views make it a natural choice for those who process large amounts of high-quality media.
Fast to load and yet possessing robust features, Foxit PDF Reader is a strong freeware alternative to the dominance of the Adobe Reader. The new features in version 2.3 include two notable improvements, a slew of minor ones, and small tweak that goes a long way to put Foxit on nearly equal footing with its better-known competitors.
Foxit PDF Reader 2.3 adds tabbed PDFs, multimedia support, and more.
(Credit: CNET Networks)Foxit now supports tabbed PDF reading, porting the feature from Web browsers into the world of documents. This is a no-brainer, and makes it much easier for having multiple PDFs open simultaneously.
The other important improvement is that Foxit now supports multimedia embeds in PDFs. Although PDFs are an effective way to compile lengthy text documents, they are not paper and shouldn't be treated as mere digitalizations of print products. Being able to watch video or listen to an audio track in PDFs is a long-needed feature.
Other improvements in this version include permanent bookmarks--as long as the PDF's security settings allow them--automatic mouse-free scrolling, a magnifying tool, rulers and guides for PDF creation, commenting tools and call-out boxes, and the capability to print a selected area from within Foxit.
Oh, and that small tweak? Finally, Foxit Reader lets users click on hyperlinks. It's hard to believe that this feature didn't exist in previous editions, but it's here now. Along with multimedia support, Foxit looks like it's positioned itself as one of the top alternatives to the bloated Adobe Reader.
The GOM Media Player (hands-on review) is more than meets the eye. The free multimedia player has presets to optimize sound quality (see CNET video) and some interesting built-in tools for capturing images (see CNET video) and correcting exposure for video playback. It also supports subtitles for karaoke glory.
Meet GOM Media Player in the First Look video below, or see other First Look videos.
In addition to the disc-ripping and -burning capabilities with which Nero first made its mark, the digital-media suite also offers a bevy of options for managing movies, music, and photos. Nero helps you create and edit videos and music files, share that content online, turn your PC into a media center, and back up and recover data in case of disaster. Nero 8 includes a revamped entry page in addition to new support for burning and creating HD and Blu-ray CDs and DVDs.
Nero 8 costs $79 to download, $99 for the box, and $49 to upgrade from Nero 7 Ultra Edition. In the past, Nero has not issued a new version of its software every year, unlike so many other brands. Instead, a new package would come onto the market every other year or so. Peppered between each release were significant updates that Nero's 50 million or so active users could download for free. Now, however, Nero will follow an annual version-update schedule.... Read more
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