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Edit Review: NewTek SpeedEdit

May 1, 2007 12:00 PM, Reviewer: Tom Patrick McAuliffe

NLE software offers innovation and rapid results.

Until recently, most NLE software applications have followed similar workflow protocols. Now a company that helped to invent this industry has come up with a different way of approaching the NLE process.

In the late ‘80s, NewTek created the Video Toaster, which helped usher in the age of computer-based video editing. SpeedEdit is NewTek's new standalone nonlinear editing application for HD or SD video on Windows XP and Intel-based Mac computer systems. NewTek calls SpeedEdit a “resolution-independent,aspect-independent, and format-agnostic” product and touts it as “the world's fastest editor.” I was more than a little curious and, frankly, skeptical. But, like so many other video creators, I'm making the transition from DV to HDV and I need what SpeedEdit supposedly offers.

SpeedEdit has all of the tools you would expect in a professional NLE application, with some innovative additions. Its resolution independence means you can use SD and HD (720p or 1080i) clips on the same timeline. SpeedEdit takes that a step further and allows the use of other digital formats such as AVI, QuickTime, MPEG-2, and Flash. And because it does not transcode anything, formats remain in their native states.

Everything is done in realtime: combining SD and HD clips, playback, color correction, and basic 3D keyframe animation. Working in the interface, there's no rendering necessary for clips, transitions, titles, etc. SpeedEdit features a dual interface with both a traditional timeline and a storyboard that are dynamically linked.

As a video maker, I wanted to see if this timeline and realtime flexibility would really add up to a new way of editing, one that would free me to concentrate on telling the story at hand. Let's see.

As with any advanced system, it pays to have a dealer or integrator put together a plug-and-play SpeedEdit system; that's how my review unit arrived. I ran SpeedEdit on a provided tower with dual Intel Pentium 4 CPUs running at 3.4GHz with Windows XP Pro (SP2) as the operating system. (I was not able to test it, but NewTek says the software will work on Macs with Intel CPUs and similar stats. Additionally, by the time you read this, an update will add Microsoft Vista compatibility.) For realtime HD or HDV editing, dual CPUs and even dual dual-core CPUs are recommended. SpeedEdit will work with slower computers, but advanced features may not work in realtime or at all. The license agreement allows you to install the software only on one computer at a time. The registration process is unobtrusive. The well-written QuickStart Guide and manual come as PDFs on the installation DVD.

With the system set up and two analog Sony Trinitron RGB monitors in place, I was off and editing. Right off the bat I noticed some similarities to NewTek's Toaster NLE system. Toaster users should pay attention to SpeedEdit because when the new VT[5] ships later this year, the HD-capable SpeedEdit will replace VT-Edit, which edits only in D1 resolution.

I fed SpeedEdit DV clips from various Sony cameras and VTRs, HDV footage from a Sony HDR-HC3 camera, and some other stuff that I had captured and put on a DVD. The software is very intuitive, and there was no stopping to render. I wasn't slowed down by having to make compressed proxies or intermediate versions of my HDV clips. I just dropped in native HDV clips and started editing. (That's something I can't do in Final Cut Pro.) SpeedEdit automatically scaled the HD or HDV clip down to SD in realtime, and I didn't notice any artifacting. The software does not care about the format of the video — a clip is a clip is a clip. Footage acquisition was standard, but when I started to edit and create a project, I appreciated the program's uniqueness.

Many NLEs offer a storyboard format interface where you can put your clips in order, but to my knowledge none of the other editing apps out there can show storyboard and timeline views at the same time — linked and updated almost as soon as you make changes. You lay out your story generally within the storyboard interface, and then do the trimming and more detailed work in the traditional timeline interface. Reorganizing clips in the storyboard was lightning-fast. What takes several steps in the timeline is one drag-and-drop move in the storyboard.

While normally you'd need a magnifying glass to view icons, SpeedEdit lets you resize the icons easily and watch a clip within the icon window itself. With a hot-key combo, you can trim the clip while a blue bar indicates how much of the clip is in use. Also, the timecode appears in the bottom of the icon. I was able to recut a five-minute demo tape in no time flat, and better yet, I was able to easily make custom versions geared toward specific market niches.

Being able to combine almost any kind of video format without any kind of transcoding is a huge timesaver. The software allowed me to edit my HDV projects and play them back on my older monitors by automatically resizing the video to SD resolution. By sending the IEEE 1394 output back through my HDV camera, I could hook up to my HDTV to see what the final product would look like — gorgeous.

Working with SpeedEdit, I found a few favorite features. Being able to layer HD and SD clips together was certainly helpful. The Cut to Music feature automatically adds cuts or transitions between clips based on the beat of the music. Playback of footage within the clip icon is very handy. Clip Inherit allows you to apply settings to one clip and have other clips inherit the attributes, which is another timesaver. I was able to put the waveform and vectorscope right next to the color correction wheel and get realtime signal feedback.

The RGB video playback was outstanding — almost as good as an NTSC video monitor. You can resize the video playback screen and make it fit anywhere in your interface — even as large as your monitor screen. I experienced no stutters, skipped frames, or severe artifacting as I have with other solutions.

Speaking of stability, I ran the software day and night for more than a week. When I was not editing on the unit, I was playing back projects via the loop function. SpeedEdit never crashed once, and I tried to crash it. The NLE's productivity benefits and realtime performance easily outweigh its learning curve.

SpeedEdit impressed me, which is not easy to do. SpeedEdit requires some work to fully learn its operation, but it offers an easier way to edit. It's one of the fastest, most intuitive NLE software products I've ever used. Videomakers considering Adobe Premiere Pro or Apple Final Cut Pro would do well to give SpeedEdit a spin.

Editor's Note: At NAB 2007, NewTek announced a new version of SpeedEdit that will be available in Q2 as a free download for existing SpeedEdit customers. Most signifcantly, the new version adds support for VST audio filter plug-ins, DVCPRO HD (MXF) reading, and WMVHD, Windows Media 11, and VC-1 file writing.

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bottomline

Company: NewTek
www.newtek.com

Product: SpeedEdit 1.0

Assets: Fast, supports virtually every format (P2 coming in spring), realtime RGB video display, fully customizable, good documentation, online user community.

Caveats: Needs a powerful system for realtime operations, slight learning curve.

Demographic: Professional video editors looking for a new workflow to handle mixed resolutions.

PRICE: $495

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