New Blue Video-plugins

There are quite a few companies that develop plugins for various video editing programs. One of them is NewBlue inc. Their origin lies in the world of audio and they do deliver audio plugins. But in this review we are going to have a look at their collection of video transitions and effects.

1. The Collections

At the moment of publication of this review, NewBlue delivers 7 different collections, 4 collections of transitions and 3 collections of effects. For up-to-date info about which filters they currently supply check http://www.newbluefx.com/videofx.html

Transitions

1. 3D transformations
   This collection contains a total of 13 transitions. The common factor in this collection is that the first scene is replaced by the second by all kinds of movements in 3D, although this is not the case for all of them. Click on the image on the right to view a movie that contains all 13 transitions with their default settings.
   
2. 3D explosions
   This collection also contains 13 different transitions. They are best described as transitions in which the scenes are broken up in segments to reveal the next scene. Like in the previous collection this is not true for all of them. Click on the image on the right to view all 13 transitions.
   
   
3. Art Blends
   There are a total of 10 transitions in this collection. The first scene transitions to the second by using all kinds of effects which can also be found in the arts effects collection (see below), like metallic, glows, blur etc. Again, the image on the right contains a link to a demo video.
   
   
   
4. Motion Blends
   The last collection of transitions also has 10 transitions. Common factor here is that the second scenes blends into the first scene by 2D movement or blurring. Click on the image on the right to see the transitions in this collection.
   
   
   

Given the number of transitions and the number of settings that can be changed in each of them, we cannot discuss every individual transition here. But in general it can be said that the 3D explosions and transformations transitions are best suitable for people that realy want to put emphasis on the transitions and are fond of special effects. The two other - blend type - collections are far more subtle and suitable for people that want to put more emphasis on the scenes rather than on spectacular transitions.

Effects to alter the look of a scene

1. Film effects
   To create the illusion of old film including dust, scratches, camera movements, and color corrections. If you click on the image on the right you will see each of these effeacts in action. Two of them, Film Express and Film Pro are not actually new effects but a combination of the other film effects put together for convenience reasons.
   
   
2. Arts Effects
   A collection of artistic effects like airbrush, hand drawn images, metallic etc. These effects can be quite radical, but by using the settings can be made a bit more subtle. All effects in default settings can be watched by clicking on the image on the right.
   
   
   
   
3. Motion Effects
   Includes both effects that moves the whole frame in 2D and effects that distorts the frame during motions like ripples, waves, wiggle etc. Linked to the image on the right is a demo video that shows all the effects in default settings.

Same as for the transitions, we can't discuss every effect in detail here. Especially because many effects have an astonishing amount of settings so the amount of variations is sheer endless. What these effects can do with your video can best be compared with what for example Photoshop filters can do for stills. It ranges form very subtle changes in the appearance of the video, like for example the greenish look as is being used in like a movie like The Matrix, to very radical artistic effects like creating cartoon-like images.

2. Compatibility

Currently the delivered plugins are designed for use in all versions of Adobe Premiere including Premiere Elements and Sony Vegas. According to information that we received from NewBlue, they are also working to make plugins compatible for the programs of Pinnacle and Ulead. We have only tested them in Adobe Premiere Pro.

3. Installation

The collections come in an executable file that will install the plugins on your system. It will create a separate folder in which the plugins are stored together with some dll’s, a help file, an uninstaller, and an activation routine. For activation you need to have internet access. If you don’t have internet access on the system on which you install the plugins you can do it via a webbrowser on another system. As long as you don’t activate you can still use the plugins but your result will be watermarked.

We installed the plugins on a system with Adobe Premiere Pro 2.0. This worked flawlessly. After installation we started up Premiere and the plugins turned up automatically in Premiere under Transitions and under Video Effects, each collection in a separate folder.

4. Use of the plugins

The effects and transitions are applied exactly the same as the standard effects and transitions of Premiere by dragging them onto a scene on the timeline. Once applied the effect is also listed in the effect controls panel. Opening up the controls will reveal all kind of settings that you can change. For some of the more complicated effects the amount of settings can be quite intimidating and this requires some playing around with it to fully understand what they do. Fortunately there is also a help function that is integrated in the settings panel.

Peculiar is that the control panel also shows the “Toggle Animation” button which enables you to define keyframes. Nevertheless, the effects can not be varied within one scene using keyframes.

Most effects have a whole range of presets that are ready for use. Nice is that you can save your own combination of settings as new presets. Unlike with user defined presets in the latest versions of Premiere, a saved preset is stored in a separate file. This makes it portable and easy to exchange between users.

5. Performance

New Blue apparently did a good job in developing the plugins to work very efficiently. We installed the plugins on a system with already quite outdated specs: Pentium IV, 2.4GHz with 512MB RAM and a NVIDA GFORCE4. And even on that system the footage with effects played without much problems directly from the timeline, without the need to render the footage first. Even the more demanding effects involving a lot of motions play almost flawless without pre-rendering so that you get a good view of the final result. Only when several effects are applied on top of eachother, the system starts having problems and you will have to render before playing it from the timeline.

6. Price

NewBlue offers each collection for around $120 but they offer also dicounts for buying more collections at one time. All 7 collections together cost around $450. For consumers that can appear as a quite significant amount of money. However, compared with competitors who offer Premier plugins, prices are very reasonable.

7. Overall Conclusion

The NewBlue collections are certainly a very interesting addition when your are serious video editing enthusiast or a pro. They work seamlessly in combination with Premiere (and probably also with Sony Vegas, but we were unable to test that). Quality of the resulting images is good and rendering times are not excessive. We'll certainly keep an eye on further developments at NewBlue.