Product updates: 30th May 2023

Posted: 25/05/2023

The latest upgrade to the Blackbird platform is due to be released May 30th 2023. This release has a  number of media compatibility improvements to ensure that the platform can be used efficiently.

Display sequence markers in story mode

This new editor feature allows for users to create markers on their timeline during an edit session and then since the visibility on the story mode displays these, rapid content resequencing can be performed or even just a high level review of the shots used in the edit. This can be a speed and productivity boost for customers that produce stringouts of media and then subsequently refine their edit within the timeline.

Timeline lasso without repositioning play head

This option can be enabled by support and alters the timeline behaviour to permit for the lasso to be used for multi clip selection without the timeline repositioning the play position. For example where a position has been selected for media to be placed into from elsewhere in the timeline.

Effects animation monitor no longer auto opens

Access to any of the blackbird effects has previously auto opened a timeframe animation preview, this has now been made into a togglable interface component to maximise screen real estate where users may not require the use of the animation of an effect or transformation.

Allow arithmetic on offset / duration and automatically updated values in xml sidecar templates

Clients using sidecar data file export with auto branding elements as preroll or postroll to their edited content can now receive the additional computed lengths post processing.

Sub pixel pan/zoom and position for titles

Movement of titles or resizing over time will now produce smoother results on publish to high bitrate source media. 

Support for publishing from multi mono (track per stream) to multiple channel /stream layouts including mono, stereo, 5.1 in MP4/MOV exports

Blackbird publishing has typically been a stereo export by default, with the option for a multichannel split mono export from source media / timeline tracks. This feature enhancement will allow for downstream encoding to be set in profiles such as 2 x stereo, 4 x stereo, 5.1, stereo and 5.1 and other combinations as required and configured by an administrator.