I've been a PiTiVi lurker for nearly 2 years now. I've been happily, and patiently watching its progress. As a professional filmmaker, and also a software developer, and based on my latest (minor) interactions with installing PiTiVi on Ubuntu, I think you can safely overlook DV capture, and effects. Regarding transitions, the only transitions you need are dissolves and fades. Of course, for the average user, silly transitions are the spice of life, and you will receive a fair amount of criticism for not having a broad range of transitions. However, for a tool to be useful for editing, cuts and dissolves/fades are the only requirement.
I think there is a point in an open-source projects lifetime, when it needs to be seen in order to gain more traction. If a simple interface is provided to make adding transitions and effects simply, you will find a lot of people willing to step up to write components to fill in these gaps. So, in short, IMO, I believe that providing a stable application with a user-friendly interface that can import, assemble, arrange, trim, and export media, as well as being able to open/save a project, is sufficient for mass consumption. Particularly, when there are very few alternatives on the Linux front. Basic compositing, such as titles and zooming/cropping are, IMO, more important to PiTiVi than a broad range of effects and transitions. Specifically regarding DV/HDV Capture. DV is, for all intents and purposes, a dead format. Yes, I realize there are a lot of DV cameras out there, and people using them, but they are a diminishing mass. Between flash-memory cameras like the FLIP on the low-end, up to cameras like the Canon D7, Sony EX1/EX3 (and even in my case, the RED ONE) on the high-ends, the majority of media content is file-based to begin with. DV/HDV is no longer a requirement. To be fair, I do still own HDV cameras that I use regularly and still have to capture from, but there are easy to use tools (despite being command-line driven) for linux that make this simple and easy to do. Admittedly, a nice GUI would be welcome, but it's not something that needs to be supported directly by PiTiVi. Specifically regarding Effects, there are a number plugin architectures and interfaces that exists today that could be utilized to provide a high level of ROI with an existing base of video-effects plugins. Recently, as it might relate to PiTiVi, I have been introduced to pyOFX, which provides a Python interface into the OFX architecture of visual effects plugins. http://sourceforge.net/mailarchive/message.php?msg_name=670594.68026.qm%40web59902.mail.ac4.yahoo.com I think providing support for OFX through PiTiVi would be a mutually beneficial relationship. OFX sees a lot of very high end plugins, developed primarily for high-end systems such as Nuke, Shake, Combustion, etc. But it lacks a broad user-base derived from more "consumer oriented" plugins. Take my input for what its worth (which probably isn't much... -maybe $0.05?) Kyle On Feb 9, 2010, at 10:11 AM, Brett Alton wrote: > I'm personally seriously concerned with Ubuntu shipping with PiTiVi - > a video editor - when it doesn't even have transitions, effects or DV > capture yet. That's like shipping GIMP without a save/export function. > > I understand where PiTiVi is and where it is going and am excited for > it, but this is far too early to be included in Ubuntu by default. > > 2010/2/9 Jeff <[email protected]>: >> Hi folks. I have been suddenly reminded of the the Ubuntu Feature >> Freeze on >> the 18th of February (that's in 10 days!) by comment #5 on the >> following bug >> report: https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu/+source/pitivi/+bug/506642 >> >> In that thread, from comment #6 onwards, I revealed some of my >> worries >> regarding the fast-approaching Ubuntu deadlines and the current >> state of >> PiTiVi. Vish then mentionned that he discussed with some devs >> (namely Rick >> Spencer and Jono) on #ubuntu-desktop. I looked up the archives of >> the logs, >> here they are if you are curious: >> http://irclogs.ubuntu.com/2010/02/08/%23ubuntu-desktop.txt (look at >> 18:32) >> >> In this discussion, it was suggested that a hackfest could be >> organized, and >> I think that they have sent some mail to Edward about that. I >> wanted to >> raise this on the mailing list because I'm still wondering about >> two things: >> >> 1) What features and bug fixes should be considered the requirement >> for the >> 0.13.4 release? In other words, when do we decide that we have >> "reached" >> that release? >> >> 2) Do we, as a project, have a “failsafe” plan of holding back >> PiTiVi from >> being included in Ubuntu 10.04 by default if we deem it “not yet >> ready for >> mass consumption”? I am mainly concerned about the bad publicity >> that it >> could get. However, maybe I am worrying too much and users wouldn't >> really >> bash it for not having features XYZ (the usual: transitions, >> effects, DV >> capture, poneys...), and maybe, on the complete opposite of the >> worst case >> scenario, more users would be interested in the software and more >> contributors would join... this is a delicate PR situation. >> >> By the way, I'm suspecting that many "rendering hangs at a certain >> point >> during rendering" bugs on 0.13.3 might be due to the broken still >> image >> support which was recently fixed by Brandon in pitivi git. Maybe I >> need to >> NEEDINFO some of bugs asking if still images were in use. >> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ >> The Planet: dedicated and managed hosting, cloud storage, colocation >> Stay online with enterprise data centers and the best network in the >> business >> Choose flexible plans and management services without long-term >> contracts >> Personal 24x7 support from experience hosting pros just a phone >> call away. >> http://p.sf.net/sfu/theplanet-com >> _______________________________________________ >> Pitivi-pitivi mailing list >> [email protected] >> https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/pitivi-pitivi >> >> > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ > The Planet: dedicated and managed hosting, cloud storage, colocation > Stay online with enterprise data centers and the best network in the > business > Choose flexible plans and management services without long-term > contracts > Personal 24x7 support from experience hosting pros just a phone call > away. > http://p.sf.net/sfu/theplanet-com > _______________________________________________ > Pitivi-pitivi mailing list > [email protected] > https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/pitivi-pitivi ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Planet: dedicated and managed hosting, cloud storage, colocation Stay online with enterprise data centers and the best network in the business Choose flexible plans and management services without long-term contracts Personal 24x7 support from experience hosting pros just a phone call away. http://p.sf.net/sfu/theplanet-com _______________________________________________ Pitivi-pitivi mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/pitivi-pitivi
