New Ulead DVD Authoring Software Achieves Limitless Creativity; Ulead DVD Workshop Provides Precise Menu Design, Advanced Authoring Technology

Business Wire, Feb 26, 2002

Business Editors

TORRANCE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Feb. 26, 2002

Ulead Systems, Inc., a leading developer of video editing, image editing and Web graphics software, today offers a preview trial of Ulead DVD Workshop, a new DVD authoring software program for professional and hobbyist videographers.

Ulead DVD Workshop provides precise control over DVD menu design while providing limitless creative options as well as leading edge technologies.

The preview trial version of Ulead DVD Workshop will be available for download from www.ulead.com starting immediately until March 26, 2002. The final Ulead DVD Workshop program will be available for purchase in March 2002. Customers interested in purchasing the new DVD authoring program can order the software ahead of time and will receive free delivery when the software ships.

"Our Ulead DVD MovieFactory consumer DVD authoring software has quickly gained popularity and industry recognition. With Ulead DVD Workshop, Ulead addresses the new needs of a higher level videographer looking to distribute their work on DVD," said Lewis Liaw, senior vice president at Ulead Systems, Inc. "DVD Workshop allows content creators to author DVD menus that match their vision without requiring them to spend hundreds of hours and thousands of dollars."

The heart of Ulead DVD Workshop lies in the advanced, flexible menu authoring features. Full of professional design tools, DVD Workshop provides high-end effects such as motion backgrounds, buttons and scene thumbnails. Authors can create dynamic, Hollywood-style DVDs with the program's precise control of all creative elements that a DVD menu may command such as customizable video scene buttons and specific selection highlight colors and actions. DVD Workshop's Power Menus feature will produce menus using one of three processes (blank, template or wizard) and merge them all into one project. DVD Workshop offers over 60 theme-based convenient menu templates to produce fast results or jump-start the creative process.

Ulead DVD Workshop supplies over 300 high-quality background images, buttons, arrows, frames and other objects for speedy creation of customized menus. In addition, DVD Workshop supports objects produced in Ulead PhotoImpact, Ulead's award-winning image editing software program. DVD Workshop also makes text and captions stand out by applying striking effects such as wrap, neon, emboss and 3D effects.

Instant DVD slideshows can be created within DVD Workshop by dragging a selection of still images directly into the workspace; the duration of each image may be specified, and background music may be added. Users may also add an introductory video, image or slideshow to their projects that will play before the first menu appears. DVD Workshop also includes title playback controls allowing the user to program the playback behavior of the DVD; a video might repeat, playback or jump to another target title or menu upon completion.

In addition to complex menu design, Ulead DVD Workshop includes convenient capture and conversion tools. Ulead's MPEG-Direct capture saves conversion time and hard disc space by capturing video directly to the MPEG format using FireWire (IEEE 1394) and analog capture boards. Ulead also supports continuous DV video stream captures beyond 4 GB in size - even when using the FAT32 file system (present in many Windows operating systems), which inflicts a 4 GB capture ceiling.

For fast menu making, DVD Workshop will automatically create chapter thumbnails based on the captured video's DV date code. DVD Workshop also imports existing AVI video and automatically transcodes the files into high-quality, DVD/VCD/SVCD-ready MPEG files when the user is ready to burn their disc. Ulead's new DVD authoring software includes variable bit-rate (VBR) encoding that varies the bit rate depending on the amount of information needed to support the image being presented. VBR encoding results in a better picture quality as well as smaller files sizes. Finally, DVD Workshop offers field-based compression to help ensure the highest quality playback of discs on TVs.

Ulead DVD Workshop will output video to VCD, SVCD and DVD for playback on set-top DVD players and CD or DVD drives on personal computers. VCD and SVCD are video formats that can be recorded onto CD media and then be played on home set-top DVD players with navigation menus similar to those found on studio-produced DVD movies. Both VCD and SVCD are cost-effective ways for people to create a DVD experience using a CD-R or CD-RW recording device.

To simplify the recording process, Ulead DVD Workshop interfaces directly with the newest DVD-R, DVD-RW, and DVD RW recorders as well as most CD-R and CD-RW devices without the need for additional burning software. Users can preview the DVD in real-time before recording to ensure that the project plays as expected before committing the file to CD or DVD disc. Finally, a disc image of the DVD project can be saved for future burning.

No additional video-editing program is required to use Ulead DVD Workshop. DVD Workshop is a worthy companion product to MediaStudio Pro 6.0 or 6.5. However, customers can use any video editing program they wish to edit their movies.