Opinions on Value of Imaginate
 

Anticipating that a new project will involve numerous high res stills from the client's collection I've been playing with the demo version of Canopus's "Imaginate" software. It seems a real time saver over methods like Image Pan in Premiere, for example, and the output looks excellent. Are their any users of the registered version with a strong opinion either for or against adding it to my editing toys?

David Hurdon

With version 1 I've been having lot of fun, I'll be updating soon. It is a great tool.

Alexis

i picked up the version 2 upgrade for 50 bucks, and the improvements over version 1 made it worth it for me

imaginate allows a 140 pictures on the timeline, and performing repeated actions is very easy, it is also a very stable app, at least for me on w2k

I had some issues with default settings that were not working but this was recently fixed with service pack 1

one issue i have is the default transition is dissolve and always applies itself, so you have to manually remove its a pain for me

you can export only direct show or dv files, so the best bet is to have premiere or edius and import the files then render out uncompressed, or in edius just play the imaginate files off the timeline render free (this depends on your computer speed and size and number of stills)

the audio part of imaginate would be non-existant if it were not for audio import...seriously, no waveforms, you can't sync pics to audio, its so useless that they should have left it out

this is again were the nle comes in handy, a bit anyway

overall it sure beats using ae, if for speed then nothing else

I picked it up a few months back and have been enjoying the use of it ever since! Things that I had to do manually in premier and pro are now just a few mouse clicks or even automated. if you hit my site, www.lauderdaledj.com and head to the weddings link, there is a demo from a wedding that I shot last month, download it and run it locally as I can't stream off my server very well but if you're interested in a basic project, this was done with 2.0

Miguel

The Direct link is:"http://www2.lauderdaledj.com:8000/modules/Wedding_Video/VIDEO_ALBUM.avi"

Thanks Miguel. I enjoyed your video and it's clear just how much time Imaginate saves in such a project. By coincidence, DV Shop here in Toronto called me yesterday to say my copy would be available today. I'm looking forward to playing with it. Now if I can just get in and out of there without buying anything else...

David Hurdon