Last week we released Pro Maintenance Tools 2.0.2, which adds many new features and fixes some issues with our suite of tools for maintaining, optimizing and troubleshooting your editing system.

Here are some of the bigger features.

Final Cut Pro X XML support

Final Cut Pro X XML (FCPXML) files can now be scanned by Corrupt Clip Finder and repaired by XML Repair. You will need Final Cut Pro X 10.0.1 in order to import and export FCPXML files.

Corrupt Clip Finder custom file extension support

By default, Corrupt Clip Finder will scan QuickTime movies, audio files and images. If you have installed third-party QuickTime components to allow QuickTime to read additional formats, you can add support for these formats in Corrupt Clip Finder by adding their file extensions to the list in preferences.

For example, if you installed the Panasonic AVCCAM Importer you can add the MTS file extension to the list to tell Corrupt Clip Finder to also scan MTS files.

Additional plugin formats in Plugin Manager

Plugin Manager now supports Avid RTAS plugins, Premiere VST effects and Motion 5 templates (for use in FCPX). Please note that when installing Motion Templates through Plugin Manager, it will copy the template to the Effects category by default but you can easily drag it to another group if you so wish.

If you have multiple NLEs installed, the long list of plugins may be daunting so you can now filter plugins based on their host application.

This is a small subset of the changes in this version. You can read the full changelog here.

Pro Maintenance Tools is an essential toolkit for maintaining your Final Cut Studio, Final Cut Pro X, Avid Media Composer and Adobe Premiere Pro system. To find out more, see our Pro Maintenance Tools page which includes a detailed feature list, gallery and video overview. A 15-day free trial is also available.

We're pleased to announce our newest product, Post Haste for Mac. Post Haste is a tool for organizing your projects. Everyone has their own way of structuring project folders on their hard disk. Post Haste simplifies this by allowing you to assign folder templates for different project types or scenarios, such as editing, visual effects and motion graphics.

When you start a new project, launch Post Haste and enter a few details about the project such as the project title, client name and the name of the editor. Choose a template and the directory you wish to place the new project folder into and click Create Project. Post Haste will copy the contents of your template into a new folder for that particular project. It's a big timesaver.

Post Haste was originally conceived and developed by Paul Conigliaro and we have now taken over the project, although Paul is still involved. Post Haste 2.0 is a complete rewrite of the application. You can read Paul's thoughts on the new version here.

We've completely overhauled the interface and provided the ability to setup an unlimited number of templates and filename parameters.

Templates can now be setup directly within the application through the built-in template editor. The location of templates can be customized, allowing you to store them in a shared location on your network to make them available to everyone.

One new and very useful feature is folder breaks. Folder breaks allow you to break parameters across folders, turning a project name like Client_Project_Current Date to Client > Project > Current Date. To get an idea of how this function works, watch the filename preview at the bottom of the window update as you toggle the Folder Break check boxes on and off in preferences. This is explained in more detail in the user manual.

To get a better idea of what Post Haste has to offer, take a look at our latest podcast episode that gives a general overview:

Post Haste is available as a free download from our site. Existing Post Haste 1.x users will need to download the software manually. It is also available on the Mac App Store, making it our first application on the store.

We're very interested in hearing feedback on Post Haste 2.0 from new and existing users alike. Use the links in the Help menu within the application or use the contact form to let us know what you think of the new version.

We've just released Editmote 1.0.2 with some great new features. Editmote is an iOS application to remotely control your editing software. Add markers and control playback and volume levels - all without having to leave your chair.

Version 1.0.2 adds a much-requested feature: customizable keyboard layouts. If you have customized the default keyboard layout for your editing application, you can now go into the Editmote preference pane and change the default layout to match the changes that you made. You can also use this feature to map unused buttons to extra functions within your application.

Editmote supports Final Cut Pro 6 and above, Final Cut Pro X, Avid Media Composer 5 and above, QuickTime Player 7, QuickTime Player X, Adobe Premiere Pro CS 5 and above and Adobe After Effects CS 5 and above. However, you can use the Keyboard Layouts tab in the preference pane to add an unlimited number of additional applications.

The full list of changes is available here. When upgrading, remember to install both the new iOS application and the new preference pane otherwise you won't get all of the extra features in this version. The preference pane is available on the right-hand side of the Editmote page.

Editmote is a useful addition to an editor's toolkit. Find out more with our overview video and check it out on the App Store.

Yesterday we released Cut Notes 1.0.4, a maintenance update for our iPad note-taking application. Cut Notes makes it easy to create timecode notes during a screening.

The changes in this version are as follows:

• Fixed a crash when displaying a popover


• Fixed an iOS 5 glitch with text field animations


• Fixed an issue where timecode values for existing cuts would change when modifying the project's start timecode


• Quick Start tutorial can now be viewed in portrait mode

Cut Notes makes a great addition to an editor's toolkit. Find out more in our overview video and check it out on the App Store.

Last week we released Pro Media Tools 1.0.5, a small maintenance update for our suite of tools to streamline media management. It fixes some XML issues, reduces memory usage in Edit Detector and speeds up Quick Bins.

The changes are as follows:

• Edit Detector - Option to export the first frame of each shot as a JPEG image


• Edit Detector - Reduced memory usage


• Gamma Shift Detector now remembers previously-opened files


• Project Overview - Fixed an issue where a project could fail to import if invalid characters were in the XML data


• Project Overview - Fixed an issue where the Position column may not sort correctly


• Quick Bins - Speed boost when creating Smart Bins and Smart Bin Ranges


• General bug fixes, tweaks and improvements

Pro Media Tools is an essential toolkit for post production professionals. Download the free 15-day trial to see how it can enhance your workflow.

Last week we released Pro Maintenance Tools 2.0.1, which adds several new features to our suite of tools for maintaining and optimizing your editing system.

System Toolkit has several new additions to make Lion behave more like Snow Leopard. You can disable window launch animations, prevent Lion restoring windows when relaunching apps, re-enable key repeating, disable automatic spellcheck and restore the old keyboard shortcuts for open and save dialogs.

You can also easily show or hide the current user's Library folder with a single click, which can be useful even if you have not yet upgraded to Lion.

Other new features include support for Avid AVX2 plugins in Plugin Manager and extra Housekeeper tasks. There are many new bug fixes too, including several for Pro Admin. The full list of changes is here.

Pro Maintenance Tools is an essential toolkit for editors and post production professionals on the Mac. Download the 15-day trial today to see how it can simplify troubleshooting and maintaining your system.

What made Final Cut Studio great was the sheer number of tools you got for the price. The demise of Final Cut Studio has left a void in the market which the closest competitor, Adobe Creative Suite, does not yet fill completely.

We've had several people come to us in recent weeks with requests to replicate certain Final Cut Studio functions that they depended on because they wanted the piece of mind that these functions would still be available after they switched to another NLE.

We implemented two of these in the latest version of QT Edit in Pro Media Tools - Cinema Tools-style frame rate conforming and a replication of QuickTime Pro's export dialog. The latter is useful for people who don't want to purchase a separate QuickTime Pro license, which they used to get free of charge with their Final Cut Studio installation.

The frame rate conform function is an improvement upon the Cinema Tools equivalent because it allows you to specify a custom frame rate. The advantage of implementing these features into applications that have not been long-abandoned by their manufacturer is that these features will continue to be improved over time.

We're interested to hear of any other Final Cut Studio features you use that could feasibly be added to our software. We're not planning to create our own versions of Cinema Tools or Color, but are keen to hear of any small features from the suite that would fit well into our existing applications. Let us know in the comments below or via our contact form.

Last week we released Pro Media Tools 1.0.4, which adds many new features and optimizations to our suite of tools for simplifying media management and streamlining workflows.

There have been several performance optimizations so many of the apps are now much faster than before, particularly Quick Bins and Project Overview.

We've added several new features to Auto Transfer based on your feedback, namely ARRI Alexa support, an option to bounce the Dock icon when the transfer is complete, the ability to choose a custom archival folder in Preferences and an option for SHA-1 checksums instead of MD5.

Project Overview saw a lot of changes too - markers now load significantly faster, it is much quicker to batch modify a large number of marker settings and there were lots of bug fixes including an issue where clip usage counts were set to zero.

Quick Bins is now significantly faster when saving to XML or sending data to Final Cut Pro. Export times from my test project went from around 15 seconds to less than 5.

QT Edit had two new additions, both of which were in response to customer feedback. The first is a frame rate conforming function, similar to the one in Cinema Tools, used to quickly convert from one frame rate to another without transcoding. It's actually more flexible than the one in Cinema Tools because you are not limited to common frame rates and can enter any rate you like into the box. This feature is located under the Settings tab when the movie is selected in the track view.

The second new feature is the ability to transcode to other codecs, just like QuickTime Pro. This feature is located under File > Export > QuickTime Conversion.

Both of these features were requested by customers because they were concerned with the obsolescence of Final Cut Studio and wanted piece of mind that such functions would continue to be available to them.

There were many other changes and features and you can read the full changelog here.

Pro Media Tools is an essential toolkit for post production professionals. Download the free 15-day trial to see how it can speed up your workflows.

Last week we released version 1.0.3 of Pro Media Tools, our suite of utilities for simplifying media management and streamlining workflows.

Version 1.0.3 is now compatible with Final Cut Pro X and OS X 10.7 Lion. Apple has made many improvements in Lion that have resulted in a noticeable speed boost in all of the applications.

We've also made several changes to Auto Transfer. The verification feature has been overhauled to be faster and the verification progress more accurate. It now also shows the estimated time remaining for both transfers and verification.

Based on user feedback, we've added a new option in Render Watcher. You can now request that it only alerts you if the application doing the rendering is in the background. This stops alerts from appearing for short renders and it will only show them if you start doing something else while waiting for a long render to finish. This option is off by default but it can be switched on in the Actions pane of Render Watcher.

We've made several other minor changes which can be viewed here.

Pro Media Tools is an essential time-saving toolkit when working with video. You can download a 15-day trial here and view a video overview here.

Our flagship software, FCS Maintenance Pack, has been a big success and is in use at many of the top broadcasters in the USA and Europe. It is used every day to solve Final Cut Studio problems and get editors quickly back on track again.

We're proud to introduce the successor to FCS Maintenance Pack - Pro Maintenance Tools.

Pro Maintenance Tools is a 64-bit, Lion-compatible version of FCS Maintenance Pack that works with Final Cut Studio, Final Cut Pro X, Avid Media Composer and Adobe Premiere Pro for Mac. This is all included in one version - you do not need to buy different versions for each NLE. This means that you're covered no matter which application you decide to switch to after the obsolescence of Final Cut Studio.

FCS Maintenance Pack Network Admin is not compatible with Pro Maintenance Tools. If you want to remotely administrate Pro Maintenance Tools, you must run Pro Admin. Licensed Network Admin users do not need to purchase Pro Admin as they can use their Network Admin licenses with the new version. There is more information on the future of Pro Admin here.

Pro Maintenance Tools builds on FCS Maintenance Pack with over 300 changes including many new log management features in Crash Analyzer such as color coding and annotations, many additional System Toolkit options, a rewritten version of Preference Manager, Autosave Cleaner has been replaced with Autosave Manager, countless bug fixes, tweaks and more.

We've prepared a short introductory video showing some of the key features of Pro Maintenance Tools:

Pro Maintenance Tools is $139 for a single license. FCS Maintenance Pack users can upgrade for $39, but if you upgrade before August 1st 2011 you'll be able to get it for only $29.

Customers who purchased FCS Maintenance Pack on or after February 1st 2011 are eligible for a free upgrade to the new version. We're going to be sending these out in batches over the next two weeks. If you need your upgrade license sooner than that, please contact us.

Pro Maintenance Tools is in indispensable suite for Mac-based editors. There is a 15-day trial here and we're keen to hear what you think of the new version.