We're pleased to launch the first public beta of Preference Manager for Windows 7. This is a Windows port of our popular Mac tool for trashing and managing user preferences for your editing application.

The beta can trash, backup and restore preferences and other settings for Avid Media Composer, Symphony, Adobe Premiere Pro and After Effects.

Backups are stored in a new file format which is different from the Mac version so Mac and Windows backups cannot yet be shared, but it's something we plan to address in future.

Please be aware that this is pre-release software so it may have bugs and issues and we do not recommend using it in a production environment yet. Please report any bugs or feature requests here.

Preference Manager for Windows is a free application that requires Windows 7 and .NET Framework 4.0.

Scarlet Deal of a Lifetime

RED is selling barely-used Scarlets at significantly reduced prices.

Get FCPX running faster by installing a PC NVIDIA Geforce GTX570 graphics card in a Mac Pro

How to benefit from the wider range of graphics cards available for the PC.

Resolve + BMCC 12-bit RAW color grading Tutorial

Detailed workflow for working with CinemaDNG footage from the Blackmagic Cinema Camera.

Adobe Upgrade Policy Changing Soon for CS4 and CS3 Customers

CS3 and 4 users can only upgrade to CS6 at a reduced price until the end of the year.

Free Aspect Ratio Overlays

A selection of mattes for various aspect ratios. I usually create my own in Photoshop so this is a useful timesaver.

Skyfall BTS

15 minutes of behind-the-scenes footage from the upcoming James Bond film.

Here's another installment of our weekly list of serious, interesting or bizarre bugs in various NLEs.

Premiere Pro

Blackmagic 9.6.6 drivers may reduce Premiere latency

Several users are reporting the inability to send clips to Audition after installing the latest Dynamic Link update

Workaround for Premiere not exporting to Media Encoder queue

Reference window will now update when RGB Color Corrector is applied to a clip

Workaround for audio clips turning red when loading a project

Audio channel limitations for various containers

Avid

OS X 10.7.5 and 10.8.2 now qualified for MC and Symphony 6.5

Media Composer 6.5 stability discussion

Last week we released Pro Maintenance Tools 2.0.11, a minor update to our suite of maintenance tools for Final Cut Studio, FCPX, Avid Media Composer / Symphony and Adobe Premiere Pro.

This version contains improved Premiere Pro support in CS Repair and Housekeeper. We've also added support for backing up Premiere audio channel layouts in Preference Manager for easy syncing between computers.

In addition to bug fixes, we've also added an option in Preference Manager to relink FCP 7 preferences to Motion 4 after trashing to prevent the error message saying it's incompatible with Motion 5.

A full list of changes is available here.

Pro Maintenance Tools is an essential toolkit for maintaining, optimizing and troubleshooting your editing system. To find out more see the feature list, read the user manual, watch the overview video or download the free trial.

Smart Rendering in Premiere Pro CS 6

Everything you wanted to know about Adobe's new FCP-style Smart Rendering feature (where it avoids recompressing the source media upon output) for certain formats in CS 6.0.1.

Mac, PC, Adobe and Resolve

Walter Biscardi on some of the problems of switching to Windows.

I am now mastering all PrP exports to OP1a AVC-I 100

On the same topic, Tom Daigon explains his reasons for choosing to master to OP1a AVC I-100 MXF.

GoPro ProTune firmware update

There's a new firmware update for GoPro HERO2 cameras offering better integration with professional workflows.

Dealing with Gamma Shifting [VIDEO]

How to use the Headroom feature in Smoke to control QuickTime color management.

FCPX magnetic timeline forum thread

Interesting discussion about FCPX's magnetic timeline and scenarios where the new paradigm isn't ideal.

How to build and use adjustment layers in FCP X

Here's a useful trick to use Photoshop / After Effects-style adjustment layers in FCPX.

Here's another pick of series, interesting or useful bugs we came across this week.

Premiere

Can't export to QuickTime H.264 or DNxHD (Windows)

Subclip descriptions set in Prelude do not show up in Premiere

Fix for Premiere Pro "Media Pending" error

Avid

Moving the playhead in QuickTime Player changes the source timecode

Fix for DISK_FILE_ALREADY_EXISTS error on Unity

Dupes are detected on effect tracks

After Effects

After Effects CS6 11.0.2 released with bug fixes and new CUDA GPU support

Compressor

Fix for Compressor 3.5 crashing at startup

Adobe Programs Explained

Ever wondered what each tool in Creative Suite does? Here's a great summary.

How to build a Thunderbolt Hackintosh

A guide to building a faster Mac Pro with Thunderbolt for half the price.

Smoke ConnectFX: Damage and Deform Nodes

Great overview of two useful nodes in Smoke 2013.

DNG 1.4 Specification Notes

This is an overview of changes in the new DNG specification. DNG is an open alternative to proprietary raw still image formats such as Canon CR2 and Adobe offers a free DNG converter.

Performance Enhancing Visual Effects Techniques

List of various VFX techniques to enhance an actor's performance or improve story clarity. I seem to do #7 a lot, often having to add establishing shots or remove entire characters from the movie.

What could the new Mac Pro look like?

I'm not convinced Apple will go for a modular Mac Pro design (and the jury's still out on whether the Mac Pro will ever be updated) but it's an interesting and well-designed proposal regardless.

We've got more important, useful and bizarre bugs this week that you should know about.

Avid

A fix for the hang when scanning media folders is coming in 6.0.3.2

Various issues with ExFAT drives

Avid FX installer does not install the Avid FX plugin by default

Issues with AMA linking 24p CanonXF files

Despite what it says on Avid's site, the Artist Color only fully supports MC 6 and higher

Premiere

New Mac NVIDIA drivers improve CUDA stability

Audio goes offline after pasting clips from another project

Application windows may appear offscreen if you disconnect a monitor (Windows but may affect Mac too)

Playback stops several frames after you pressed Space

Tip: to enable CUDA support, delete the entire cuda_supported_cards.txt file instead of editing it

QuickTime HDV file issues in Premiere Pro CS6 for Windows

FCPX

Various issues with standard definition media

Compressor

Green bar when Frame Controls are switched on

Today we released Video Space Calculator 1.0.5 for iOS and 1.0.3 for Mac.

These updates add 3K ARRIRAW support, along with Avid DNxHD 80, 100 and 444 codecs.

Video Space Calculator can calculate the disk space taken up by over 75 codecs including ProRes, Animation, ARRIRAW, DNxHD, XDCAM and DPX.

The app is available on the iOS App Store and the Mac App Store.

How to color correct a horror film

I love this idea: Patrick Inhofer introduces his first Grade-Along project.

CS6 Gripes / CS6.5 wish list

Well thought-out list of Premiere feature requests from an FCP switcher.

An Exciting Post About File Management

Interesting discussion about project management (be sure to read the comments). Post Haste seems to be commonly used.

Pretending to be pro: Pro Amp

Dennis Couzin analyzes the Proc Amp filter in FCP 7 against the output a real Proc Amp should produce.

Autodesk Smoke 2013 Pre-Release 4

Smoke PR4 is out with several new features, including many UI changes.

Telestream releases Flip4Mac 3.0

Improved support for OS X 10.8 and AV Foundation, and also ships with a new standalone video player.

The Return of the Save As Command

This is good but you still need to hold down the Option key to access it. It's an example of Apple's constant efforts to simplify everything actually making things more complicated.