Cleaner

Terran Interactive's Media Cleaner Pro has always been the compression tool of choice for anyone producing audio and video for Web sites or CDs, thanks to its winning combination of superb compression quality, broad multimedia technology support, ease of use, and excellent documentation. The latest release, renamed Cleaner 5, has even better compression and workflow features and takes the first tentative steps toward streaming- video authoring.

From Capture to Compression
Cleaner 5's enhancements begin with the video-capture process itself. The program now includes Digital Origin's MotoDV FireWire capture software, whose DV codecs can deliver better image quality than QuickTime's. Since Cleaner isn't a video editor, you'll still need a separate program to refine your content. Cleaner 5 does a better job of removing noise than its predecessors. Several of its filters are faster, and they support dual-processor Power Macs.

Cleaner 5's new file-transfer features upload freshly compressed content straight to a server -- no need for a separate FTP utility. And Cleaner's new workflow features will aid high- volume content providers. The program now relies on XML-based text files, with commands that control compression settings, batch processing, and file-transfer tasks. This allows you to create a custom database application or a set of scripts to generate those files for you.

Beyond Basic Video
This version is the first to offer event-oriented authoring features, with an EventStream window where you specify which events occur during playback. You can set Web pages to display at specific times, place synchronized text captions below video content, or create hot spots that turn a movie into a menu, with each option leading to a different Web page.

If there's a single must-have application for anyone working with professional video and audio on a Macintosh, it's Terran Interactive's Media Cleaner Pro. The company, now a subsidiary of Media 100, is the leader in video and audio compression tools. Its flagship product has adopted a new and simpler name, Cleaner, and the latest version covers greater ground, with DV capture, improved batch processing, and output to interactive streaming media. Cleaner 5 lives up to its promise to be "the camera-to-Web streaming solution." It's the perfect tool for both video professionals and Web content creators.

The first step in Web-based video authoring is importing video into the computer. In the past, you needed programs like Apple's iMovie or Final Cut Pro to bring digital video into the Mac. The Cleaner 5 package now includes Digital Origin's MotoDV, a simple application for capturing DV from FireWire-compatible DV cameras. Installing MotoDV was a simple plug-and-play process, and the application worked seamlessly with Cleaner 5. We simply connected our Sony DCR-TRV900 to the Mac with a FireWire cable and launched MotoDV, and we were ready for video capture.

To capture video, you just click a single button. The first time we did it, MotoDV asked us to give the file a name. After that, Cleaner 5 automatically launched and placed that clip into the batch window, ready to take instructions for compression and output.

What compression parameters you need depends on how you intend to distribute your video. Web content creators who use video on their sites want to give users as many viewing options as possible. With Cleaner 5, you can render a video in any size. The program handles all three major streaming standards - QuickTime, RealSystem, and Windows Media - as well as the MP3 format on the audio front.

Once you're familiar with the compression and optimisation techniques, you can move onto the Advanced Settings. But, when you run your eye closely over the context- sensitive tabbed palettes and options, it all becomes much clearer. Choose a format, codec, frame rate and audio settings among other things, click Apply and the hit the Play button on the Batch window. Save your file and play it back. You'll even find publish settings that will automatically upload your finished video to your server for you. It may take a bit of trial and error at first, but Cleaner 5 certainly makes the once-laborious process pretty damn easy.

The app also features EventStreaming functionality. This enables you to add interactivity to your footage, whether it's saved in QuickTime, Media Player or Real Player format (the technology is built into the latest versions of the players so there will be no need for any extra plug-ins), meaning you can add dynamic hotspots, links to Web pages and more, directly from your streaming video.

Cleaner 5 will be a godsend to anyone needing to add video content to their Website. Apart from being a little buggy, it makes the process of compressing and optimising video as easy as it can be.

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