Adobe Systems Incorporated today announced Adobe® After Effects® 6.5, a new version of its award-winning motion graphics and visual effects software. Significant new features, including Animation Presets, an advanced clone tool, and tighter integration with the other Adobe video products, help professionals meet production challenges and demanding deadlines.
After Effects 6.5 is a core component of the Adobe Video Collection 2.5, which includes new versions of Adobe Premiere® Pro 1.5, Adobe Audition™ 1.5, and Adobe Encore™ DVD 1.5 (see separate releases). Together, these products deliver a complete digital video and audio post-production platform for video and audio editing, motion graphics, visual effects, and DVD authoring at a fraction of the cost of competing solutions.
After Effects 6.5 includes new Animation Presets enabling users to save any combination of layer properties, including text animation properties, and easily apply them to other layers. More than 250 text Animation Presets were added to create sophisticated text animations and more than 60 new effects enable users to create visuals including light rays and 3D particles.
“After Effects 6.5 is a huge leap forward,” says Matt Silverman, director of effects and design at Phoenix Editorial. “The new cloning and tracking features are top-notch, and allow me to complete shots directly in After Effects without having to move to other dedicated paint or tracking tools. Including Cycore FX and Color Finesse is icing on the cake.”
The new advanced Clone tool provides a visual overlay of the clone source, and five user-definable presets make it easy to rapidly shift between clone settings. To assist users in matching footage from different sources, After Effects 6.5 Professional adds three grain management tools and both editions include one-click tools like Auto Color, Auto Levels, Auto Contrast, and Shadow/Highlight. For advanced color correction, After Effects now includes Color Finesse™ from Synthetic Aperture, a professional 32-bit floating point color correction system. In addition, motion tracking in After Effects 6.5 Professional has been enhanced for greater accuracy and flexibility.
In After Effects 6.5, previews and support for OpenGL are faster and more accurate. In addition, After Effects 6.5 has been optimized for the latest Intel and Macintosh G5 systems. New scripting support in After Effects 6.5 Professional enables users to write scripts to streamline their work and disk caching vastly improves real-time playback.
After Effects 6.5 offers tighter integration with other Adobe video products including Adobe Photoshop® CS, Adobe Premiere Pro and Adobe Encore DVD. Text from Photoshop CS files — including text on a path — is fully editable. Users can copy and paste content directly between Adobe Premiere Pro and After Effects, keeping motion paths and keyframes intact. Adobe Encore DVD menus can be imported into After Effects to be animated, and After Effects layers can be transformed into Adobe Encore buttons.
Pricing and Availability
Adobe After Effects 6.5 for Windows® 2000, Windows XP®, and Mac OS® X, will be available in the second calendar quarter of 2004. The estimated street price for After Effects 6.5 Standard will be US$699; After Effects 6.5 Professional will be US$999. Registered users of either version of After Effects 6.0 can upgrade to the new version for an estimated street price of US$99.
Adobe After Effects 6.5 is part of the Adobe Video Collection 2.5 Professional Edition for Windows XP, which includes Adobe Premiere Pro, Adobe After Effects Professional, Adobe Audition, Adobe Encore DVD, and Adobe Photoshop CS for an estimated street price of US$1499. The Adobe Video Collection 2.5 Standard edition, which contains After Effects Standard and does not contain Photoshop CS, will be available for an estimated street price of US$999.
Information about pricing, support policies, and other language versions is available online at www.adobe.com/motion. These products are available from Adobe certified resellers, as well as through licensing and education programs. For more information on any of the products mentioned in this release, customers in North America can call 1-888-724-4507.
