I haven't rewatched it since childhood, but my vague recollections of Gremlins 2 strained through my modern brain's taste filter bring me to the conclusion that the film might not be the Oscar-candidate I once thought. But there was one scene that was very memorable all the same. It's when the film breaks in the middle of the movie and gremlins take over the projection booth (where they injected themselves into various films). On VHS, the sequence was altered as a tape breaking with a similar outcome. Now, one highly talented fan updated the whole sequence for today's VOD technology with completely new clips. It's not just some fanboy creation; this is the work of a very talented special effects professional. And once you watch that first clip, the making of is even better:

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Before Gizmodo, I worked in the bowels of the broadcast industry for a number of years. I was either shooting video or cutting video every day, all day. And while Final Cut Pro and Adobe After Effects were both tools I used with some proficiency on a daily basis, I've never seen a post production demo as incredible as this clip from the University of Washington.

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Charlie over at DVICE is a musician, so if he says this Direct Note Access is miraculous, we definitely believe him. Think of this software suite as Photoshop, but for music—able to change any note to any other note even if it's buried inside chords or other instruments playing simultaneously. Up until now, you could only change the entire chord, not individual notes, which would affect the general feel of the tune. But as you can see above in the video, DNA gives people much more control. [Celemony via Technology Review via Daily Swarm via DVICE]

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So, it's been four days since I started here at Giz, and I've been so busy trying to get myself sorted out that I've overlooked introducing myself. Well no more!

The name's Nick Broughall. Some of you might recognise that byline if you're a reader of Australian T3 magazine — I was editor there for the past 18 months, reviews editor before that and staff writer before that. I've also done a spot of tech freelancing around the place. Think Rolling Stone, OPSM, Paperplane, and probably a few others I've forgotten about and you'll get the idea.

So why should you care? Well, I know you lot are a pretty dedicated lot. You love gadgets as much as me. You hate missing out on the latest product just because you're Australian too. My aim is to give you all the best local gadget info, plus keep you informed of all the overseas goings on.

I also want to build the Australian Giz community... some of you guys are awesome commenters (applause). But there's more of you lurking in the corners, maybe to shy to make your opinions heard. Well I want to hear them. In the coming weeks, look out for some great competitions for commenters, plus I also have a few ideas for  some Giz-reader get-togethers.

It's going to be an awesome ride. Feel free to tell me what you like about the site, what you don't like, tips, tricks, ideas, or if you simply want to send me money. I'm all for receiving anonymous cheques, by the way.

Blackmagic Design is now shipping Intensity Pro, a $349 PCI Express card you can install in a Mac or a PC that lets you capture uncompressed HD video via an HDMI port, and then view that video as you edit by plugging in an HDMI-equipped HDTV set. The Intensity Pro also lets you capture and play back any analog source using S-Video, or component connections. If you don't need that analog capability, for $249 you can just get the previously available Intensity card that handles HDMI only. HDTV shooters and editors, consumer and pro, are going to love this.

AU: FYI, the awesomeness of Blackmagic Design comes straight outta Melbourne. We're chasing up local pricing. Word is the local price is $415 for the Intensity and $565 for the Intensity Pro (from New Magic Australia).

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We've heard a lot of complaining about the paucity of editing tools for the nascent AVCHD video format, and now Ulead VideoStudio 11 Plus comes along with that capability and a lot more. With AVCHD originator Panasonic's latest solid-state camcorders using the format, and Sony rocking more cameras using it just the other day, the ability to edit that footage is long overdue.

Hey, that format's fo' reals, and is here to stay, right? Yep. Well, what else can Ulead VideoStudio 11 do?

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I've liked the idea of AVCHD video, but the fact that nothing to date has been able to edit the footage -- even Sony's own Vegas 7 -- has been plain ridiculous. Sony has promised "coming soon" since their cameras launched back in November, but now, six months later, we finally get the news we've been waiting for.

Vegas 7 Professional will have a free update, downloadable from May 1. Huzzah! Users of the consumer Vegas Movie Studio Platinum 8 will get their update in July. Ouch, but at least you've finally got a date.

It is native editing too, not transcoded to an intermediate codec, so you won't be getting any generational loss. No decision yet on recommended spec, but it will have to be more than general Vegas use because real-time editing AVCHD is going to cane your CPU. We've been told:

It does not do too bad on a Duo CPU! Sony CS have come up with a faster way of editing naively that's all I can tell you...

Let's assume that's 'natively'... I don't want to call them naive about this just yet. Zing!! -Seamus Byrne

Avid Technology announced the latest version of its wildly popular consumer video editing software package, Pinnacle Studio 11, set to ship next month. Now the software is offered in Basic, Plus, and Ultimate versions.

If you don't need to edit HD, the Basic version for $49 will probably do everything you need. Bump up to the $99 Plus version and you can edit HD videos and also burn HD DVDs. Another 30 bucks gives you Pinnacle Studio Ultimate, unlocking chromakey and film-look effects, panning and zooming tools and a few audio tweaking toys.

Sounds good, but the previous version of this software sucked. Find out more:

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If you're interested in high-end video production, you'll want to take a look at Apple's Final Cut Studio 2. It's chock full o' apps, included a smooth new update to Final Cut Pro, now in version 6, Its main coolness is its ability to crunch HDTV video down to manageable sizes, made possible by ProRes 422, a codec for compressing video that Apple claims to be able to do the video equivalent of stuffing a basketball through a garden hose.

We watched a lengthy demo of the new software, and found it to be a remarkable polyglot, able to handle all kinds of footage all in one big bucket, something that's really important to broadcasters and filmmakers these days. When there are dozens of varieties of HDTV and regular TV to deal with, this is not a new feature, but welcome by Final Cut users.

Check out a few of our pics in the gallery below, and read more about Final Cut Studio 2 on the next page.

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Apple introduced Open Format for Final Cut Pro, allowing you to mix different formats on the timeline. They say "it just works," and from the demo, looks like all kinds of formats can nicely live together on the same editing timeline, where they had to be transcoded to work together before.

Then Apple showed some uncompressed 1080p footage with other resolutions and frame rates, all edited together in real time. Nice.

They then showed us a side-by-side comparison of ProRes and uncompressed HD, and it was hard to tell the difference between the two. Then the kicker? The ProRes footage was 10th-generation. Impressive.