Archive notice: This article was originally published on July 23, 2008. Links and embedded videos are preserved as part of the historical record.
Avid is now offering three updated versions of products in the Avid Deko family: Avid Deko 5.0, PostDeko 8.0.1 and DekoCast 4.1.2. The Deko family provides a comprehensive range of on-air graphics systems. The new features enable greater productivity and therefore even better creative output across broadcast graphics projects. Compared with graphics products from other manufacturers, Avid’s Deko family now also offers substantially improved ease of use and fast, trouble-free on-air deployment as a cost- and time-saving solution.
Ian Kennedy, CTO at Fontastics, a Los Angeles production company specializing in broadcast graphics and openers for major live events, explains the benefits of the new Deko versions: “With Deko 5.0, we save a great deal of time when creating graphics and can get our programs on air much faster because we do not need an additional technically skilled team to operate it. That allows us to give viewers an even better television experience. We have always been impressed by how easy it is to create and edit motion effects with the Deko system. The new animation interface in particular gives us everything we need for our live and high-profile broadcast environments. We also import many QuickTime movies into the Deko system, which reduces the need for external hard-disk recorders for complex multilayered animations.”
Deko 5.0: What’s new?
Avid Deko 5.0 software offers innovative 3D motion features that simplify the creation, editing and real-time playback of sophisticated animations. Customers can also now exchange files with users of third-party editing systems. The new features include:
- PowerClips: PowerClips gives users access to a greater number of integrated video effects, such as creating moving portrait shots and special animations. PowerClips can be created locally or with other tools such as Adobe After Effects, then imported into a Deko system as a QuickTime movie. This makes on-air playback easy to create.
- Motion-in-Motion: Motion-in-Motion provides grouped motion effects for Deko 3000 and Deko 1000 models that can be added to standard motion activities.
- Z-Depth Animation: Z-Depth Animation adds the Z-position parameter to the Motion Editor, allowing users to animate graphics from a true 3D perspective.
- Deko 3D in HD: Deko 3D in HD imports 3ds Max models into Deko systems and maps them with Deko layers that can be edited in real time. Text and images remain real-time components of the graphic, enabling rapid content replacement and a straightforward workflow that makes the graphics operator’s job considerably easier.
- Auto-Motion: By defining specific logic in advance during preparation, Auto-Motion automates transitions between graphics, helping broadcasters save on-air time.
- Texture Shadows: Texture Shadows provides automatic shadow control over color, distance, direction, blur and opacity. Deko shader applications can, for example, use an image texture and add it to the image’s alpha channel.
- ClipDeko Updates: With ClipDeko Updates, videos can now be previewed on the desktop in a new Clip Viewer within the Clip Edit window.
PostDeko 8.0.1: What’s new?
With a seamless broadcast production workflow, PostDeko systems simplify consistent branding throughout an organization by making it easy to exchange graphics and effects with third-party systems. Additional features include Z-Depth Animation, Motion-in-Motion, ClipDeko add-ons and PowerClips. Motion Design and Make DekoMovie are now standard features in the new version, simplifying the transfer of offline graphics and motion effects into an online Deko system.
DekoCast 4.1.2: What’s new?
DekoCast 4.1.2 software supplies an expanded set of software plug-ins for improved scene control, better playback and more customized requirements. The new version also provides scripting and API capabilities that allow users to draw data from sources including iNEWS rundowns, websites and RSS feeds. Other features in DekoCast 4.1.2 include:
- iNEWS Extractor: iNEWS Extractor provides a direct live-data connection from an iNEWS rundown or story to key DekoCast objects for producing breaking news and top stories.
- Image Fetcher: Image Fetcher automatically retrieves web-based images at scheduled times and places them in a preformatted position within the DekoCast scene.
- RSS Extractor: RSS Extractor extracts web data feeds based on the RSS protocol to add live headlines and top stories for news, sports and entertainment to the DekoCast layer.
- Database Extractor: Database Extractor enables DekoCast scene objects to query ODBC-compatible databases such as Microsoft Access directly.
- Engine Trigger: Engine Trigger enables actions directly within a scene to control and respond to other parameter changes.
Media created in Deko, PostDeko and DekoCast can also now be saved using the Avid DNxHD QuickTime codec. This not only ensures fast import into Avid editors but also accelerates the process of adding HD motion graphics to a broader workflow.
Pricing & Availability
Avid Deko 5.0, Avid PostDeko 8.0.1 and Avid DekoCast 4.1.2 are available now from the Avid website at http://www.avid.com/downloadcenter. More information about Avid’s family of on-air graphics systems—Deko 5.0, PostDeko 8.0.1 and DekoCast 4.1.2—is available at http://www.avid.de/de/products/broadcast-graphics.asp.
