Tools And Software, Continued

Excellent eyesight is a prerequisite for using Power2Go and Power Director 3. Before these applications are ready for use, the user has to enter the product key, which is printed in minuscule characters on the DVD.

Power Director 3 is a video-editing suite consisting of four modules. As the name implies, the capture module can import movies and sounds from DV, TV, web cams, microphone, and CD and then save them to AVI, MPEG1 or MPEG2 format.

The Edit module allows you to arrange and synchronize video, images, sounds and effects. It also offers a selection of transitions and image effects, as well as titles. An audio mixer and voice-over recording feature round the module off, enabling users to add audio commentary to documentary movies.

Next, the Produce module lets users convert the result of the previous steps into a Mini-DVD, DVD, VCD or SVCD. The movies can also be saved as DV-AVI, Windows-AVI, MPEG1 or MPEG2 files, played back to DV tape, or turned into a streaming file. Attempts to switch to the Burn module yield an error message informing the user that Power Producer is not installed; those that want to burn their movie to a disc can use the other bundled program, Power2Go.

Power2Go is burning software for files, videos, pictures, and sounds. The user interface is easy to use, and integrated tools help users with tasks such as erasing rewritable media and audio ripping and conversion. An image recorder saves user-created projects.