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Pitivi Video Editor Surpasses 50% Crowdfunding Goal, Releases Version 0.94

Posted by samzenpus on from the brand-new dept.

kxra writes With the latest developments, Pitivi is proving to truly be a promising libre video editor for GNU distributions as well as a serious contender for bringing libre video production up to par with its proprietary counterparts. Since launching a beautifully well-organized crowdfunding campaign (as covered here previously), the team has raised over half of their 35,000 € goal to pay for full-time development and has entered "beta" status for version 1.0. They've released two versions, 0.94 (release notes) being the most recent, which have brought full MPEG-TS/AVCHD support, porting to Python 3, lots of UX improvements, and—of course—lots and lots of bug fixes. The next release (0.95) will run on top of Non Linear Engine, a refined and incredibly more robust backend Pitivi developers have produced to replace GNonLin and bring Pitivi closer to the rock-solid stability needed for the final 1.0 release.

67 comments

  1. Pitiemacs by CanEHdian · · Score: 5, Funny

    Bah, humbug! My money is on Pitiemacs.

    --
    When the copyright term is "forever minus a day", live every day like it's the last.
    1. Re:Pitiemacs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      It's a fantastic industrial management system and ERP suite, I just wish it had a better video editor.

    2. Re:Pitiemacs by marcello_dl · · Score: 1

      But, emacs users piti-vi!

      --
      ---- MISSING MISCELLANEOUS DATA SEGMENT --- [sigdash] trolololol
  2. LGPL 2.1 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    So would this mean that any plugins would not have to be GPL?

  3. Honest question by Delicious+Pun · · Score: 0

    Why would you donate money to an open source project? They can change it to whatever they want, whenever they want. Your concerns will be routed to http://islinuxaboutchoice.com/. You could fork it, but wouldn't you then feel cheated?

    1. Re:Honest question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      So that the people making it can continue to make it. So that they can continue to improve it. So that they can do so more than they already have.

      It takes time to make software. Time is worth money.

      You want someone to make it? They have to invest their time. That costs [opportunity cost] them money. They either do it out of the goodness of their heart, or someone gives them money to do it.

    2. Re:Honest question by wierd_w · · Score: 1

      No, because I still would have gotten what I paid for. A more mature, more stable code base, from which a good and fully useful product can be built.

    3. Re:Honest question by Delicious+Pun · · Score: 2

      Closed source software already exists. Why not spend money on that?

    4. Re:Honest question by Narcocide · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Because closed source software disappears when the company goes out of business. Ever heard of Caligari Truespace?

      Exactly.

    5. Re:Honest question by Delicious+Pun · · Score: 2

      But open source software can effectively disappear too. If the devs want to change it to something you don't like, you have no say in the matter. If no one forks it and you can't do it yourself, it's gone.

    6. Re:Honest question by Delicious+Pun · · Score: 0

      . A more mature, more stable code base,

      Hahaha. Ever heard of somethingd? It's neither of those things.

    7. Re:Honest question by unrtst · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Agreed with AC.

      In addition, they're goal was 35,000 €. In comparison to commercial development, that's damn near free.

      You can continue to:
      * pay zero and use nothing
      * use any of the existing free-ish editors that don't have the features this has
      * pay zero and pirate some commercial software
      * pay your monthly subscription for creative cloud etc
      * pay ~$1k for a license to something like Final Cut Pro or Premier Pro
      * pay nothing and still end up using this after others put their time and money into it and still complain because they asked for money

      Why *wouldn't* you donate money to an open source project?

    8. Re:Honest question by Narcocide · · Score: 2

      But if its something useful and popular, historically usually someone will fork it, or replace it with something else. Its no guarantee of everlasting life, but making it closed-source-only is an almost certain eventual doom.

    9. Re:Honest question by Delicious+Pun · · Score: 0

      Because they can change it to whatever they want, whenever they want. Your concerns will be routed to http://islinuxaboutchoice.com/ [islinuxaboutchoice.com].

    10. Re:Honest question by davydagger · · Score: 4, Insightful

      you don't know what your getting, often no bug tracker, or companies hostile to the concept of fixing bugs, expensive, often bloated, often limited in features, and unable to make your own in many cases.

      There are lots of reasons to get involved in FOSS programs. The notion that an established project is going to pick up shop after you donate is simply ludacris.

      Also, if a program is GPL or copyleft, more or less all work put into it, will be done publicly and will be available in some form.

      Oh, and what happens if a closed program just goes away, the maintainers split, company goes under? No more bug fixes, doesn't get ported to new platforms.

      I just saw your page, not convinced your not a troll.

    11. Re:Honest question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      * pay zero and use Fusion 7 - https://www.blackmagicdesign.c... - now free-as-in-fantasy-beer
      * pay zero and use LightWorks - http://www.lwks.com/

      There's probably others that are closed source and commercially developed, yet available in free form one way or another, with extensive featuresets.

      Of course on the open source side, there's further software as well. So I don't think it's unjust to ask why one would donate to Pitivi; it's just that the reason in this case is bunk. The real question should have been "Why donate funds to Pitivi, and not to [alternative]?"

    12. Re:Honest question by Narcocide · · Score: 2

      Also, you're forgetting that the simple fact of there being existing open-source code for a project, means that someone, even you, given the effort and time, can learn to fork it, or rewrite something like it from scratch. With closed-source code this is not possible either.

    13. Re:Honest question by Delicious+Pun · · Score: 1

      C'mon, admit it. You just want free stuff.

    14. Re:Honest question by Camembert · · Score: 1

      Correction: Final Cut Pro costs $300 these days. For someone who is serious about their video, that is not too bad. It is good enough for the Coen Brothers after all. But for non professional use, something like Premiere Elements or iMovie may be more than good enough, except of course if you use Linux. Does Pitivi offer more features?

    15. Re:Honest question by jones_supa · · Score: 1

      Just be aware that we are often talking about 100k+ lines of code projects these days. For fixing minor bugs it is okay, but adding new features means a lot of real work. Have you tried downloading the source code of some application and making even just small modifications to it?

    16. Re:Honest question by Narcocide · · Score: 1

      But adding new features isn't necessary just to keep it in play. Often all that is required is minor updates to keep it working on newer kernels.

    17. Re:Honest question by Bite+The+Pillow · · Score: 1

      So back to the point - the purpose of funding open source instead of closed source is to ensure future production. Closed source has a product in mind, and you pay for what you were delivered, with fixes to major bugs.

      In that sense, Caligari Truespace did exactly what it was supposed to do for whatever money people gave it. Sure it disappeared, but people didn't pay for a continuing company. They paid for a product that worked.

      Open source means that the people who care and want to develop it will. If they think it's important, they don't have to answer to a green-eyed bean counter. The features that the developers think are important will get developed. Not necessarily finished, but at least started.

      The future of the project is not related to funding. The open nature of the code may be. The production of the code is the reason for funding. Don't confuse closed source, where the production of the binary is important. It may be abandoned, because no one cares to develop it, but that's not the point of funding.

    18. Re:Honest question by LordLimecat · · Score: 2

      Open source software disappears too. Ever hear of AmaroK?

    19. Re:Honest question by LordLimecat · · Score: 1

      Gnome2, AmaroK, Songbird...

      Yea, OSS just isnt the miracle elixir people like to pretend it is, and "Just fork it" isnt an effective incantation.

    20. Re:Honest question by Microlith · · Score: 1

      ludacris

      Ludicrous is the word you want. What you used was this guy: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L...

    21. Re:Honest question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      You still can compile AmaroK if you want to. The source code is available.
      If you are skilled enough you can even make improvements.

      Try that with closed source...

    22. Re:Honest question by hvdh · · Score: 2

      I was looking for something free and tried Lightworks. I had a free-hand 720p recording from a Nikon D3100 and wanted to de-shake it, do some noise reduction (temporal, recoring was quite low-light at night), cut it in a few places and store it properly compressed. Nothing special, typical household stuff.
      Lightworks free couldn't read the camera's video files (MPEG4/H.264 in MOV containier), had no image stabilization and couldn't export H.264. I also could not find proper noise reduction or a way to use available IS/NR plug-ins from e.g. virtualdub. Also I still don't get the LightworksUI and controls completely.
      I ended up using vdubmod to import the camera's video files, doing IS+NR, writing uncompressed video that Lightworks could read. Then do the cutting in Lightworks, again writing uncompressed video, and doing the final H.264 encode with MediaCoder. Performance was disappointing due to huge files sizes.

    23. Re:Honest question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Oh - and that's not possible in closed source?

      If you fork out money and get an piece of closed software that will never be updated to fit to an newer OS or developed any further, or the company goes out of buisness and you cannot even validate your software to run (because of DRM), your money is well spend.

      But money spend than on an open project that can be picked up by anybody an developed further, even if the original developers go under, Is not money well spend? Even if the price you pay is just the amount you want to fork out? Oh - and no DRM so your software stays usable even when re-installing.

      Well - make your choice...

    24. Re:Honest question by risom · · Score: 2

      Gnome2, AmaroK, Songbird... Yea, OSS just isnt the miracle elixir people like to pretend it is, and "Just fork it" isnt an effective incantation.

      But the Mate Desktop, a Gnome 2 fork, exists, so GP seems to be right: If it's popular enough, it will live on.

    25. Re:Honest question by jones_supa · · Score: 1

      Yep, that should be doable by one man.

    26. Re:Honest question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      *purchased v2.1 of ClosedSourceEditor*
      Next week - NEW! Version 3.0 of ClosedSourceEditor! Now with extra shiny bits and the one really useful feature you've always wanted! Cost: 75% of what you've already paid, again. Don't want to pay? Ah well, you're on your own with v2.1, no support/patches/updates for you!

      # apt-get update
      oooh, look, pitivi v1.0 is here!

    27. Re:Honest question by grahamtriggs · · Score: 1

      You would donate if you believe in the direction that they are taking, and want to help them get there / sustain it.

      Just like you buy commercial / closed source software, because you want what it does.

      Nothing is ever guaranteed, but you have more of a chance of getting what you want if you are prepared to put your money (or time) where your mouth is.

    28. Re:Honest question by reikae · · Score: 2

      Nobody claimed that free software means someone will fulfill one's every wish. In the end, with free software you're allowed to create the fork; proprietary software, you're not (generally). That's it, no miracles involved.

    29. Re:Honest question by Narcocide · · Score: 1

      You seem to be forgetting the fact that if the source code isn't available then its not doable AT ALL. PERIOD. You also seem to be assuming that there only will ever be "one man."

    30. Re:Honest question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      apt-get source xxx
      cd xxx
      Modify what you want to modify
      dpkg-source --commit
      dpkg-buildpackage -rfakeroot

      That's it. Not that hard, is it?

      To actually answer your question: yes, I do many many modifications to all kinds of packages.

      Also, usually there is lib documentation which makes it obvious how to use the libraries, if that's what you mean...

    31. Re:Honest question by jones_supa · · Score: 1

      No, no, no. As an example, download Firefox source code and find where the code for linear interpolation of zoomed images is located. Before even modifying it, just locate it and try to roughly understand how it works. When you have done this, come back to the coffee table.

    32. Re:Honest question by jones_supa · · Score: 1

      My main point is that it is hard also when the source is available. At least I have found fixing even a small bug to take a few days. In the end, the fix can be trivial but it takes ages to get familiar with the codebase.

    33. Re:Honest question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Amarok is still being developed: https://www.openhub.net/p/amarok. It's not as active as it used to be, and there are a number of reasons for that, one of them being that it stops being fun working on a project if you get attacked for it all the time. I guess it's also pretty much feature complete, but then, ogg123 does the job for me, personally.

    34. Re:Honest question by iluvcapra · · Score: 1

      NB. I'm not sure if the Coen brothers ever made the transition to Final Cut Pro X. Most professionals haven't. After X came out most feature crews I know either have been keeping their FCP 7 installations going or transitioned back to Avid. A lot of the people on the very low end have mostly transitioned to Premiere Pro.

      --
      Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
    35. Re: Honest question by iluvcapra · · Score: 1

      Avid has been in development and in release for about 25 years now; I think Adobe Premiere is been available since at least 1992. I think both have been available for longer than the Linux operating system, let alone any OSS video editing package.

      --
      Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
    36. Re:Honest question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Wow, almost like fucking magic! The miracle of open source at work!

      Unfortunately, reality is much, much different.

    37. Re:Honest question by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Amarok still exists. Even version 1 still continues as Clementine.

    38. Re:Honest question by Narcocide · · Score: 1

      Well then, just imagine how much longer it must have taken to write in the first place. Don't think of that time you spent learning the codebase as a waste; think of it as an investment.

    39. Re:Honest question by jones_supa · · Score: 1

      That is true.

  4. Porting should be given priority by Alworx · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I think the broader the base, the quicker the funding, so I would recommend pushing for porting to OSX, Windows and perhaps even Android

    1. Re:Porting should be given priority by kxra · · Score: 2

      Aside from achieving stability, there are no set priorities, and donors have been given the opportunity to vote. Porting has not been of significant interest. It could be an issue of self-selection (probably is), but there is no way that the expanded donor base would be greater than the cost of doing those ports. Plus what's the point of porting to a platform which has way more competition available for no charge?

    2. Re:Porting should be given priority by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Completely agree with this. If it doesn't run natively on OS X, most content developers won't touch it with a 10 foot pole.

      I have the full Adobe Creative Suite, which costs $50 a month and gives me not just Premiere, but PhotoShop, Audition, Illustrator and the very very powerful After effects, which is something this project isn't even contemplating. The claims that PITIVI will somehow be an alternative to the very very feature rich tool suite from Adobe is laughable. The value for money Adobe is providing is tremendous and the amount of continuing development going into their products is at least 100X as much as the effort that this 35K will buy.

      That being said, I applaud the effort to at least have some reasonably good free video editing tools out there. But they will never be of the caliber of professional tools (and neither will blender for that matter). That's delusional thinking. Instead focus on a good core set of capabilities, a clean expandable architecture and universal availability across Windows, Linux, OSX and mobile platforms.

    3. Re:Porting should be given priority by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Video editing on Android? WTF for? What are you smoking?

    4. Re:Porting should be given priority by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Never say never. Don't underestimate the power of large numbers of people that have the same itch and are pointed in generally the same direction

      There was a time when nobody thought anything could challenge the dominant operating system. Now there are several different viable OSes available, some of which are completely free. Same thing for web servers and word processers.

    5. Re:Porting should be given priority by iluvcapra · · Score: 1

      Never say never. Don't underestimate the power of large numbers of people that have the same itch and are pointed in generally the same direction

      Casual users will no change their platform in order to get a video editor. People cutting YouTubes and home videos, that want "image stabilization" and "hum removal" are going to continue to use whatever platform makes the most sense for their use case. If all an OSS editor has to offer is "works like iMovie but free," that won't be enough to get people to transition.

      Professional users might switch an OS, most of them simply rent their equipment and the OS is less an issue. But in that case, the editing system has to support professional features -- media interchange with RED, ARRIRAW, AAF and OMF, ProRes quicktime, DPX, MXF, and a small army of color correction, machine control and metadata interchange platforms (most of these are licensed proprietary or FRAND standards); it has to offer realtime composition, color correction, LUTs for these at raw quality; it has to be able to manage and organize tens of terabytes of media, spanning hundreds of hours of shot material.

      These are possible but this is totally not where an open source project's emphasis is going to be -- they're going to go for stability in the "home movie" use case, and amateur videographer features, because these will drive 99% of the feature requests. Also, because these people are developers, they'll make sure the program has an elaborate API and scripting interface, because OSS developers consider this a universal panacea for missing features, and anyone who wants unpopular features will be told to RTFM and write their own.

      --
      Don't blame me, I voted for Baltar.
  5. kdenlive by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    kdenlive is by far the best linux video editor I have ever used.

    1. Re: kdenlive by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Thank you for letting us know.

  6. US Tax deductible by gQuigs · · Score: 1

    Just in case you were wondering.. (Handled by the Gnome Foundation)

    And they let you allocate the money to specific sub-projects..

    And slashdot posted a crowdfunding campaign before it was over!

  7. why? by jehan60188 · · Score: 1

    why is this necessary? i mean, blender has nonlinear video editing capabilities. what will this offer that blender doesnt?

    1. Re:why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      why is this necessary? i mean, blender has nonlinear video editing capabilities. what will this offer that blender doesnt?

      Because blender is old, and new is better. Duh.

    2. Re:why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Because Blender has a shit interface and is an enormous pain in the ass to use.

      Also, I tried Pitivi recently and it crashed every few mouse clicks.So does every other FOSS video editor.

      Can you fuckers just make something that doesn't crash CONTINUOUSLY?

    3. Re:why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Hipsters want to write new code not fix and maintain "legacy" code (aka NIH).

    4. Re:why? by Immerman · · Score: 1

      Possibly a discoverable interface? I mean I'm pretty technically inclined, and I liked Blender once I got decent with it, but go few months without using it and I'm practically back to square one.

      --
      --- Most topics have many sides worth arguing, allow me to take one opposite you.
    5. Re:why? by the_arrow · · Score: 1

      You mean besides Blender not being a generic video editing program like, for example, Pitivi?

      --
      / The Arrow
      "How lovely you are. So lovely in my straightjacket..." - Nny
    6. Re:why? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      gee... that explains Windows 8 and the brave new Metro thing

  8. Awesome by trawg · · Score: 4, Insightful

    More OSS video editors is great. I backed openshot a while ago, not because I have any interest in video editing (or watching videos - would much prefer to read) but because I think it'd be great to wrest some of the power away from the commercial options.

    1. Re:Awesome by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I think it'd be great to wrest some of the power away from the commercial options.

      That is a false dichotomy. Free software and commercialization aren't mutually exclusive.

      On the one hand we have Free software vs Restrictive software, on the other hand we have Commercial software vs Non-commercial software. One says absolutely nothing about the other.

  9. Does it have systemd dependencies yet? by nublaii · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    Otherwise it can't possibly be *that* cool

  10. "GNU distributions" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Someone playing Vladimir Putin and rewriting OSS history?

  11. Speaking of open source editing tools... by neurovish · · Score: 2

    Is Cinelerra still around? Looks like there was an actual update back in September, which is the first movement I've seen on the project in about 5 years. I've never come across anybody else that uses it though.

  12. just use FFmpeg by PJ6 · · Score: 1

    GUIs are overrated.