Lightworks to go open source

T

TrueIndigo

Well-known member
Just read on an Ubuntu forum that Editshare (who acquired the Lightworks professional NLE) announce that they will make it available for download (possibly by quarter 3 this year). Editshare propose a business model in which independent developers can create and sell plug-ins and in/out devices through a centralised Lightworks online marketplace.

This could be big news. I hope Linux is included in the platforms -- feels like I've been waiting years for Lumiera to come out and now this...wow.

www.editshare.com


Edit: I checked out some PDF brochures of their existing products and it seems they are cross platform (Mac, win, Linux), so looking good for Linux.
 
Part of the buisness model seems to be selling server-infrastructure to larger studios and therefor they need lightworks to be more widespread.
 
Anyone know if/how this supports AVCHD? I see AVC Intra and Quicktime in the specs, but not AVCHD specifically.

-cp
 
Cool news.

Gotta say that I was a little disappointed, because I misread your thread title as "Lightwave to go open source."

But cool news regardless.
 
This is great news! Apart from Kodak announcing they are killing off Plus-X, the last few days have been nearly all good news on the filmmaking front.
 
http://www.geebroadcast.co.uk/LWKS/lwks_product.htm

So Lightworks Softworks (or the LE version) will be free. It looks quite interesting judging by the client list. Softworks (the software-only version), now 7,500 euro, has native AVI container and codec support, so it should work with the Drama avi container today like most other PC apps. Insert Drama cartridge to 3.5" bay and edit in realtime without ingest or transcoding.

It sounds like they made an excellent marketing move. It will help them expand a lot. Learning the tool looks like quite a good investment in time, and there is an upgrade path. Very interesting for indie cinematographers or anyone seriously interested in production.
 
GPL License would be awesome! I don't think it is their plan right now though. We should set up a petition to get them to do it. Have it signed by the Open Source, filmmaking, and effects communities.

Also, Lightworks looks Windows only right now. Hope that will change.
 
On their download page the counter of submissions for "I would like to be notified when the free Lightworks application is available for download" was at 7,025 when I looked just now.
 
Just had the first email update. Highlights: "Currently Lightworks runs on Windows 7 and Windows XP...Our intention is to port it to Linux and OS X...We believe that Lightworks is the most powerful editor available, particularly with its effects engine...Our plan is to finish off a couple more key new features, such as stereoscopic support, and then make it available as a free downloadable application. We aim to make the first free download available in Q3 of this year."

The code is to be made available at the end of the year and maybe the Linux port will come about soon after that?

Cheers.
 
This is strange. I read their press release and although the do mention Open Source a dozen times, they only commit to a free download of an app later this year. The rest of the text implies nothing more than the ability to connect to the core and write plugins which is what other companies call an SDK. Didn't they allow that in the past? Making the app free will boost third party development of course, it was an extremely expensive piece of software that was only popular in the big budget film market.

I don't understand how they can release the source. It will not work in their situation. Actually, I don't think they will release it. They are just trying to expand by offering it for free and get some interest in third party development. Their market share in the affordable editor segment is zero so they have nothing to loose. Any mention of Open Source creates a lot of enthusiasm these days.
 
I think they are probably busy auditing the code, to make sure they isolate any stuff that cannot be open sourced from the core of the application. When the Video Toaster source code was open sourced, NewTek had someone go through first and take out all the bad words from the source code comments, for example.

Open sourcing Lightworks ought to be a good strategy for them. I think their hope is to take the number of users from a tiny fraction of a small market (high end professionals who use Windows and aren't already using Final Cut Pro or Avid) and expand into a much bigger market (the previous group plus independent filmmakers and dedicated amateurs on all three main platforms).

If things go well for them, they can increase their user base by one or two orders of magnitude, get their application ported to two other platforms for free, and make more money selling turnkey systems, plug-ins, and support than they are currently on the core application.
 
I find this really interesting, for what I read this can be a killer app giving the indy filmmaker a nice tool to work and and at the same time incorporate proffesional processes to the editing stage via omf edl...etc export.
 
This is strange. I read their press release and although the do mention Open Source a dozen times, they only commit to a free download of an app later this year.
Click to expand...

I read this and also interpreted that they would be releasing what is basically a free lite version of the full app. A paid "pro" version with full server support would be available as a paid upgrade. Anyway, it's still an interesting development.
 
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