Keynote: Software Part One

"2005 is going to be the year of high definition video."

He introduces Final Cut Express HD, which includes LiveType, Soundtrack, and accepts datafiles from iMovie and Motion.

Next is iLife, and iLife '05 with major upgrades to almost every app. iPhoto offers better organizing & searching, more format support, greater editing abilities, advanced slideshows, and new book designs. New Project folders can contain multiple albums. A calendar view will show your library by date. MPEG-4 movies are now supported, and RAW image formats. Editing includes an album crawl along the top, an editing dashboard containing advanced settings like histograms, saturation, temperature, and tint. New slideshows can manage transitions and timing individually.

Demoing iPhoto with 25,000 photos, Steve shows a folder containing multiple albums. Next he searches for 'Lake' which searches photo tags. He then looks at January and June 2004 using the new calendar view, then drilling down to weeks and days. Double-clicks an MPEG-4 video to play it. Next he edits a couple photos in realtime using the editing dashboard. Next he uses the straigten control to level out a sunset shot!

Slideshow controls include different transitions for each photo, with the Ken Burns effect in some places.

New book drop-down menu with picture books, travel, watercolor and some others. iPhoto asks whether Steve wants to do layout manually, but instead he chooses to have it done automatically. He moves from book to edit mode effortlessly. Books now come in softcover, 8x6 softcover, and 2.5x2.5 pocketbook, and all are 20 pages.

iMovie is now much faster, works with MPEG-4 video, and Magic iMovie which automates the entire editing process. It also includes high definition editing (720p and 1080i)!! Now demoing iMovie with high definition video, showing a Hawaiian wedding with wide aspect ratio and flawless quality.

Now Steve shows the Sony HDV camcorder ($3499), "I've been playing around with this thing for a month, and...you just gotta go get one of these." Steve welcomes Kunitake Ando, President of Sony, on stage. Kunitake: "It's very exciting to see real Steve Jobs, making presentation." Steve is recording Kunitake with his HDV camcorder. "Steve is a big fan of Sony products, not all of them, but most of them." (Sidenote: Steve's water bottles now have their Smart Water branding on them, whereas in the past they were stripped.) Kunitake goes on, "HDV format allows recording and playback of HD video, on existing DV tapes." Steve and Kunitake shake hands as Kunitake leaves the stage.

iDVD now includes new themes, animated drop zones, and support for all burnable DVD disc formats. Demoing iDVD shows photos and videos being animated across the menu. Other new themes include are varied and gorgeous, with more media element animation, especially an infant mobile animation.

Garage Band also includes a fourth Jam Pack with Orchestral instruments. New features include 8 track realtime recording, realtime music notation, pitch and timing fix, make your own loops, and a few others.

John Mayer comes on stage to play piano, while Steve shows the realtime music notation (the note graphics resize in realtime also), and drags the note graphics to change the tune. John and his backup bass player start playing, and Steve records John's guitar, the bassist's bass, John's vocals, and the backup vocals simultaneously. Steve plays back part of the recording, isolating individual tracks at random.

"These apps work together seamlessly in iLife '05...it goes on sale January 22nd." (For $79).