Product Review: RealProducer 10 Competes On Features, Codecs

Parallel Inputs let you create one encoded file from several sources. You can combine the audio from one file and the video from another (with a time offset delay you can set). Or, use video from a file and encode it with live audio from your sound card. You'll need to configure parallel inputs in a job file, and then kick it off from the command-line interface.

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There are two other notables about RP10. First, the RealProducer ActiveX control lets you build Real encoding into your own custom applications. There are a number of features you can access using the ActiveX control that you can't get to in the full RealProducer product, such as embedding an event track into a live stream. The new release of the SDK updates the previous ActiveX control from version 8.5 to version 10. In a future article, we'll look at the things you can do with the RealProducer ActiveX control, and how to write simple code to take advantage of it.

Good news/Bad news: There's no full RealProducer product coming for Mac users. Although the RealProducer SDK is available for the Mac, there's something better on the way that'll help ease the Mac gap. The QuickTime Export Plugin is a component that will plug into any Mac application that has an "Export to Quicktime" option, including Final Cut Pro, Avid Xpress, After Effects, Adobe Premiere, and others. The plugin will allow export directly from these apps to the codecs and formats RealProducer supports. The Quicktime Export Plugin is not available to the public yet, but we're testing an early version now. Look for an in-depth review in a few weeks when it's ready to go public, right here on streamingmedia.com.