It was a bit of a surprise back in April when NLE stalwart (at least for some) Lightworks announced that it would go open source. EditShare is the current owner of the Lightworks editing application, one of the original nonlinear editors that has cut a lot of feature films you may have seen. EditShare had a Lightworks demo set up in a back corner of their booth at NAB 2010. I hadn’t seen a Lightworks system in years and, while it has evolved into a totally different product from what I remember, it looked like a capable platform.

Fast forward to today and a new website has launched that offers the new Lightworks for public beta. Just thumbing through the front page of the site makes for an intriguing look at the product. The buzzwords are: speed, real-time effects, unmatched format support, stereoscopic editing, instant save, and unique trimming. Even without digging into the details of those headlines my interest is piqued! Too bad it’s PC only … but a check of the Compatibility page reveals this: “Support for Linux and OSX is scheduled for late 2011.”

Even more interesting is the in-depth features list. That’s a lot of bullet points, and a lot of features that any modern NLE might envy. It’s also worth checking the Roadmap page, as those bullet points point to what looks to be a bright future for Lightworks:

There’s the current Lightworks interface (from the website) and for those who remember the old Lightworks, there’s the shark!

The road map:

Q1 & Q2 2011

  • Blackmagic support
  • AJA support
  • DVS support
  • Stereoscopic adjustment toolset
  • Export options for DVD and Blu-ray
  • Titling tool
  • Interoperability improvements with AAF and XML

Q3 2011

  • New effects such as image stabilization
  • Audio plug-ins
  • File delivery
  • Remote editing

2011-Q4

  • Full 64-bit version
  • Linux and OSX support

It looks like 2011 might get really interesting. Avid will continue to advance Media Composer, Adobe will most certainly try to make major inroads with Premiere Pro … and who knows what Apple will do with Final Cut Pro, but if rumors are to be believed the next release will be awesome! And we shouldn’t forget all those PC-based editors including Vegas and Edius.

And then there’s Lightworks. If they deliver an application that can really do what all those bullet points claim as well as deliver the cross-platform compatibility, then the future looks quite bright for us editors. More choice and more competition.