Jog Your Way to Editing Bliss: Shuttle Pro v2 [Archive]

Neil Enns

11-10-2004, 06:00 PM

<img src="http://www.digitalmediathoughts.com/media/users/303/neile_oct14_shuttlepro_top.gif" /> Product Category: Hardware Manufacturer: <a href="http://www.contourdesign.com/">Contour Design</a> Where to Buy: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/redirect?tag=jasonsego&path=tg%2Fdetail%2F-%2FB00027X2YM%2Fjasondunn-20">Amazon.com</a> Price: $115 USD System Requirements (PC): Windows 98/98SE/ME/2000/XP, USB port, 3MB disk space System Requirements (Mac): PowerBook/iBook/iMac/G3/G4/G5 with Mac OS 10.1 or later, USB port, 1.5MB disk space Pros:<li>Makes quick work of editing video; <li>Responsive and comfortable to use.Cons:<ul><li>Macro buttons weren't as useful as I expected.</ul>Summary: After shooting 4+ hours of video on our recent trip to Hawaii, my wife and I were not looking forward to the prospect of endless hours spent in front of the computer searching for the clips we wanted. Premiere Pro supports auto-detection of clips on a tape, but you always need to futz around to find the right in and out points to make the cuts smooth. There are controls built-in to the UI for searching through clips, but I figure why use software when you can geek out and get new hardware? :) So I went looking for a jog/shuttle wheel to add to my computer, and settled on the Shuttle Pro v2. Did it help ease my editing pain? Read on to find out!<!> <PAGEBREAK> Overview Jog/shuttle wheels are a staple of the video editing industry. Watch any show on TV that cuts to a fancy control room and you're bound to see editing boards with lots of switches, buttons, and a jog wheel. The big win with a wheel is that it lets you use your otherwise useless left hand while editing. The left hand takes up the job of moving through video clips at various speeds, and your right hand can drive the rest of the application UI (lefties shall, of course, reverse this!). Couple a jog/shuttle wheel with a few macro buttons and you have a powerful tool to speed up tedious video editing. Installation The Shuttle Pro comes in a box with a CD (for drivers and the manual), a quick start card, and a set of button labels. Setup is pretty much like any other USB device: plug the Shuttle Pro in then install the drivers from the CD. After the installation is complete you get a small icon in the system tray to let you know the device is active and to access the control panel if necessary. The device installation was relatively smooth, although I did have a few hiccups. The first came when I realised that the driver included in the box did not support the latest version of Premiere Pro. It took me a few minutes to realise why the Shuttle Pro didn't do anything when I was trying to edit video! An updated driver from the Website solved the problem, however it wasn't clear from the site that this support was added to the driver I downloaded. It would be nice if the site were updated to provide a complete list of the supported applications in each download. The second problem appears to be a bug in the CD. The link to launch the manual didn't work, and I had to browse the CD to find it instead. Jogging for Something Other Than Health and Fitness In day-to-day use for video editing the Shuttle Pro is everything I wanted it to be. The Shuttle control is very responsive, snaps back nicely when released, and really helped me power through video clips looking for just the right moment. I never noticed any lag time between when I released the wheel and when Premiere Pro stopped moving through footage. The jog portion was equally useful at moving frame-by-frame to pinpoint the exact location for a cut. The device as a whole is very comfortable to use, even with my big hands. When I first put the Shuttle Pro on my desk I was worried about its weight. To be honest it isn't very heavy and I was concerned it would slide around while I was using it. It turns out this wasn't a problem at all, and it stayed put through all my editing tasks. The nice thing about its weight is that it's actually very easy to slide out of the way when I'm done with it to make more room on my desk for papers and such when I'm doing real work. My only real complaint with the hardware is the depth of the finger dimples on the jog wheel. Maybe I just have big fingers, but I did find that if I was jogging too quickly my finger would occasionally slide off the wheel. <PAGEBREAK> Need a Macro Button? Here are Fifteen! The Shuttle Pro also includes 15 programmable macro buttons. Each of the buttons can be assigned to a specific key sequence to automate common tasks in your favourite applications. The default mappings for Premiere Pro are great and include functions like: forward/reverse, play, stop, skip to next/previous, edit, and insert or overlay. These are all available as keyboard shortcuts in Premiere Pro as well, but by grouping them next to the jog wheel your left hand can again offload some of the work from your right. To help you remember what each of the macro keys do the Shuttle Pro comes with a set of pre-printed labels. Using a pen or a paper clip you pry off the key covers from 9 of the 15 keys and insert the label underneath. This is much nicer than a stick on label, as it allows you to change the mappings down the road and prevents a gummy sticker mess as the devices gets pounded from daily use. A set of blank labels is also included so you can add your own custom mappings. In practice, I didn't bother adding the labels underneath as it doesn't take very long to memorize what the buttons do. I also found that I didn't use the macro buttons as much as I'd thought I would. I was already pretty familiar with the keyboard shortcuts for Premiere Pro, and had already trained my left hand to do all the commands. When I was already using the jog wheel to move through clips I did occasionally make use of the macro buttons, but if you wanted to save a few dollars you could probably go for the Shuttle Express (see conclusion for more details) and still be happy. Not Just a One-Trick Pony Even though I only intended to use the Shuttle Pro for video editing it actually comes with presets for an <a href="http://www.contourdesign.com/shuttlepro/sp-apps.htm">exhaustive set of applications</a>. While I was writing this review, for example, I discovered that the jog/shuttle wheel can be used to arrow through Microsoft Word documents. The same scrolling behaviour works in Internet Explorer, and gives you a nice way to roll through a document while pointing with your mouse. Some macro buttons and the jog wheel do zooming in Photoshop, too, and other macro buttons are mapped to common image transforms. The Shuttle Pro driver automatically detects the active application and adjusts its settings accordingly, so you never have to swap settings through a control panel. <img src="http://www.digitalmediathoughts.com/media/users/303/neile_oct14_controlpanel.jpg" /> Figure 1: The Shuttle Pro v2 control panel. If you're not happy with the button and wheel mappings you can use the Shuttle Pro's control panel to set up custom behaviours for each button in specific applications. For example, I changed the default Shuttle action in Word to map to the mouse wheel movements rather than up/down arrow key presses. The control panel is pretty simple to use: select the application settings you want to change, press the button on the Shuttle Pro to modify, and then assign the key stroke or mouse command. Unfortunately, however, there is no help integrated into the control panel to explain some of the non-obvious options. It would be nice to include a help button somewhere so you don't have to go load up the manual from the CD. Conclusion At $115 the Shuttle Pro v2 is a steal for anyone who does video editing on a regular basis. If you want to spend a little less you might consider the <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/B0001DBEKG/jasondunn-20/">Shuttle Express</a> which provides a jog/shuttle wheel and 5 macro buttons for a mere $38. Either one will be a valuable addition to your video editing workflow!