Simplified workflow
Fresh, clean interface enables access to all of the important organization and preparation tasks from a single screen. Browse and view clips, make a secure backup, copy clips to a production PC or external hard drive, transcode to a variety of formats, create rough-cut storyboards, or upload to Sony Media Cloud Services Ci for collaborative review.

Browse and view

• Browse multiple devices and view media directly from your camera, deck, or card reader. View clips as thumbnails or as lists with associated metadata. Quickly zoom in to check focus, apply a look to check color, and view and add metadata. Mark in/out points during playback or scrub the timeline and log marker points to focus on the important part of the clip. Create subclips to capture important sections of a longer file.

Off load

• Back up multiple media cards with checksum verification.

Dual app workflow

• Use the Windows auto resize feature or the new split view in Mac to take advantage of drag and drop from Catalyst Prepare to Catalyst Edit.

Organize into libraries and bins

• Catalyst Prepare is a key organizational and creative tool that allows you to arrange media into targeted, meaningful libraries and bins. Then launch the creative process with solid rough drafts. Locate the correct media, create subclips, and develop rough drafts on a storyboard in a dedicated tool designed specifically for these tasks.

Logging

• Mark in and out points during playback or scrub the timeline and log marker points to focus on the important part of the clip. Create subclips to capture important sections of a longer clip.

Edit mode
View details, zoom to check focus, mark in/out points, adjust colors nondestructively, and create a storyboard to rough draft your vision. Edit mode enables you to zero in on the important parts of each clip. Create sub clips to easily access the best parts of each clip. Assemble, trim, and sequence a group of files into a Storyboard. Even apply color adjustments. Then render the Storyboard out in a variety of formats or export it as an EDL with media to send to Vegas Pro, Apple Final Cut Pro, AVID Media Composer, Adobe Premiere or Da Vinci Resolve. The edit mode also offers the ability to automatically detect and repair flash band problems created by flash photography.

Touch enabled

• Use gestures to start and stop playback, zoom and pan to check focus, select and move files, adjust color controls, and more.

Pro SDI monitoring

• For critical color work, output to an external reference monitor through a Blackmagic SDI or UltraStudio device.

GPU accelerated

• The entire Catalyst family takes advantage of the power of modern GPU devices from Intel, NVIDIA, and AMD to enhance playback and transcoding. The optimal GPU device is automatically selected.

Native format support

• Catalyst Prepare natively supports Sony professional formats such as XDCAM SD and HD, XDCAM EX, XAVC-Intra, XAVC Long-GOP, XAVC S, NXCAM, Sony RAW, HDCAM SR (SStP), AVCHD, AVC H.264/MPEG-4. DNxHD, HDV and DV and ProRes (OS X only) are also supported. All formats can be mixed and matched when building a storyboard. Multichannel files? No problem: Catalyst Prepare supports files with up to 16 channels of audio. Supported video formats and devices.

Precise first-pass color correction
Work in the same high dynamic range and wide color gamut as professional cameras shooting in the S-Log or Sony RAW format. Set source, convert-to, and grade-in color spaces. Apply a look profile. Use the brightness, contrast, tone curves, color wheels, and color correction sliders to adjust color while viewing the waveform, vectorscope, and histogram displays. Transcode files that carry the new color adjustments or save the settings as standard ASC-CDL to apply later in the finishing session. The color grading tools also support the ACES color management system. Set your preview display to a before, after, split, or 2-up view to compare before-and-after adjustments.

Support for Tangent surface controls
Use the Tangent Wave or Element line of surface control devices with Catalyst Prepare. These devices provide dedicated hardware control of the built-in color correction tools. Fluidly adjust RGB, Lift, Gamma, and Gain in addition to playback and undo/redo functions.