Enhanced Version of Adobe Premiere Offers Affordable Real-Time Capabilities

San Jose, California, (Dec. 14, 1998) (NASDAQ: ADBE)--Adobe Systems Incorporated today announced the immediate availability of an enhanced version of Adobe Premiere 5.1 software, its award winning digital video editing solution. Called Adobe Premiere RT 5.1, it fulfills the demand from video professionals for real-time capabilities at an affordable price. Adobe Premiere RT 5.1 software enhances productivity and expands creative freedom for video professionals with a superior, cost effective real-time solution. The application will only be available as a software/hardware bundle from two leading video board manufacturers: Pinnacle Systems and Matrox Video Products Group.

Adobe Premiere RT software's real-time capabilities, enabled by an expansion of the Media Abstraction Layer in Premiere 5.1, allow video editors to add transitions, apply filters and create 2D and 3D video motion without having to render the effects. Hardware developers who take advantage of this new API can offer their Adobe Premiere RT customers significantly improved performance for faster processing time and enhanced creative freedom, enabling a wider range of unique video effects - all of which, until now, have only been available from video editing systems costing tens of thousands of dollars more.

Pinnacle Systems will bundle two real-time products with Premiere RT software, ReelTime and ReelTime NITRO. Both products support two channels of D1 broadcast-quality video, and include titling, transitions, chroma, luma and linear keying, plus over 400 special effects. ReelTime NITRO enhances ReelTime to include over 300 sophisticated 3D special effects, adds a key-frameable 3D effects creation tool, and includes TitleDeko for dynamic professional character generation.

"Our ReelTime customers rely on a blend of performance, features, and price as their criteria for evaluating a product's usability," said Ajay Chopra, vice president, general manager, desktop products, Pinnacle Systems. "With the addition of Premiere RT to the ReelTime bundle, our price/performance leadership is elevated to a higher level, satisfying the needs of the most demanding customer."

"The Adobe Premiere RT software application is powerful, and the ReelTime hardware makes it a real-screamer," said Harry Marks, media consultant, producer, Marks Communications. "Adobe and Pinnacle let me maintain my sanity and creative freedom."

Matrox is bundling Adobe Premiere RT software with the Matrox DigiSuite and DigiSuite LE cards. The DigiSuite platforms offer two streams of D1 video - up to uncompressed-quality - plus 32-bit animated graphics in real time without rendering. Transitions, DVEs, color-correction, keying and video filters can be applied simultaneously to multiple video and graphics layers in real time.

"We are proud to be working with Adobe to offer Premiere users access to the advanced real-time features of our DigiSuite boards," said Spiro Plagakis, vice president of sales and marketing with Matrox. "Feedback from our beta sites has been phenomenal and they are spreading the word. Video editors are lining up to buy this impressive package that offers them unprecedented creativity and productivity at an attractive price point."

"Using Adobe's Premiere RT with Matrox's DigiSuite LE, I have a full-blown professional editing suite that has made me the cost-efficient envy of friends who run NLE systems that cost them over five times more for less functionality," said digital video artist Thomas Giebink aka. NoNothing Arts. "I've got high quality video, instant transitions, variable slow motion, instant graphic overlays, chroma keying and luma keying, color correction and tinting... the list just goes on and on and on. I couldn't be more pleased."

Pricing and Availability
Solutions integrating Adobe Premiere RT are available only through authorized Pinnacle and Matrox resellers. Pinnacle's solutions are priced as follows: ReelTime $4,995 and ReelTime NITRO $8,995. Matrox is offering a "Dream Suite" bundle that includes a DigiSuite LE card, Adobe Premiere RT, Inscriber CG and Boris FX for $4,995. Matrox DigiSuite with Adobe Premiere RT, Inscriber CG and Boris FX is priced at $9,995. (Note: all prices are in U.S. dollars.)

About Adobe Premiere RT
Adobe Premiere RT enables video professionals to edit digital video and easily output it across mediums, from videotape to multimedia and the Web. Adobe Premiere works together with Adobe Photoshop®, Adobe Illustrator® and Adobe After Effects® software to provide an integrated, professional dynamic media solution that enables users to easily and affordably bring their ideas to life.

About Adobe Systems Incorporated

Founded in 1982, Adobe Systems builds award-winning software solutions for Web and print publishing. Its graphic design, imaging, dynamic media, and authoring tools enable customers to create, publish and deliver visually-rich content for various types of media. The company's products are used by Web and graphic designers, professional publishers, document-intensive organizations, business users, and consumers. Adobe is the fourth largest U.S.-based personal software company, with annual revenues approaching $1 billion. It employs over 2,400 employees worldwide and has operations in North America, Europe, the Pacific Rim, Japan and Latin America. Adobe's worldwide headquarters are in San Jose, California and its web site is located at www.adobe.com.