Wondershare Filmora 13 releases update with a better video editing experience for users at all levels

Creating content and sharing our lives online has become the norm, but not everybody can just sit down at their computer and put together high-quality video footage. Editing can be complicated even for advanced users. With Wondershare Filmora, it doesn’t have to be. Filmora 13.1.0, the latest update to the video editing suite from Wondershare, was designed to make content creation accessible to all, regardless of skill level. Ease of use doesn’t mean lacking in functionality, though, and Filmora is packed with useful features to give your videos an extra kick. 

AI Music Generator and Text-to-Speech 

Wondershare Filmora 13.1.0 update

(Image credit: Wondershare)

Sometimes we just want to create and share videos about our day-to-day lives, but we want to make those videos more interesting with background music. If you’ve taken an incredible vacation and want to share video footage of your adventure, you’re going to need music to accompany that, even if you’re just planning to share the footage with family and friends. However, finding the right music for your videos can be time-consuming. 

Filmora offers a solution with their AI Music Generator tools that can help you create soundtracks for your videos that fit your vibe and are safe to commercialize. With Filmora you can easily make those shareable moments in your life look and sound good without worry. Filmora’s latest slate of enhancements makes it even easier to use, as well, allowing you to utilize Text-to-Speech to add voice-overs to your vlogs with natural-sounding tones that are categorized by scene type. 

Vlogs are not the only content that can benefit from these new features, either. Many of us have taken our educational endeavors online in recent years. Teachers and professors have had to find new ways to engage their students via video, becoming content creators in the process. Soundtracks created with Filmora’s AI Music Generator can help set the tone for your lectures. Text-To-Speech to translate your lesson, giving your students clear, natural-sounding audio that is easy for them to understand and easy for you to create.

Special effects for everybody 

Some stories are too good not to be told, but not everybody has the backing of a major motion picture studio at their disposal. Filmora 13.1.0 features improved professional caliber tools that allow you to easily create short films and music videos with ease, regardless of skill level (or production teams.)

Special effects have traditionally been thought of as an extremely skill-dependent part of content creation and cinematography. Filmora demystifies special effects. With just a few clicks of your mouse, your video’s action sequences can be taken up a notch with realistic motion blur that can be customized to suit your specific needs. Want to draw extra attention to a particular element in a scene? Filmora features a Lens Zoom Effect to simulate camera zoom, giving you creative freedom to hone in on a part of a scene and further enhance your storytelling. Get ready for your close-up, a well-timed zoom-in can set the scene and change the tone of your video. 

With the ability to digitally zoom also comes the option for digital magnification. The Magnifying Glass Tool in Filmora makes it easy for you, as an editor, to examine a scene in your video by getting up close and personal with it. Zoom in, make adjustments, correct your footage as necessary, and then return the frame to its proper size with the corrections intact. That’s professional-quality editing with no more effort than a few clicks of your mouse.

Create with the power of the cloud 

Whether you’re creating with the power of a production team or you’re a personal creator looking to share your life, one thing remains true: video content is a resource hog. If you’re working on projects that involve others, you may find that harnessing the power of the creative cloud can streamline the process and make it more accessible for everybody involved. 

Filmora 13 features improvements to Cloud Resource Management and Beautification tools, making it easier to enable migration of custom LUTs to cloud storage. Seamless synchronization allows you and your collaborators to color-grade assets across multiple devices, streamlining remote work and improving your workflow. Custom LUTs can even allow for the direct import of media files from cloud storage. If your video content features episodic content and color grading is important, the cloud-based custom LUT feature of Filmora 13 can streamline that process by allowing you to enhance and color grade your footage with the power of the cloud.

Every day editing at a professional scale 

With Filmora from Wondershare, creators of all skill levels can create professional quality videos and content with ease. From the DIY homemaker creating short content for YouTube to full-scale production teams working on episodic content, Filmora’s suite of tools can help you put out the best content with less work. Wondershare continues to work and improve Filmora with each upgrade so that you can spend less time editing and more time creating.  

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Bing AI is rolling out to Chrome and Safari, but the experience may not be as good

Following up on recent teases, Microsoft is expanding browser support for Bing AI, giving Google Chrome and Safari access to the chatbot – with some limitations. The third-party experience won’t be the same as Bing Chat on Microsoft Edge

In a recent report, Windows Latest states the character count for the AI prompts have been cut in half, from 4,000 on Edge to now 2,000 on Chrome. Conversations with the chatbot will be considerably shorter as the third-party version will only allow you to engage in five messages with the AI before resetting everything. The normal amount is 30. Also, Bing will push you to download Edge if you haven’t done so already on your Chromebook. If you already have the browser, choosing the download option simply launches it. 

In addition to the roll out, Microsoft is adding a new dark mode option for the chatbot. The theme will match your system preferences by default, but you can manually change them yourself in the Settings menu.

Future updates

It’s unknown if Bing Chat on Safari will be exactly the same. Microsoft has yet to make an official announcement regarding the patch outside of a small notice, so we can’t say for sure if any tweaks are being made. We reached out to the tech giant for clarification as well if it has plans to expand Bing AI access to other browsers, namely Firefox. This story will be updated if we hear back.

As for the future of the AI, it looks like Microsoft is putting everything in the hands of people. Another Windows Latest report claims the company has been sending out feedback forms to various users on mobile asking what features they would like to see. Apparently, one of the new changes will see Bing recommend certain AI apps or tools for people to try out. 

Another potential upgrade could see the AI mimic the personalities of famous people like billionaire Elon Musk. Microsoft reportedly claims mimicking people will result in a “more engaging experience”.

We’ll let you know if Bing undergoes any personality changes. So far, it’s the same artificial intelligence we all know. Until then, check out TechRadar’s list of the best AI content generators for 2023

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Universal Control blasts open the door between Mac and iPad for an eye-opening experience

Are macOS and iPadOS becoming one? Not exactly, but the arrival of Universal Control on iPad OS 15.4 Beta and macOS Monterey 12.3 Beta pierces the thinning barrier between the two.

The update, which may take weeks to arrive for general download, connects a Mac and iPad and creates an open road for your cursor to travel from one interface to the other without breaking a sweat.

There are some small hoops to jump through, like signing in to all the devices with the same Apple ID and verifying that you want to connect these systems, but you only do that once. After that, Universal Control gives you a double-wide desktop, albeit one with some significant limitations.

Universal Control

Both systems, the iPad and MacBook appear in the display settings. (Image credit: Future)

Universal Control might remind some of Apple’s Sidecar for macOS, which Apple introduced a few years ago. It’s similar but less of a two-way street than Universal Control. It extended the Mac desktop onto the iPad, which more or less put the iPadOS to sleep in the background. It was a bit more than that, though, in that you could use your finger on the iPad like a mouse and, if you had an Apple Pencil, use it to draw on some macOS apps much in the same way you would on an iPad.

After I installed the latest development betas and set up my iPad Pro 12.9 and MacBook Air M1 with the Universal Control, I found I could instantly move my cursor on the Mac to the left, see a little control bar appear along the edge of my iPad display (it appears only upon the initial connection), and slip right through the ether to the iPad screen. After that, the door is more a less open for dual-platform operations. I can even grab, say, an image and drag it from the Photo app on the Mac into Procreate running on the iPad. I could not, however, drag and drop images from my Mac desktop into a Mail window open on the iPad. They would drag to the screen, but then disappear instead of appearing in the message.

There’s still the ability to extend or mirror your Mac display onto the iPad, though it’s hidden under Advanced settings. This offers the added benefit of being able to drag over complete application windows from one screen to the other. When I use Universal Control to move my mouse between platforms, it puts the iPad to the left of my Mac. Switching to screen extension expands the Mac display on the opposite side.

Universal Control

Some of the settings to control how much dual screen interaction you get through Universal Control. (Image credit: Future)

Screen extension also turned off the iPad’s Magic Keyboard trackpad but, like Sidecar, it still lets me use the Apple Pencil. I can even enable the Pencil’s double tap in the settings.

In Universal Control’s “Linked Keyboard and Mouse Mode” I can also use the keyboard on the Mac to take notes on Note on the iPad, while also using the same keyboard to take notes in another instance of Notes on the Mac. That’s an instant doubling of my productivity power. I can do it in reverse, as well, using the iPad's Magic Keyboard to type on either screen.

Universal Control

Universal Control in action (Image credit: Future / Lance Ulanoff)

The ability to connect the two disparate OSes and use one keyboard and mouse to control all of it is, as some have noted, magical. It’s also still limited. Until I can drag complete windows and Mac or iPad Apps from one screen to the other, this universe will still feel relatively small.

It’s early days, of course. The beta’s not done, and Apple may refine and add some features before it arrives as a fully baked set of updates.

Ever since Apple started positioning the iPad as a productivity tool and not simply a content consumption device, it’s been transforming iPadOS – like adding mouse and trackpad support – to better support that notion.

Universal Control is another exciting, big step in a long-term effort to make the marriage between iPad OS and macOS seamless.

 Will they ever become one platform? I think it’s still too soon to tell.

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