VideoLAN, the creators of the extremely popular open-source VLC media player, is preparing to launch VLC 2.0. The update is a complete rewrite of the program, and brings Blu-Ray playback and an all-new interface to the Mac.
The enhancements for the Mac include native full-screen mode in OS X Lion, support for Blu-Ray media playback (experimental), a nifty new redesigned subtitle manager, support for multiple video files inside of RAR archives, enhanced video output modes, and more.
Felix Kühne, one of the developers, has released a series of screenshots showing off the new Mac interface, which is designed by Damien Erambert. The new interface looks great, sporting a much simpler and more Apple-like design. The full change log for the release can be found here.
VLC 2.0′s interface for Mac is dramatically different from its previous revision, both technically and usage-wise. Playlist and video output share the same window, service discovery modules can be easily accessed through a sidebar and various audio + video filters are available through the respective panels. Besides that, the interface is noticeably faster and easily expandable. Speaking of that, we also added support for VLC’s lua-based extensions, which allow you to get info about the current movie from Allociné, post to Twitter, fetch subtitles automatically, etc.
VLC is great for many reasons, not the least of which is its ability to support almost every audio and video format known to man, including many that don’t work natively under OS X, such as .mkv files and Windows Media.
For those of you who are daring, the release candidate can be downloaded immediately, while the final release is expected later this week. The final release will be posted on VideoLAN’s web page once it is complete. Additional screenshots can be viewed on Flickr.
