DaVinci Resolve 21 beta: local AI tools and setup

Mr Alex Tech walks through DaVinci Resolve 21 beta, with demonstrations of its photo page, editing changes and local AI features. He advises backing up the project library before installation: upgrading it can prevent updated projects from opening in Resolve 20. The download comes from Blackmagic Design's support site unless beta updates are enabled.

The Studio-only speech generator turns text into audio with preset voices or a custom voice sample. The speaker uses about 20 seconds of his own voice. He notes that users cannot preview speech before generation and that text input is limited, without giving an exact character limit. He says Resolve's AI runs locally and nothing leaves the system; the video does not independently verify that claim.

AI IntelliSearch, also Studio-only, requires an additional package with faster and better options. After analysis, the demonstration searches footage by visual content and faces, isolates matching segments and creates a smart bin that updates as more footage is analyzed.

The photo page supports ratings, metadata and color-page adjustments, though the speaker's Lumix raw files are not yet supported. Other demonstrations cover background rendering, timeline backup comparisons and AI focus and face effects. Performance varies: the face age effect struggles in his 4K project even on a laptop with a 5090.