Hi,

Im making a jump into serious mini DV film making. I would like to find a editing software with much capabilities but not so hard on a newbie such as myself.

Any suggestions??

any suggestions on computer specs??

thanks

I'd say Vegas 5 for a powerful but friendly PC based editing platform.
You can run it on anything, I'm using a 3 year old P4 2ghz system with 512mb RAM, 1 80gb and 2 200gb hard drives on Win XP Pro and it works great.

Free:
imovie/mac - Excellent, excellent program unless your project has 150+ cuts (may be very bad bugs that occur past that point).
windows movie maker (never tried)
avid free dv (ditto)

Cheap:
Cut down versions of Vegas, Premiere, Final Cut (express), etc.

More expensive (few to over a thousand):
Final Cut / Mac - Easy to use (and the Mac platform is arguably easy to use too)
Vegas / PC - It's a popular choice on this board. Try the demo to see if you find it easy to use (most do?). Very powerful program (more so than the other programs without 3rd party stuff), perhaps a little slow on the render side (but the other programs probably aren't as fast you think).
Premiere Pro / PC (+ hardware acceleration card like Matrox RTX100) - Kind of like Final Cut on PC, similar interface and features. The main difference is the hardware acceleration- for specific things, there's lots of real-time; downside would be configuration issues, cost, and not everything is accelerated.
Avid (PC or Mac) - Not that popular on this board, but popular nonetheless.

If you do a search you should bring up lots of posts. My recommendation to you is:
A- decide on the program first, then pick your machine. Many of the programs have demos (i.e. Vegas, Premiere, Avid has avid free, Final Cut I don't think has demo?).
B- A basic program like iMovie is a great way to get your feet wet. Imovie delivers the same quality as other programs, as just as powerful for most stuff but with a much lower learning curve.
C- Considering how fast computers and software lose value (about half value every two years), you might want to start off with a cheap system to get your feet wet and then in that time you'll figure out what you need. i.e. Mac mini, iMovie, external firewire drive
OR the PC you may own, windows movie maker or the cut-down version of Vegas or Premiere.
Cheap systems are very comparable to more expensive systems... at best, the higher end systems are like 2X faster but at many times the cost.
On the PC/Vegas side, a cheap system is close to one of the fastest Vegas systems you can get.

Most of the major software packages have a free, downloadable 30-day trial. Everyone's got an opinion; naturally that is usually based on what they're invested in. Your best bet is to try before you buy.

Try Canopus Lets Edit 2 that includes DVD authoring from the timeline.

Ron Evans

Premier ($595) is good. Spendy if you want the after effects ($999)along with it ($1600 total). Final cut if your a mac user, I suppose. It's really up to your personal prefferances. I used to do editing with a 800 Mhz, 500 megs ram, PC.
It worked just fine a little slow compared to my new 3.4 gig hz, hyper threading, 2 gig ram with a ATI 9600x graphics card. OOOH hoooo! rock and roll time boys and girls.

For $199 you can get all 3 Studio versions of Vegas, Acid, and SoundForge. (click here) (http://mediasoftware.sonypictures.com/products/studiofamily.asp)