Hi there, I've been looking for a PC alternative to FCP, which I am very happy with. Does anyone know how Edius 3 compares to FCP or even Premier? It looks like a great editor and the interface really impresses me. I don't do multi camera, but I do lots of 4:3 and 16:9 work on the same timeline, ie converting 4:3 to 16:9, with lots of gamma corrections, colour corrections and rescaling.
Also someone has mentioned that Edius 3 is not a full feature editor, whatever that is. Does it have bugs or complications.
Another thing, with a fast pentium 4 do I really need the NX hardware card to do HDV work, will the software run just fine without it?

I am an Edius user, started at v1 (June03) and now at v3.5 having moved from Premiere v6.5. It has eveolved very fast since the initial release. Version 4 is expected early next year (cJanuary for the Broadcast version and April for others according to an interview given by the CEO). It was easy to pick up and, for me, easier to use than AP6.5. Cannot comment on a comparison with FCP.

For me, and many others, it is a solid, reliable programme and provides real time performance for most of the things I do. It lacks the full range of features to be found in PremierePro so it is not as comprehensive if you do lots of compositing. The solution for many who need more is to use Boris Red. It lacks the full range of audio features to be found in Vegas. The main aim has been to provide reliable, real time performance.

It will mix formats on the timeline, provides useful colour correction/white balance tools (with split screen/vectorscope/waveform tools) and has a handy layout tool for dealing with different formats.

I still use the Storm card and miniDV. For HDV you need the fastest processors available and either an OHCI card or NX card and a PCI-X slot. A list of compatible motherboards can be found here:
http://www.canopus-uk.com/US/products/EDIUSNX_for_HDV/pa_EDIUSNX_Compat.asp

With an NX expansion kit it is possible to get component output. There are upgrades for other HD options if you need them.

The interface is different from other nles in that it does not have the conventional drop down menu bar. But it can be customised in many ways to suit your style of working.

Thank you for your user report David, that is a very helpful perspective

I'm in the same Boat as David ...He gave you an excellent summary..

let me add..

edius is very fast, the fastest editor i have ever used, it's so real time it makes you wonder how they did it...cut and apply your preset filters and your done...no rendering no background rendering, no draft mode, full resolution full output...

for dv i usually edit on a laptop 3.06 and have finished many projects in hotels across the country, edius is a keyboard driven application, but you have the option of a custom gui with icons..so if if speed, stability and simplicity is your objective edius works great...

now for the down side:
it has a lack of keyframe support (confirmed for v4)
no alpha support on transitions and filters
no multi camera tool (confirmed for v4)
limited audio tools
vst support does not always work (no sound soap support)
no 24pA support (rumored update in v4)

those are the major issues off the top of my head, ...fcp does not have these issues except for vst, which i'm not sure about, fcp is a more mature robust nle that has gained a lot of ground in the pro broadcast market vs avid...but its realtime leaves a lot to be desired

besides speed, i would say one other thing i like better with edius is the implementation of there hdv support, in edius you can edit hdv many diffrent ways, the best way is to transcode the hdv source to canopus HQ codec on the fly...the canopus hq codec can be made indistinguishable from the orginal footage, which is amazing...what i like to do is convert it on the fly to a proxy size of 1/2 reslution creating a smaller file and more manageable on my laptop, i edit using that file and then batch capture from the orginal tape to replace my proxy footage before master output

Hi Robert,

I read your comparison post earlier. Thanks for this. I guess its the complex things that matter with NLE's these days, the standards have become very high.

I have been trying to find out if Edius do multiple screens, you know, having three different tracks playing on one screen in different boxes like FCP? I do like its ability to deal with different formats via Procoder express. Ps do you know if it can edit DVPRO 50 and DVPRO HD ?

Edius will do picture in picture. It will also handle DVCPro HD etc with the addition of appropriate codecs. If you start here:
http://www.canopus.us/US/products/EDIUS_HD/pt_EDIUS_HD.asp
and work through the following pages you will get some idea of what is available.

Also. if you look in the left hand column and click on Edius Effects Flash and the Features flash you will get a summary of some of the available features.