Prefered Editing Software

[Ray Harkness]

After doing some searching and reading on this forum, I notice that some of you have just upgraded the bundled PowerDirector software to the fully-licensed version.

But for those of you not using PowerDirector and are a Windows PC user, what is your preferred package. I'm a real newbie to video but am fairly technical in nature (I'm a software developer as a profession). I'm not going to be doing anything complex in nature, but have a vision of doing some video podcasting in the near future and am starting to cut my teeth with my new GZ-HD7.

I'm not too happy with the bundled software and don't want to fork over the money to upgrade to PowerDirector 7 if it's a piece of junk

[Ray Grizzle]

Hello Ray,


In my opinion, the bundled software power director, is absolute junk.
It's just no where near as powerful as I need it to be. I use Sony Vegas Pro 8 and I am extremely happy with it. It's quite powerful, and any version after 7.0e works with native .TOD's. With my HD7+Vegas 8 pro, editing is a breeze. I copy the footage on to my external drive, drag the footage into my Vegas project, edit it, grade it with magic bullet looks, and I'm done.

You can check it out, and download a trial to see if you like it here.
http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/vegaspro



Good luck,
Raymond Grizzle

[Roger Shealy]

Ray,

I also use Vegas 8 Pro and like it very much. If you are in the PC environment, it's a good bet. Adobe Premiere might be a contender (I've never used it).

If you ago Mac - Final Cut and Avid seem to be the most widely used and are probably the most accepted editing packages on the planet.

[Ray Harkness]

Roger & Raymond,

I'll take a look at Vegas and see if I can wrap my mind around it

[Roger Shealy]

Try the free trial and you can get some free tips on YouTube for basic tasks. If you like it, you may want to try more formal training programs.

By the way, if you're not going to be doing more than 4 video tracks (titles & video), or not more than 4 audio tracks, and you don't need blu-ray; Vegas Movie Studio 8 Platinum (VMS8P) is a very powerful program and can be had for around $100. It works almost identically to its bigger brother (Vegas Pro) but trims out a few of the more advanced features. I used VMS7P & VMS8P for several years and it is very good. I went with Pro to get better multi-camera options, more tracks, and 64 bit processing when it comes out.

This might be a really inexpensive way to get started and 100% of what you learn will transfer to the Pro package, if you ever need to go there. Make sure you get the Platinum version if you decide to go this route. It's an incredible bargain. If you're making your living at this, I'd go Pro and spend a few extra Hundred for the extra tracks and upcoming 64 bit upgrade. If you want to use blu-ray, I think you pretty much have to go pro at this point.

[Kaushik Parmar]

Guys!

I am using PowerDirector and I am very much happy with it! It is perfect video editing software, I recently purchased new "PowerDirector 7" and I must say it is fantastic! Very easy to use, very fast too!

I do have all major software with me included Adobe CS3 Pro, Ulead 11 Pro, Sony Vegas but PowerDirector is my favorite!

PC Magazine rated it best and gave "Editor's Choice" award!

Here is link: http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,2319839,00.asp
http://www.pcmag.com/category2/0,2806,4835,00.asp

Here is CyberLink's link: http://www.cyberlink.com/multi/products/main_4_ENU.html

For me it is perfectly suitable, I am much happy!

Kaushik

[Jeff Nyman]

I guess I'm a minority but I use Avid Liquid 7.2 and now that I've got into it I love it. I like the all in one features. I can composite, make DVD menus and edit all on the same timeline. No more using three different packages to do the same thing. There was a learning curve from premiere but not too bad. It is a very powerful program.

[Roger Shealy]

The good news.... There are a lot of great packages available.

[Martin Kravagna]

Hello i use EDIUS NEO and Cyberlink Powerproducer.
Edius NEo works with the native *.TOD Files and the result works with PP and i author this files to BDs or HDDVD.

[Richard Boyer]

I've been using Premiere, and I really hate having to convert the .tod file before I can even start editing my video. I think based on your recommendations, I'll give Vegas a shot!

[Wayne Avanson]

I'm on FCP on Mac and simply capture the 1440CBR as if it was miniDV tape. Not ideal, but pretty damn good. I can't really tell any difference on the stuff I've done so far between 1920 and 1440. - And I have good eyes.

here's some of my stuff.

http://www.vimeo.com/user506080/videos

[Chad M. Bell]

I'm glad this came up again! What editors out there is everyone using that you can buy for around $100 at a store that work with TOD files. The conversion process is taking forever. Maybe its becasue I'm shooting in FHD. Do you lose quality if you go to 1440? I'm not a pro, I just shoot family stuff here and there. Thanks for any replies or advice.

[Gary Colon]

Ive been using MpegStreamClip for my .tod files and everything goes FAST and looks AWESOME! I shoot in 1920x1080 and using MpegStreamClip to convert to 1440. Macbook 2.0Ghz, 2GB RAM, Final Cut Express 3.5, External Firewire 400 HDD

[Steve Mullen]

Originally Posted by Chad M. Bell

I'm glad this came up again! What editors out there is everyone using that you can buy for around $100 at a store that work with TOD files. The conversion process is taking forever. Maybe its becasue I'm shooting in FHD. Do you lose quality if you go to 1440? I'm not a pro, I just shoot family stuff here and there. Thanks for any replies or advice.

There's no need for MPEGstreamclip or for long conversions. If you check through the posts, you'll see that MPEGstreamclip hasn't been needed for months. iMovie 08 works well with only a very quick change of TOD to Program Steam MPEG-2. The file only needs to be remuxed. And, it's under $100.

The under $100 PC editors have lots of functions, but seem a bit strange to me and I don't trust them as they seem to crash way too much.

Vegas works well with TOD files and can create 5.1 soundtracks. But, IMHO, it's very weird. For example, when you double-click a clip in a Bin, it goes unseen into the Timeline WHEREVER the cursor happens to be. (Be very careful.)

If your clip is 5 minutes long, with several shots, you've got to try and work with these shots in your already completed work. Any error, and you might screw-up what you've completed.

Alternately, you can choose to have a double-click open the clip in a Trimmer which is a one clip version of a timeline. You get a nice audio waveform plus a few random images from the clip. (Unfortunately, the Trimmer covers over your Bin.) You can play the clip in the Trimmer and see it on the single monitor -- like an old version of Premiere. But, there are no IN/OUT buttons to click!

One trick is to detach the Trimmer and make it really tiny -- showing only one image. But, the lack of IN/OUT buttons to click certainly makes it a pain to trim. Actually, Vegas works a lot like Pinnacle and Cyberlink -- although they at least have IN/OUT buttons.

If Sony were to add a real Source Monitor it would really help. But, there are still things like "Regions" to figure-out. Another strangeness -- like audio editors, you can apply a real-time filter to a TRACK. But, if you add a filter to a clip -- the normal way of using video filters -- these filters aren't real-time and must be rendered.

[Gary Colon]

Originally Posted by Steve Mullen

There's no need for MPEGstreamclip or for long conversions. If you check through the posts, you'll see that MPEGstreamclip hasn't been needed for months. iMovie 08 works well with only a very quick change of TOD to Program Steam MPEG-2. The file only needs to be remuxed. And, it's under $100.

The under $100 PC editors have lots of functions, but seem a bit strange to me and I don't trust them as they seem to crash way too much.

Vegas works well with TOD files and can create 5.1 soundtracks. But, IMHO, it's very weird. For example, when you double-click a clip in a Bin, it goes unseen into the Timeline WHEREVER the cursor happens to be. (Be very careful.)

If your clip is 5 minutes long, with several shots, you've got to try and work with these shots in your already completed work. Any error, and you might screw-up what you've completed.

Alternately, you can choose to have a double-click open the clip in a Trimmer which is a one clip version of a timeline. You get a nice audio waveform plus a few random images from the clip. (Unfortunately, the Trimmer covers over your Bin.) You can play the clip in the Trimmer and see it on the single monitor -- like an old version of Premiere. But, there are no IN/OUT buttons to click!

One trick is to detach the Trimmer and make it really tiny -- showing only one image. But, the lack of IN/OUT buttons to click certainly makes it a pain to trim. Actually, Vegas works a lot like Pinnacle and Cyberlink -- although they at least have IN/OUT buttons.

If Sony were to add a real Source Monitor it would really help. But, there are still things like "Regions" to figure-out. Another strangeness -- like audio editors, you can apply a real-time filter to a TRACK. But, if you add a filter to a clip -- the normal way of using video filters -- these filters aren't real-time and must be rendered.

Perhaps MpegStreamClip isnt needed anymore, but its still usable. If I already have mpegstreamclip, why bother spending $60-$80 in getting iLife 2008? Like I said, I work with 1920x1080 videos and QUICKLY convert it to 1440x1080 AIC to use in FCE. In this process, there is no muxing, which is great, because I dont want the audio and video to be "one," as I often need them separate.