The PC iMovie clone
 

At a recent shoot, I was asked for a recommendation for an easy-to-use DV editor for home use. I recommended iMovie, but she needs to run it on her Windoze PC. Is there a PC equivalent that would fall into this category, without a steep learning curve? All my experience is with FCP and the MAC, so I'm at a disadvantage here.

Thanks.

Windows Movie Maker is probably the closest thing, but in true M$ fashion it's a pretty lame attempt. It's all drag and drop and quite limited. From there you might go to the Pinnacle Studio Products or Ulead Video Studio. There are a bunch of OEM things that come with IEEE1394 cards from Correll and some other people but they are no better than Movie Maker.

I bought Sonic Foundry's Video Factory for my parents and they love it. It has a similar interface to Vegas Video. It's a pretty neat piece of entry level software ($69.99/US). Check it out.

I would say go with a older version on Pinnacle Studio. The current version is 8 but I bought a old version (7) for my sister to use and it works great. She is not technically sophisticated, but learned the software very fast. It also has great features and things like slow/fast motion and ripple audio level adjustment. It is very easy to learn and version 7 only cost me around $7 (I think ver 8 is in the hundreds of $). Check eBay for ver. 7. I saw one on eBay (ver 7) that was going for $12 with 2 days left. Good Luck.

I'd second Jasons reccomendation for Video Factory. Ridiculously easy to use and still packs a nice punch of effects and transitions. Plus it acts like a "gateway drug" for Vegas, and everything you've learned transfers right over.

I agree with Video Factory, but here is another suggestion

Order the the training guide 'Digital Video and Audio Production' from Sonic Foundry and get the following...

Vegas Video LE
Sound Forge XP Studio 5.0
Acid xpress
Loops for ACID.
Example material for the lessons.

Plus demo versions of other software.

Great if you have a kid who is creative and you are on a budget.

cost around $50.00 US.

Thanks for all the replies, gang. I forwarded the string to the interested party, (along with MY recommendation that she still consider an IMAC!) :-)

Cheers