I love Vegas
 

I have been bursting at the seems to make this declaration, so I am making it now. I am absolutely IN LOVE with Vegas Video. I haven't played with every operating system under the sun, but I just love Vegas's simplicity, as well as it's alignment functions. I am completing my second feature film with Vegas Video and it has been nothing but a pure joy ride. I hope this NLE never dies, because it has become like a tight fitting glove to me, it is spectacular.

I love it too!
 

I have tried Premiere Elements 3, Avid Free, Ulead 10 Plus, TMPGen, and a bunch of free but well-known combinations/solutions including Virtualdub and AVISynth. Then I found out the powerful Vegas Platinum 8 that I can buy with under $100, including the DVD Architect 4.5. I have tried it and even though the trial period is not ended yet I already order a full package from Fry's just few days ago. Besides tons of cool features, Vegas supports Unicode so I could create some family DVD in my native (Vietnamese) language!
I don't know which Vegas you're talking about but I guess if it's a pro version then I absolutely understand.
Which is/are its features that you like the most?

Vegas Movie Studio Platinum is the little brother to the full version of Vegas. The full version does add many nice additions over the Movie Studio version. Some of these are:

1. Unlimited Video and Audio Tracks
2. Customizable render settings ("Custom" is disabled on some formats in VMS)
3. Scripting - scripts are a powerful timesaver
4. Customizable screen layouts
5. Project nesting
6. Envelope "painting" and automation

FYI, BH Photo has the full version of Vegas 6 for $99 at http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...o_Editing.html or for $249 you can get to Vegas 7 + DVD at http://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/produc...tware_for.html


Duane

I have 7.0, and I like the snapping feature, the ease of the layout and the fact that it doesn't eat up a lot of hardware requirements.

I will get the Vegas 7+DVD after my Vegas Movie Studio 8 Platinum "elementary school" !

I trust you're aware of the upgrade path from Movie Studio to Vegas 7 + DVD.
And assuming Vegas 8 comes out this fall, there's usually a one month window with even better upgrade pricing :-)

Thanks for pointing that out.
Yeah I will take advantage of the upgrade benefit for sure. But for now, I will stick with V.Platinum try to learn some rudimentary video stuff and such. You know I'm a real noob and I have very limited time - but I like these movie stuffs!
Cheers!

Vegas is one nifty little tool. But if you're looking into breaking into the professional editing industry you have to leave it behind. Can't shake the feeling that everything done in Vegas (when done using any effect/title/.... tool, apart from editing) still has an amateur-industry feel to it. The 'industry' NLEs often offer no more than mere cutting and then spend out the footage (sound mix, correction, titling, 3D) to a third-party application. An application designed only for that purpose thus offering the best in their field. Using only Vegas you can never come close to the sounddesign in ProTools or Soundtrack Pro (you cAn go to Soundforge however), you can never get the same titling/correction/effects results as in Motion, Color, Livetype, After effects.

What I found unique about Sony's software however that it's the only NLE application that offers a decent control level in every one of these fields. Thus making it the perfect deal for many like us. I've chosen Vegas as my favorite application since about one-two years now, but next year I'm off to my second year in editing education and will have to leave Sony behind.

So yes, I love Vegas too; but AVID and Final Cut Pro are the only industry standards offering the tools for the best possible quality there is. No compatibility with Mac doesn't do Sony any good as well.

Merlin hit on alot of valid points, its true that if your breaking into the industry it will be some time yet before your taken seriously when you mention that you edit on Sony Vegas. However i believe that if you are an independent breaking into the industry then it wont really matter what you edit on as long as you can deliver the product, but even then there are a few hold backs that are often overlooked when fans like myself are talking about sony vegas and these 'issues' really need to be addressed in vegas 8.

First of all alot of the features vegas are lacking are only really important if your doing high end work, for example, vegas doesn’t support 10bit processing which is a huge problem for people who are used to working with digibeta in final cut pro or even Premiere. Another HUGE HUGE HUGE problem I’ve had in vegas is the inability to do frame precise edits, now this is a big deal to me seeing as i do a lot of music videos and often have to cut to a beat, there’s been many times where I’ve had to scrap ideas due to the fact i couldn’t cut my video at a precise frame.

There’s other minor things like the lack of a preview window (trimmer doesn’t cut it for me, excuse the pun), the dodgy EDL, the general samey dull grey look to the whole program from version to version (is it too hard for a stylish black or something?). I'm sounding like i dislike the program here but the truth is I love it, hence me posting to this thread and being so affected by where its lacking, however whether i love it enough to stick to it has been the real question. I have now moved over to final cut and regrettably i like it more than vegas for a number of reasons HOWEVER its the hardest thing in the world trying to get used to the difference in speed between final cut and vegas. in 10 minutes of using final cut i could have achieved the same results from vegas in about 1-2 minutes for general things. Anyway i shall stop here before this turns into a whole other thread. Basically Vegas is great, if volume 8 can deliver in the lacking areas then i may set fire to my mac g5 and return to my beloved pc but if i don’t see any 10 bit processing and frame accurate editing sony vegas will be saying goodbye yet again to what was once a very VERY loyal user.

That's why films such as "The Last Samurai" etc have many areas scored, sound designed, etc with Vegas exclusively. It's why high end producers such as Dean Devlin (Who Killed the Electric Car, Stargate, and many other films) uses Vegas for a national television show. Steve Oedekerk's staff uses Vegas on a regular basis for his television pieces.
I've personally received Emmy's and Grammy's from work exclusively done in Vegas.
You're limited in Vegas by your own imagination, nothing more.
It's rare I'll belittle someone in these forums, but to suggest you can do more in ProTools than Vegas is silly,and to compare Vegas to Soundtrack is beyond ridiculous. BTW, I wrote the original Soundtrack books for CMP and Focal. I've written several Vegas books. I'm an FCP trainer. I was one of the first-ever artists recorded with ProTools when Windham Hill was funding Doug.
In other words, I'm very familiar with these tools. And have been quite successful with them.

Can't do frame precise edits? Huh?

Daniel - obviously some will find some things easier to do in one program than another, but I am mystified as to why you can't do frame accurate edits in Vegas. Do you have Quantize to Frames enabled?

I'm at an age where, not even 10 years ago, I should never ever had even contemplated entering this world of video and sound capture and edit.

But 5 years ago I did.

I've since created video works that have allowed a London Organisation to apply and win a National Competition; I have videoed, edited and delivered work that has been shown at the British Library; I have written and produced "specialist" reviews on video and audio equipment from this User's perspective and ONLY using the s/w under debate here and I have demonstrated the ease with which Vegas works to likes of "hardened" techies of the BBC.

And I still don't, and will never reach the dizzy heights spoken about here. But I have made in-roads to the industry at a time and at a space in my life that I'm fundamentally grateful. For those that DO know me, they know I don't say this lightly nor flippantly.

Breaking into the "Edit Industry", I do see your point. But maybe, just maybe there is "another/other" industry/industries out there for somebody LIKE me that I can make head-way in.

Oh, yesterday I was negotiating with a band to do a promo for them. I was speaking about audio and storyboards and "look" and the need to design an audio framework and . . so on and so on . . None, none of this I would be doing if it wasn't for the suite of software that Sony has under its wing now.

Now, you may read this and say,"Grazie, you just made my pioint for me!" - well, what I've achieved may not be what you are debating, apologies, but what I wont apologise for is that I AM proud of where and what I have done. And I guess, if you were to go about today you will also find many others doing the same too.

Best regards,

Grazie

First things: I love Vegas too and I prefer lots of its capabilties over AVID or FCP any time. I live in Belgium and don't even know half the people or shows you mentioned (part from the movie). All I know is when I presented my first year's project and was asked which software I had used for editing (Vegas) the jury gave me that grim look and told me I better start working on FCP or AVID starting next year. I can't believe that teachers/industry professionals like them tell me that for no reason. Here in Belgium Vegas is a myth. And please don't lecture me with your degree titles; I get the picture: you're a seasoned professional and I'm a second degree student newbie. Sorry but I felt a little personally assaulted there.