[Stuart Wright]

Hi guys,
I have a Sony HD camcorder and I want to start producing video reviews of equipment for the forums.
We will want to do the usual things - editing, dubbing, superimposing an AVForums watermark on the video, ideally taking advantage of the HD.
The movies will most likely be published to YouTube. Depends on what YouTube allow for quality. If they only allow low quality video, we will stick to downloads from AVForums.
We'd rather go for software which has bells and whistles in case we need them.
What do you recommend?
Thanks

[Figment]

Hi Stuart. I personally use Pinnacle Studio and it does the job but to be honest it can be a real pain and some people never get it to work properly on their systems so I can hardly recommend it. But I have been down this route of asking the same question and our knowledgeable moderator and friend Senu who seems to be the guru of all things video editing wise generally recommends Sony Vegas as being extremely stable and capable. I have yet to buy a copy but when I am ready its what I will be going for. I'm sure if Senu sees this thread he will be a font of wisdom for you especially as it is for use of the forum. Until then at least you have a product name to take a look at.
Hope all goes well as I for one look forward to seeing video reviews.

[redsox_mark]

The main pro apps (as far as I know) are Premiere Pro, Avid Liquid (I think being renamed as Pinnacle Liquid), Sony Vegas Pro, and on the Apple side FCP.

I don’t think many people have used all of them extensively to make a true comparison. I use Vegas and highly recommend it, but they probably all have their pros and cons. Most of the comparisons I’ve seen was in the Vegas forums so it may be a bit biased…

[mmace]

I'd recommend Premiere Pro CS3, but everyone has their favourites

[CarlB]

Originally Posted by mmace

I'd recommend Premiere Pro CS3, but everyone has their favourites

If you're on a PC I'd say Premiere Pro, or Final Cut Studio for the Mac. I have both but mainly use FCS on the Mac.

[jwramsay]

Youtube work in the MP4/Divx range, which you can produce from the tool that I use to edit my Sony HDV footage (Sony Vegas 7.0).

They also limit your clip to 10 mins.

That said, you can use Vegas to do all your edits etc then render as say WMV-HD for "high quality" and then render for mp4 for "low quality".

You can stream the WMV-HD stuff to an XBOX360 from a PC with WMCE 2005 OS or Windows Vista Premium/Ultimate. PS3's seem to be fussier with that format. Also if you burn to a disc as a DVD-ROM, an XBOX360 plays WMV-HD files too.

So, Sony Vegas gets my vote.

[mmace]

Originally Posted by CarlB

If you're on a PC I'd say Premiere Pro, or Final Cut Studio for the Mac. I have both but mainly use FCS on the Mac.

I'd still recommend Premiere Pro CS3 for the Mac too

[CarlB]

Originally Posted by mmace

I'd still recommend Premiere Pro CS3 for the Mac too

I just prefer Final Cut, and the whole toolset and tight integration offers great value.

[senu]

For the Mac FCP
Adobe doesnt need any introducing.

I use Avid Liquid 7 ( used to be Pinnacle Liquid 6) and Sony Vegas.
I do however also have the less costly Pinnacle Studio 11 plus, Adobe Premiere Elements 3 and Sony vegas movie Studio on different machines which I use from time to time

They are somewhat different in use butall seem to get the Job done
However as you are keen on getting the video to You tube, Why dont you edit in SD ? Unless you want your HD edits .. Editing as HD and then converting them to a highly compressed You tube friendly format means you can shoot HD but edit as SD and convert to any of the smaller formats

With this you can then use any of the budget Video editing packages for quick editng , reserving extensive editng for the more Semi Pro Packages which pack a semi pro price and learning curve

[Stuart Wright]

The advantage of YouTube, is, of course, the greater reach of your video to the YouTube community. I'm trying to think whether 10 minutes will be enough for a video review. If not then we have a problem as I wouldn't want to split reviews up.
Certainly 10 minutes would not be enough for coverage of shows.
The difference in price between Vegas and Vegas pro is a lot. Is the difference in features worth the extra expenditure?

[redsox_mark]

See this post I just made
Sony Vegas 8 Pro announced

[Stuart Wright]

Thanks.
Is the Blackmagic Design Intensity HDMI input capture card going to work with Vegas?

[redsox_mark]

Yes it does. I haven't used it, but I know people who have used it with Vegas.

[DEREKDEL]

Hi STUART,
I have been using ULEAD VIDEO PRO for some years now and have recently upgraded to PRO 8 and it does everything you want titles,transitions,overlays with perfect results.
Derek.