Video Editing Software, stat! (No one else edits videos?)

Improvolone

I'm getting into filming and hosting on-line some stuff that I've written/performances/whathaveyous and I need some software to help me work a little Hollywood-magic. A friend of mine is involved in an online puppetry troupe and they use Sony Vegas software for all of their stuff, but there are so many versions of that software as well as competing software that I have no idea where I should look.

I would like if at all possible:
Chromakey
Audio processing
Captioning
HD processing
I figure most things come with a catalog of random special effects?

Newegg has some Nero software on deep discount today. How about them?

edit: And star wipe, it has to have a star wipe

note: Using Windows 7

matt has a problem

I use Pinnacle Studio 14. It has everything you listed, in addition to being retardedly easy to use. And it's around $50-100 depending on where you look.

Improvolone

Outside of the price, what seems to be the big discount between these versions of Pinnacle?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=40000376&IsNodeId=1&Description=pinnacle%20studio&name=Digital%20Media%20Editing&Order=BESTMATCH

iRevert

Take a lookyloo at Vegas, I've pretty much only used Final Cut (Mac) but int the times I've had to do my editing in a pinch I'll use vegas on my PC and have excellent results. Be forewarned though the learning curve as with any editing software is a bit steep.

http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/vegassoftware

I know you stated it in your post, but its a good piece of software that works and if your already around people who are familiar with it you can use them for local help and tips on it.


EDIT:

I use the pro 10 suite but I recieved a copy for free through an old workplace, the Movie Studio Platinum 10 should suit your needs: http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/moviestudiopp

matt has a problem

Improvolone wrote: »

Outside of the price, what seems to be the big discount between these versions of Pinnacle?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Submit=ENE&N=40000376&IsNodeId=1&Description=pinnacle%20studio&name=Digital%20Media%20Editing&Order=BESTMATCH

The "Ultimate Collection" includes a couple extra features and plugins over just the "Ultimate".

Red Giant MagicBullet Look, Trapcode Shine, 3D Stroke and Particular plugins

I don't think it's worth the extra though, I haven't found anything plain Ultimate won't do for me.

Penguin_Otaku

My advice, personally, is to not use a PC. But if you are, Avid is a pretty solid software choice.

mere_immortal

Penguin_Otaku wrote: »

My advice, personally, is to not use a PC. But if you are, Avid is a pretty solid software choice.

Media Composer is also £2,500 or nearly $5000, so unless you're a professional (even then) it doesn't really matter.

The basic Vegas/Pinnacle/Premiere Elements should be fine.

Improvolone

Has anyone had problems with Pinnacle crashing? I keep reading about it.

matt has a problem

It's crashed on me once, while time-compressing and encoding a 4 hour video down to 6 minutes, but I haven't had any other crashes.

schuss

Penguin_Otaku wrote: »

My advice, personally, is to not use a PC. But if you are, Avid is a pretty solid software choice.

Eh, according to my buddy in the biz it doesn't really matter any more. Also, some are starting to move away from Final Cut as Apple hasn't been forthcoming about future plans.

Improvolone

I'm not editing True Grit here (all edited in Final Cut Pro, that's neat). I'll be filming sketches, stand up, live performances, whathaveyou and just want them to look nice. I think Pinnacle and Vegas will more than foot the bill. It seems Vegas has a much stronger set of tools, but recent updates have fixed the crashes in Pinnacle and its cheaper.
Still on the fence, but I do think about this type of stuff pretty obsessively.

Locust76

A Word-O'-Warning: If you plan on editing and exporting in AVCHD 1920x1080, Sony Vegas is not the program for you. Since 2008 they've had AVCHD 1920x1080 (not that janky 1440x1080 crap) in their Vegas Home and Pro versions, and it's been horribly buggy ever since. Even the latest versions are still buggy.

You can't get the software to properly render out at that resolution. It will always crash. It has something to do with the fact that the 32-bit executables only use a small amount of RAM. Hacking the executables to enable Large Memory Awareness (or whatever its called) works, but the outputted result is still crap, because the audio and video lose sync and the video starts getting choppy. You can work around it by exporting the video and audio streams separately and muxing them using some 3rd party crap freeware, but that's a bit of a pain in the ass, isn't it?

Improvolone

I have a 64-bit OS, does that factor into my choice at all?