Best software for Video Editing - Nero, Roxio or Pinnacle Studio

[bpatters69]

Hello Folks,

Just some quick background. I am fairly new to video editing but I have been using a PC forever. I want to be able to capture video from some old VHS tapes and burn the video to DVD. I would also like to be able to take video from say a Camcorder and create movies with transitions and such. I have the following hardware:

Pinnacle Capture Card (PCI) that was sold with Stuido 9
Pinnancle Studio 9 Software
Nero 7 Ultra
Duo core E6600 PC with GeForce 7950 Video Card (PC is about 6 months old)

Does any one have an opinion on my Pinnacle Capture Card? The card is a PCI card. How about Nero vs Pinnacle Studio? I have read some good things about Roxio. I am not really sold on either Nero or Pinnacle. I find both difficult to use.

Would you recommned something completely different?

Thanks, Bill

[snowbabe]

My Friend who is a professional video editor for documentaries says there is only one (PC) video editing program "Adobe Premiere CS3", the rest are just toys.

[edDV]

At consumer level try Premiere Elements, Sony Vegas Movie Studio or ULead Video Studio. All have demos.

Or learn Virtualdub (free) or Virtual VCR.
http://virtualvcr.sourceforge.net/

I'm not sure if the Pinnacle card works with other software. It might be possible to capture using your camcorder. Does it support "Analog PassThrough" to DV?

[terjeber]

My Friend who is a professional video editor for documentaries says there is only one (PC) video editing program "Adobe Premiere CS3", the rest are just toys.

Your friend needs to stop using hallucinogenic drugs, but Premiere is nice enough if you can handle the awkward work flow, frequent crashes and Adobe idiosyncrasies.

For home users I'd recommend Vegas Movie Studio, Ulead DVD Video Studio or Premiere Elements, possibly in that order. I would stay away from Pinnacle, they are notorious for stability problems.

If you want to move into more high-end software I'd recommend Vegas Video Pro or Premiere CS3, definitely in that oder.

Vegas is far easier to use than Premiere, and you will get excellent results a lot faster with a lot less headache. On the other hand, if you want to integrate well with Photoshop CS3 and After Effects CS3, then Premiere is for you. But then you know that already if you have $1,699 to spend on video editing software.

I have used both Vegas and Premiere extensively, and for video editing Vegas beats Premiere hands down, but for the total solution you get with the production bundle, Premiere is hard to beat.

Oh, and btw, regarding the "professional" comment from your friend, as I said, tell him to get off the drugs, the only tool used by professionals, if you go by his stan dards, is Avid. For these professionals Premiere/Vegas/Anything is a ridiculous toy. And then again, some other professionals will point out that Avid is ridiculously old fashioned and that any serious work in Hollywood today happens on Final Cut Pro.

[Chris K]

Pinnacle Capture Card (PCI) that was sold with Stuido 9
Pinnancle Studio 9 Software

I use the same Pinnacle capture card with succes for over a year but never use Studio 9. Not for anything.
I capture with VirtualDub to segmented MJPEG avi's. Premiere can handle this and probably other software even better.
For Windows XP you have to use the experimental 1.7.x version of VirtualDub (I use 1.7.3) older versions can't handle the Pinnacle card properly (though they do fine with the card in W2K).
Capture quality of the Pinnacle card is excellent but it only supports MJPEG so you need a lot of HD space.

Chris.

P.S., You must keep the Studio 9 software installed because it installs the driver that vdub needs.

[fjmr]

Use the Pinnacle card is one of the best
Pinnacle 9 is easy to use and has a very good picture
So capture with Pinnacle card edit with Pinnacle Studio9 and render to dvd complaint (mpeg2)

Then take this mpeg2 files and author with Menus with Nero7 and burn with Nero also

You have all the best for amateur dont be affraid to be happy go on!!!!

[Chris K]

The benefit of using vdub for capturing is that you have full access to the encoder settings and can set a much higher quality then the predefined settings of Studio 9.
The codec used by Pinnacle is from Pegasus. Forgot to mention that the card also supports DV capture through a build-on firewire. Don't know if you can use vdub for that.

Chris.

[bpatters69]

Thanks all for the feedback. I will take a look at the editing programs that you linked.

As some of you have suggested, I use the Nero Software for capture and the Pinnacle Hardware card. I did remove the Pinnacle Software that came with the Pinnacle Card as I did not want any conflicts. My beef with the Nero software was in usuability as I find it rather cloogy. I also had trouble using the cut tool to take out portions of video that I did not want. To be honest, I still do not really know if I am using the cut feature properly. Secondly with regrad to Nero, I had captured 90 minutes from a VHS tape that Nero would not burn. I finally discovered WinAVI and I used WinAVI to convert the captured video (MPEG-2) to DVD and then I was able to burn without issues. WinAVI also burns a lot faster than Nero. I am not really sure why.

I might stick with the Pinnacle Capture card for now but I will take a good look at the Video editing packages that you all recommend. If anyone does have a recommendation for a capture card for about $100, please let me know. I have read some good things about Hauppauge 150 on this forum.

Thanks

[edDV]

Be aware that the Hauppauge 150 captures directly to MPeg2.

[bpatters69]

Be aware that the Hauppauge 150 captures directly to MPeg2.

So does my Pinnacle Capture Card.....? Sorry for my green response but what is wrong with MPEG-2? WinAVI does a nice job of converting to DVD format that I can burn directly to a DVD. Are you saying that I should be looking at capture cards to capture to something other than MPEG2?

Thanks

[edDV]

Be aware that the Hauppauge 150 captures directly to MPeg2.

So does my Pinnacle Capture Card.....? Sorry for my green response but what is wrong with MPEG-2? WinAVI does a nice job of converting to DVD format that I can burn directly to a DVD. Are you saying that I should be looking at capture cards to capture to something other than MPEG2?

Thanks

Evidently you aren't an editor.

[bpatters69]

Well... evidently I am new to this and I only half know what I am talking about. I would appreciate it if you could explain why a capture board that encodes to MPEG-2 eliminates me as an author.

Thanks

[edDV]

Well... evidently I am new to this and I only half know what I am talking about. I would appreciate it if you could explain why a capture board that encodes to MPEG-2 eliminates me as an author.

Thanks

It doesn't. MPeg is best done last if you expect to fiddle with pixels.
It all depends on what you are doing and how much loss you can take up front.

You came in asking for "best" editing software.

[bpatters69]

Ok. Getting back to my question. Should I be looking for a capture card and or capture software that captures in something other than MPEG-2?

When I have used the Nero Capture Software with the Pinnacle Capture Board, I just left Nero at defaults. I guess Nero captures from VHS in MPEG-2. I will check that when I get home. I will also check to see if I can capture in a different format or am I missing the point?

Thanks

[thecoalman]

Should I be looking for a capture card and or capture software that captures in something other than MPEG-2?

That's a "depends" question as far as the capture card goes, software should be selected according to the capture format. If you get a capture card that captures directly to MPEG you need software for editing MPEG.

I have an article here that will give you the basic information for the differences between MPEG and less compressed formats: www.nepadigital.com/articles/analog-capture.php

[bpatters69]

I went ahead and downloaded Premiere Elements, Sony Vegas Movie Studio and ULead Video Studio. ULead Video Studio would only allow an install to my hard disk so I started experimenting with it first. Ulead seems like a decent program and I see it is made by the same folks who made Corel Draw. The one feature that I am looking for is sound manipulation. By the term "sound manipulation" I mean adjusting the sound to match the video. When I used the Pinnacle Capture Software with the Pinnacle capture card, the sound did not match the video and I could not figure out how to adjust the sound so it synched up with the video. Is adjusting the sound in this way above and beyoned the consumer editing products? For whatever reason when I used the Pinnacle Capture card with the Nero Capture software the sound was in synch. I used defaults in both programs.

I guess it would probably make more sense to try and figure out why the audio is not synching up with the capture in the first place but I still don't know enough about how to tweak settings in capture software. Knowing I can manually adjust the sound until I figure out how to tweak settings is a plus.

[Richard_G]

Junk the Pinnacle capture card, they invented video/audio sync problems. In fact, I think they may even have a patent on it!

There are two reasons you are losing sync, you are encoding to mpeg on the fly and using Pinnacle to do it. If you have read The Coalmans guide you will see, as others have mentioned, that mpeg is a final output format and does not lend itself to editing. You ideally need a card that will allow you to capture as avi using whatever compression you decide is the best for you.

I don't use VideoStudio but I have used it's bigger brother, Ulead Mediastudio Pro for years. Whether VideoStudio will do the same job I don't know, but in MediaStudio Pro you can right click a clip and select Split. This splits the video from the audio allowing you to do things to one without affecting the other.

[Relayerman]

A couple of options if your budget is constrained:

Serif's MoviePLus 5 - capturing, editing, transitions, special effects, multiple audio tracks, multiple video tracks, etc. (http://www.serif.com)

TMPGEnc DVD Author Pro 3 - DVD authoring (http://www.tmpg-inc.com/en/index.html)

I use both and they both do a great job.

Relayerman

[Nelson37]

Have not heard many good things about Pinnacle cards. Have heard a LOT of bad things about Pinnacle software.

Ulead VS comes free with lots of capture cards. Decent prog. Media Studio Pro is IMO absolutely fantastic for special effects. But, I don't really need this, Spielberg's job is safe from me.

"Editing" is different things to different people. Basic cutting to special effects.

MPG is more difficult to edit properly, real-time MPG even worse. The best, in fact ONLY, cutter I have found which maintains audio synch for me is MPG2CUT2, which is free. Great Prog. Anything else requires re-encoding, which defeats the purpose of real-time MPG capture. You might as well cap AVI if you have to re-encode.

Re-synching audio to video requires a more advanced editor. Dramatically more preferrable to find a way to maintain synch during capture.

I have 2 or 3 legit copies of Pinnacle Studio which I have never bothered to load. Worthless piece of crap, IMO. Nero is not far behind, except as a burner ONLY.

For real-time MPG2, you have to be aware of a very important issue. Many softwares will play the video incorrectly, indicating a lack of synch which is not really there. TRY MORE THAN ONE. It is also extremely important what you use to demux and/or edit, also authoring. Synch can be lost in these processes. Try burning an RW disk and test in a standalone. I lost a lot of hair before I realized I was chasing a phantom problem.

Just started using Vegas, it definitely does what you want to do. Bonus, it includes a licensed AC3 encoder capable of creating valid 5.1 audio. Plus, as an editor, it does everything I need, though it does not properly cut my real-time MPG files. I did not expect it to, as mine are somewhat unusual. Real-time IVTC.

MPG2Cut2 for basic cutting.
Besweet for converting AC3 to 6 WAVes.
Vegas to align and cut WAV, then convert to AC3.
TMPGenc (old version) to Mux.
GuiforDVDAuthor to author.
IMGBurn to, well, burn images. Also create them.

5.1 audio, subtitles, perfect synch, 23 FPS, 16:9, hi-quality. All is good.

Premiere - supposedly good software. Reminds me of taking apart a Steinway piano, I actually think they pay somebody extra to stay up late at night and make it more complicated for no particular reason. It failed the 5-minute productivity test.

[harley2ride]

I have used Ulead Studio 7, 11, Virtualdub, AVISYNTH, Adobe Premiere 6.5, Vegas 5,, and a few others. I have spent a lot of time viewing tutorials and demos of Pinnacle Liquid. I have to say that I was most impressed with Pinnacle Liquid, but have stayed away from it due to the tons of negative comments I've seen. Out of the ones I have actually used, I like Vegas for most of my stuff. If I want to do some quick down and dirty effects and menus, then Ulead Studio (now have version 11 Plus), works very nicely. If I need to clean stuff up or apply special filters, AVISYNTH is the ticket. If I could only have one program, I would have to stick with Vegas..

[studur]

For TV acquisition, I love IUVCR (from IUlabs), very stable, very low memory usage and fast to load. Transfered VHS using coax cable and no drop frames after 45 minutes in 720*480 MPEG2 8000kbps 30fps (on a pentium IV 3.0ghz HT and a Leadtek TV2000deluxe). I have tried 10-15 differents softwares for TV acquisition and this one is the best.

For video editing, I love Ulead VS11+ for introducing transitions and special effects but for fast editing (i.e. cutting ads, denoise filter, dvd compliant MPEG2 files) I prefer TMPGenc Xpress 4.0. Then you can burn it with Nero Vision express since you already have the software.

So far, I havent found any software that has a low memory footprint during video acquisition, easy and fast frame-level cutting, DVD burning capabilities, fast and stable video-audio format interconversion using the advanced features of codecs (bitrate/#pass/filters).

I like the interface of VS11 but for all the VideoStudio series, I've always found that the rendering takes so much time compared to other softwares. So far, my favorite series of softwares is from TMPGenc : Fast, stable, highly compatible, wide support of codecs.

[Marvingj]

Pinnacle Studio and liquid will piss you off. It chokes all the time.

[lordsmurf]

Your friend needs to stop using hallucinogenic drugs, but Premiere is nice enough if you can handle the awkward work flow, frequent crashes and Adobe idiosyncrasies.
For home users I'd recommend Vegas Movie Studio, Ulead DVD Video Studio or Premiere Elements, possibly in that order. I would stay away from Pinnacle, they are notorious for stability problems.
If you want to move into more high-end software I'd recommend Vegas Video Pro or Premiere CS3, definitely in that oder.
Vegas is far easier to use than Premiere, and you will get excellent results a lot faster with a lot less headache. On the other hand, if you want to integrate well with Photoshop CS3 and After Effects CS3, then Premiere is for you. But then you know that already if you have $1,699 to spend on video editing software.
I have used both Vegas and Premiere extensively, and for video editing Vegas beats Premiere hands down, but for the total solution you get with the production bundle, Premiere is hard to beat.
Oh, and btw, regarding the "professional" comment from your friend, as I said, tell him to get off the drugs, the only tool used by professionals, if you go by his stan dards, is Avid. For these professionals Premiere/Vegas/Anything is a ridiculous toy. And then again, some other professionals will point out that Avid is ridiculously old fashioned and that any serious work in Hollywood today happens on Final Cut Pro.

But your comments are equally delusional.

Premiere CS3, Vegas Video, and Final Cut Pro (Mac) are all excellent choices. If you want proprietary systems, Avid is one of several.

Premiere CS3 is not any more or less awkward than the current version of FCP or Vegas.

A majority of professional workflows are using Premiere Pro on Windows, or FCP on Mac. That excludes proprietary systems. This considers all environments too, not just Hollywood. Many of us are involved in commercials, DVD production, and other projects that, while not rented in Blockbuster, are every bit as professional and seen in daily life. Vegas seems to be favored by hobbyist more than pros. For starters, it doesn't integrate into Adobe/Apple software like the others do.

Tools like Nero, Roxio and Pinnacle Studio are "idiotware". They are designed for people who know nothing about video AND are satisfied with minimal quality (as compared to more professional methods). If you know anything at all about video, you tend to find these programs aggravating and worthless.

[Noahtuck]

Tools like Nero, Roxio and Pinnacle Studio are "idiotware". They are designed for people who know nothing about video AND are satisfied with minimal quality (as compared to more professional methods). If you know anything at all about video, you tend to find these programs aggravating and worthless.

You forgot to include Winavi in there
Although it should be forgotten

[Richard_G]

I have noticed an interesting trend appearing on this thread. While the majority of us are advising against the idiotware (I like that term), there are some that are actually advocating it's use. I noticed that of those that I agreed with I recognised the posters as regular contributors, those that I thought were talking out of their backsides I didn't (Why would anyone recommend Pinnacle Studio and Nero for working with video!). Then I looked at the post count of the contributors. It seems if it is below 1000 they think they know what they are talking about (but don't) and if above they really do know what they are talking about!

Just goes to prove that there's no substitute for experience....

[SearchQuality]

I have just seen this discussion thread and would like to contribute to the subject. Based on my five years of experience as a video enthusiast here is my opinion. Pinnacle is easy to learn and to use, very good for newbies and amateurs, but quite unstable, slow and crashes frequently. It can make you very nervous during video work. Ulead is quite good. Its biggest drawback is the authoring part. If you go into the project with a big file to capture you always get a useless one item top menu whether you want it or not. A feature that is quite annoying for beginners. I do not have much experience with Adobe premiere, but from what I have seen I would not recommend it for newbies. I have also used Roxio My Dvd. A very slow package that can easily crash. I would not recommend it. Finally Vegas Movie Studio and its companien DVD Architect is my latest favourite. It is a stable, robust and performing product. Its design is logical and functionality is powerful. I would not say easy to learn, but once you come to grips with it then you can achieve a lot with it. I hope my comments will help you.

[bpatters69]

It has been a while since I looked at this post. I am going to switch gears and probably buy a Canopus ADVC-110. I want to be able to capture video from VHS and burn it to DVD. Not sure which software program I will use. Initially, I just need capture so I might stick with Roxio as there will not be any need to edit at first. Anyone have any pros/cons to the Canopus ADVC-110?

Thanks, Bill

[slacker]

Depends on how much it is. Cheap Canon miniDV cameras have some of the best chips around for analog to digital passthru, and after you have completed your vhs conversions, you have a fully functioning camcorder. Why buy into a dead end!