Hi All,

What's your opinion on Vegas Video? I'm not a video professional, but I've played around with Premiere 6 and I use other Adobe software that I like. I've used a lot of audio software, including Sonic Foundry's stuff before too. My main applications will be 1) home videos with fun stuff and 2) output to MPEG-2 and DVD (I have an HP200i DVD burner).

How does Vegas compare with Premiere? I think that Vegas is totally software rendered, so I guess that means you don't get any realtime previews. Is that correct? Does that really matter? With Premiere, I could add a realtime card to speed it up, right? My machine is a P4 1.7GHz.

Thanks!

Vegas Video is entirely software that gives you amazingly good real-time preview to the computer screen or out the firewire port to and external monitor. On my 700 MHz PIII, the program "stutters" slightly when crossing dissolves. For straight dv, it plays 29.97. For multilayer effects, it sometimes gets as low as 4-5 frames per second (hence the stutter).

In my mind, it is about the best option available right now. It is equal to Premiere in most ways, exceeds Premiere in some ways, and is inferior is a few others. To see how it works for you, just download the trial version and give it a test. It has been solid on my system and works with my work flow. Premiere wasn't as intuitive.

Bottom line: both will suit your purposes. Test them both and use the one that "feels" best.

Hello,

I was all set to go out and buy a MAC plus Final Cut Pro. Had the system all picked out and my hand on the credit card...

I was familiar with the SF audio products and decided for grins to try out VV3. After doing a couple of projects (some fun and some real) I have decided that this is the more cost effective way for me to go. So now I am looking at a big Dell PC with large HDD's and loads of RAM (much cheaper then a Mac).

I also used it to cut a quick 30sec bit for my company to use at a trade show by using VV3 on a laptop in a hotel room. (The bit was 100 five frame still images and a custom audio track with moving text graphics.)

Now if I can find someone to buy my Trinity/Linear SVHS rig, I can buy those nice 19" LCD monitors for my PC!

Cheers
BTH

We use Vegas. It is a lot easier to use than Premiere. Sonic Foundry has incorporated most of their sound tools in with the Vegas package. It's a win win!

Thanks everyone. I think I will give it a go. The demo version seemed to make sense to me, and that is probably the best productivity advantage you can get.

I heard from a sales person at a local store that used to carry it (Guitar Center in Kirkland, WA) that Sonic Foundry may be "dropping" the Vegas line. His store stopped carrying it. (They sell all sorts of music production software). He said he heard that from 2 separate sources. Hmm. I hope the product stays alive and updated.

I have Vegas Video 3, and it's pretty sweet. From what I read about it, the speed and smoothness of the playback relies on your computer. Hence, if you have a super machine, the program will perform super-ly. I upgraded my processor to an Athlon 1600x for about 300 dollars, and you'd probably want to look at something like that, or even higher. I've also been told you can never have enough RAM (and that 1 gig is good to have).

I noticed that the basic VV3 demo package doesn't seem to include any 3D fx; all the transitions are 2D. What do you use for 3D fx, if any? I think SF sells an extra pack. Are there any good 3rd party packages for VV?

I have been using VV3 on my dual TYAN/AMD rig for about 6 months now. I still have Premier, Pinnacle Studio 7, Adobe AfterEffects and Media Studio Pro 6.5 loaded on my machine, but, I now use VV3 exclusively. No need for the other programs. VV3 currently has very few 3rd party plugins, but, Pixelan Spice Rack is one that works. There's several way to spoof 3d transitions.....see the following:
http://www.digitalvideoediting.com/Htm/DVEditHomeSet1.htm
look under "more techniques".

VV3 also supports a number of Directx plugins like Izotope and WAVES audio effects. Most NLE's are sorely lacking in adequate professional audio editting capability. VV3, plus these plugins give quite flexxible filters, compressors, and mixer capabilities.

Thanks everyone. I just ordered a license for VV3 from videoguys.com.

Here's a tip for the money-conscious: VV3 last time I checked was priced at around 420 or somewhere thereabouts if you download a demo and then pay for the code to unlock, versus ordering it boxed.

Also, this may sound stupid, but with a student discount you get it real cheap, provided you take the time to shop the academic providers (I got my copy for 170 bucks or so). If you sign up for a 180 dollar class at your local community college, and use the discount to buy the program, you'll still get away paying less than you would without the discount!

Or just steal your cousin's student ID and say you're him. Whatever.

That is how I got most of my programs from Macromedia, to Adobe suites and Vv3. It just makes sense because if you don't like it -there you are stuck with hundreds of dollars worth junk. Vegas Video is pretty sweet.

http://www.creationengine.com/html/action.lasso?-database=products.fm&-layout=w&-response=prd.html&product%20ID=10721&-search

$166 with plugins and Acid pro 3.0 as well!

I've seen new, non-academic copies of VV3 going on Ebay for $250-ish. None right now though.

Anyway, my Vegas Video question, can anyone reccomend a book/user manual/training guide for VV3?

1. Get "The Official VV3 User Manual" from SOFO....about $35.
2. Spend (a lot of) time at www.creativecow.com. They've got tons of tutorials...the best way to learn VV3.

I would suggest that if your a student great, go academic.
This program is well worth full price and 400.00 is peanuts compared to Premeire and others.
The money you spend on it will fuel future improvements.
I love the program!
Hang with it. You will be amazed at all the functionality it has.
I am fairly new to this program myself. I learn something new and get excited every time I use it.

Cheers,
Rick

I like VV3 and find it really intuitive and performance is really nice. One question though. If I was going to learn an NLE program, just so I would have skills enough that I might be able to get bits of work editing for people, would Avid DV Xpress be a better choice? Is it the software of choice for PC's? And from what I've heard it's pretty populare on the Mac too so you would have skills that you could use on other the other most popular platform.

Unless, I'm wrong, Avid DV Xpress is PC only. . .there was a big debacle about it. Vegas Video is good, my only gripe is the fact that the scrub tool SUCKS.

Also, if you're ever planning to do the big time stuff (with film, and such), VV doesn't do batch lists and EDLs and the like.

As of v3.5 Xpress DV is cross platform (MAC and PC) all in one box.

Ah. . .did not know that! Well, like I said, it's all about what you want to do. Vegas Video is substantially cheaper, and not at all a bad editor. You can still edit just about anything in the world on there, including your own feature length film, if you desire--it's just that you will probably have to stay digital, without going to film, and use the program for all offline and online editing.

Also, I say again it has a worthless scrub tool. My editing technique sometimes involves playing the beginning of a clip over and over to see how much I can cut off without clipping the beginning of a word (also useful for determining exactly where audio ends), and it's harder to do this when you can't just run the playhead over the clip and instantly hear the sound--all other NLEs that I've worked with allow this; I can't imagine why Vegas Video doesn't. Sorry for the redundancy.

Josh...

Your complaint with VV3 can be easily and cheaply remedied. For about 100 bucks you can get a Countour ShuttlePro which makes the scrub process just like the old VCR tape editors. A wheel allows frame by frame, with audio, scrubbing or a multiple frame scrub at whatever speed you choose. Try it, you'll like it.

<<<-- Originally posted by AaronKoolen : I like VV3 and find it really intuitive and performance is really nice. One question though. If I was going to learn an NLE program, just so I would have skills enough that I might be able to get bits of work editing for people, would Avid DV Xpress be a better choice? Is it the software of choice for PC's? And from what I've heard it's pretty populare on the Mac too so you would have skills that you could use on other the other most popular platform. -->>>

To answer your question brielfly, Avid DVX would be a better choice if you want to impress people with what software you know. It is the more advanced PC NLE It isn't the most popular NLE for PCs though. That award would have to go to Premiere, which probably outsells Avid at least 50 to 1 (ok, so they give it away free alot too).
In the end, if you want to get work for other people, a kick ass demo reel will make more difference than what software you use.

Vegas is a program that can certainly be used in a business to make professional quality video.
I do just that every day.
Avid Xpress is a very good program and is also capable of making great quality video.

Software is a personal choice.
Yes you may get certain Kudos for learning and using Avid software.
You will also pay more than twice the amount than Vegas.
Is Avid express twice as good?

I would say No, not yet.

It also depends on the type of work you intend to do.
If it is long form documentary or Indy Film than Avid is a better choice in my opinion.
Otherwise I would rather use Vegas.

Just some thoughts.

I've heard of that shuttle dealy . . .maybe I'll try one.

Check out the Shuttle Pro at http://www.contouravs.com/cav_shuttlepro_info.html -- well worth the $100 plus you can freely download whatever drivers you need for it, including Vegas Video 2 & 3.

Looks like I am a new owner of VV3 also. It should arrive in a couple of days and I am looking for a basic learning tool. Vast tour sounds great but I would like some very basic stuff under my belt first. Anyone have any ideas for basic learning of VV3. Hints and suggestions would be appreciated. I believe the book is extra if I read sonics website correctly?

The best way to learv VV3 us to go thru the many tutotials offered over at www.creativecow.com

Also go to digitalvideoediting.com and click the techniques tab and go through the archives (a link at the bottom of the page) there are several task specific tutorials with examples and .veg files you can download and play with.

Actually I just went and got the link, it's faster than you trying to hunt for it.

http://www.digitalvideoediting.com/cgi-bin/showarchivedindex.cgi?id=90&start=30&end=50

Go through the other techniques as well, there is some great stuff on that site.

Oh and here is a great one on effects and velocity envelopes you can have fun with. If you download the .zip files it has the article a .wmf of the project and the .veg that you can open and modify to get a feel for vegas video.

http://www.digitalvideoediting.com/2002/02_feb/tutorials/vegas_velocity.htm

You'll need vegas installed to play with the .veg files

Finally, make sure you download and install the LATEST version (now at 3.0c). You actually don't need to install the CD, just install the download and enter the serial number in the box.