ULEAD Editing

[skychic68 0]

HI ho,

Anyone tried the Ulead video studio product? How does it compare with Pinnacle? Adobe is so complex and expensive. YIKES.

Que sera sera

[cameramonkey 0]

Generally speaking, the more powerful and flexible the solution, the more complex it becomes. If you get a simple editor, it wont have many cool features. Take microsoft movie maker 2 (free add on to windows xp) as an example. Its brain dead to use. but you cant really do anything but take clips you have selectively recorded to the PC, arrange them in the order you want, and add a half dozen cheesy transitions(but no standard smooth fade *grrr*). Yeah, its easy, but that really isnt editing. You cant do many cool effects, slo-mo, etc.

I'd recommend getting a copy of what your fellow vidiots use, and learn from them. I started with the ulead media studio pro, then switched to premiere. it was challenging, but I just started playing and reading the manual when I had a question.

Now, I work with other vidiots at my dz to teach them the basics. To give you an idea how easy it can be, I can have you producing professional looking tandem videos in about 2 hours of time together playing. It took me months to learn what I could teach you in that 2 hours. So it pays to work with others to learn instead of hitting the books. I by no means know everything about it, but I can do what I need efficiently, and it gets the job done.

Yes, its complicated, but dont let that scare you. take it step by step. You only need to know a handful of things to get started and to make good movies.
How to:
>capture your video
>get your other files (soundtracks, etc) into your project (import)
>cut/trim/adjust clips (editing)
>add and manage transitions
>export to tape
Thats it!

and NEVER buy premiere (or any high priced editor)... it comes with all kinds of hardware bundled in. For instance you can buy Prem for $600, or get a hardware firewire or dv editor card that has it included for less (i.e. pinnacle dv500 dvd card for $490). If you are gonna lay down the $$, might as well get the best deal possible.

Two wrongs don't make a right, however three lefts DO!

[miller 0]

I've got ULEAD 4.0 and 5.0., and 6.0 is currently out for about $90. They are nice programs to learn on, pretty easy to work with. 5.0 was a huge step up in ease of use from 4.0, and I'm sure 6.0 is much better than 5.0. They include dozens of modifiable transitions and special effects, and can take two music or audio tracks over the text and video tracks.

Also, ULEAD currently has a 3-D graphics creation program for about $50. It's really cool, and you can incorporate anything you create into your video editing.

Overall, nice beginner program, quite a few features, easy to use, and fairly inexpensive.

[CBurket 0]

ULEAD was the first video editing system I ever used and it was very easy from the second I installed it and I made some pretty cool and complex videos with it, but you'll definately want to step up to something like Premiere after a while, but I'd say its a great program to learn the basics of computer based editing.

[skychic68 0]

I currently have a Pinnacle DC 10 plus. A bit buggy.
Have you heard anything on Pinnacle studio 8?
I do need and want something simple, because I just don't have the time to get into depth when editing so many videos from the weekend.

No problems with ulead? Good.

Does it have clow motion effects?

Que sera sera

[marcin 0]

Could you give some examples how Premiere differs from Ulead Media Pro (in what respect is it better) ?

I use Ulead and have found that the most time consuming part is going through hours of footage and selecting the best few seconds you wanna insert, plus editing to the music. Boris FX and Cool 3D have usually more than enough effects and options, and anyway you dont see much of fx in norman kent's film either (apart from slow mo' and fade in/outs).

Nevertheless I would be interested in using a program more efficient than Ulead, so if you have any thoughts, please share.

marcin