What video editing software you guys using?

[Michigan_PI]

FCPX on a 5k i7 iMac

 

[melmartin]

FCPX on a Mac Pro. I hate the Adobe subscription model, even though I'm stuck with Adobe for PS and Lightroom. FCP and FCPX have been updated many times over the years for free to users. Many feature films are done on FCPX, so it's more than enough for my humble Mavic Pro videos. It's workflow is quite similar to iMovie, and it was a pretty smooth transition.

 

[choiahoy]

I'm a beginner drone pilot but I've been a professional film and TV editor for over 15 years. My two cents -

In terms of features in editing software, I would think that a DJI user might want to have access to 1) an easy 4K workflow 2) good color grading tools 3) the ability to conform high frame rates to true slow motion clips.

There are a lot of software out there, but I see little reason not to use one of the three 'professional' industry standard programs, as they are now all relatively cheap or free. These are Avid Media Composer, Premiere Pro, and DaVinci Resolve. FCP X could also be considered for some.

They're all excellent programs that are stable, have strong technical support platforms, and support a large selection of excellent third party plugins.

Though I've mainly used Avid for most all my professional work, I've chosen to use Premiere to edit my drone videos solely because the 4K workflow is so simple.

Hope this is helpful.

 

[Slowcaptain]

I'm a beginner drone pilot but I've been a professional film and TV editor for over 15 years. My two cents -

In terms of features in editing software, I would think that a DJI user might want to have access to 1) an easy 4K workflow 2) good color grading tools 3) the ability to conform high frame rates to true slow motion clips.

There are a lot of software out there, but I see little reason not to use the three 'professional' programs, as they are now all relatively cheap or free. These are Avid Media Composer, Premiere Pro, and DaVinci Resolve. FCP X could also be considered.

They're all excellent programs that are stable and have strong technical support platforms, and support a large selection of third party plugins.

Though I've mainly used Avid for most all my professional work, I've chosen to use Premiere to edit my drone videos solely because the 4K workflow is so simple.

Hope this is helpful.

Hi, thanks for the reply. Do you think computer's hardware causes video quality issues? I edited a 4k video and it had stutters and rubber-band effects in it. I reduced the resolution to FHD and the video turned out smooth. I always thought hardware would cause slow rendering but won't hamper the quality but seems like h/w has impact on the quality too.

 

[The Real Heavy Metal]

So I spent a lot of time downloading, evaluating a handful of video editing softwares. Most of them are behemoths and absolutely suck the life out of your machine if it is anything less than a high end setup. Mine is a 5th gen i7 with 16GB RAM and a 2GB GFX card, and the thing absolutely dies editing 4K video.
Anyhoo, I used Adobe Lightroom CC (for color grading/LUTs loading) in combination with Movavi Video editor for trimming, clipping, joining and transitioning of videos.

Took a better part of the day for editing and rendering, but I think results for a novice first timer are good.

What programs are you folks using, which is less cumbersome and does not burn a big hole in your pocket?

I don't know how this program works on 4K but I had to do some serious searching for a program that would even run on my machine. I'm running a Toshiba Intel I3 core laptop. I just wanted to do 1080. The program I'm using is called CyberLink Power Director 12. It will do 4 K but not without CUDA acceleration. Perhaps due to the fact that it runs on archaic hardware it may not be such a resource hog doing 4 K on your machine.

 

[choiahoy]

Hi, thanks for the reply. Do you think computer's hardware causes video quality issues? I edited a 4k video and it had stutters and rubber-band effects in it. I reduced the resolution to FHD and the video turned out smooth.

Are you seeing the stutter and banding when playing the exported file or while trying to watch on your editing software? If it's in the exported 4K file, what codec did you use to export? And are you viewing it via an online stream?

Many artifacts and quality issues are introduced in compression--particularly when compressing to stream online versus compressing a broadcast quality file.

 

[choiahoy]

I edited a 4k video and it had stutters and rubber-band effects in it.

Also, do you see the stutter in the same place in the 4K file? If not, it could just be your computer is having issues with playback and the banding could be a result of your monitor's resolution.

 

[Slowcaptain]

Are you seeing the stutter and banding when playing the exported file or while trying to watch on your editing software? If it's in the exported 4K file, what codec did you use to export? And are you viewing it via an online stream?

Many artifacts and quality issues are introduced in compression--particularly when compressing to stream online versus compressing a broadcast quality file.

No, not in the editing software. The exported/output video stutters (I used Movavi video editor for editing). The stutter is most visible where I inserted transitions between different small clips. I am viewing it on my laptop, not online streaming.

 

[Slowcaptain]

I don't know how this program works on 4K but I had to do some serious searching for a program that would even run on my machine. I'm running a Toshiba Intel I3 core laptop. I just wanted to do 1080. The program I'm using is called CyberLink Power Director 12. It will do 4 K but not without CUDA acceleration. Perhaps due to the fact that it runs on archaic hardware it may not be such a resource hog doing 4 K on your machine.

Try a free program called "Shortcut" that works ok on archaic machines but you do have to struggle with poor UI and silly nagging issues (Like it never "remembers" the last LUT's location" and always goes to default location). I managed to create an ok video out of it but the rendering the video is a job of a veryyyyy patient person. It literally took 3 hours for me to write a 8-9 minute 4k video. Not worth it.
P.s. I am using Adobe LR CC and Movavi for now - both of which seem to work (strictly) ok.

 

[The Real Heavy Metal]

So I spent a lot of time downloading, evaluating a handful of video editing softwares. Most of them are behemoths and absolutely suck the life out of your machine if it is anything less than a high end setup. Mine is a 5th gen i7 with 16GB RAM and a 2GB GFX card, and the thing absolutely dies editing 4K video.
Anyhoo, I used Adobe Lightroom CC (for color grading/LUTs loading) in combination with Movavi Video editor for trimming, clipping, joining and transitioning of videos.

Took a better part of the day for editing and rendering, but I think results for a novice first timer are good.

What programs are you folks using, which is less cumbersome and does not burn a big hole in your pocket?

I used to be a computer hardware and software tech. The issues with any software is this. Regardless of what resources it asks for it is all made on and created for current technology. The farther you are away from that current tech the slower it runs. It's hardware promoting new software and vise versa. The industries have always run that way. It's a shell game and unless your name is Gates and can upgrade as often as you change socks it a very expensive, no win no end game. Trick is to find the oldest versions that do what you need them to do. There is a chance that your hardware is above the systems that were state of the art at the time. If you can find an older program it will run like a super car on your machine doing the same task that newer software will choke on. When this stops working is if they release a new OS's that will no longer support the older program. Then they force you to start all over.

 

[The Real Heavy Metal]

Try a free program called "Shortcut" that works ok on archaic machines but you do have to struggle with poor UI and silly nagging issues (Like it never "remembers" the last LUT's location" and always goes to default location). I managed to create an ok video out of it but the rendering the video is a job of a veryyyyy patient person. It literally took 3 hours for me to write a 8-9 minute 4k video. Not worth it.
P.s. I am using Adobe LR CC and Movavi for now - both of which seem to work (strictly) ok.

I'll have a look at shortcut. Lol... Like I said though mine an I3 core. Takes an hour to render 6 minutes of 1080p. I won't complain. at least it does it. I'm thinking your I7 would be a lot faster.

 

[choiahoy]

The stutter is most visible where I inserted transitions between different small clips.

Ah, I would put my money on the transitions being the cause of the problem.

I don't know Movavi, but if you're able, check to see if the transition effect is 8 bpc (bits per channel). In addition to projects to having varying bits per channel (usually 8 bpc, 16, or 32), so too can effects. A low bit per channel, particularly on effects, can result in banding on gradients. See the attached image.

One good thing about the softwares I mentioned above is they clearly label which effects have higher bpc.

 

[Johnnynxn]

I am struggling through I-mac's free editor- "I-Movie"- I find it somewhat
cumbersome; as I have found with most of the free ones. I have not yet tried any of the pro(cash) systems. As I am after is a little trimming, simple transitions and some easy sound editing, maybe a key or two.
I am looking forward to your responses.

 

[Kilrah]

I have FCPX from the time I had a powerful MacBook Pro, really like it but now only have a small Retina Macbook i.e. not exactly a powerhouse so it's not very convenient to use anymore (even if performance is actually impressive for the low spec machine it is). My desktops are PCs so can't use there...

So I kinda went back to Premiere, but I think I'll give up on that when my subscription next ends and start using Resolve. The free version does everything a basic user would want/need. Did spend some time on it since the beta of v15 came out and I can definitely work with that.

Performance is good on my travel PC (i7-7700K, GTX1070, 24GB RAM).

 

[Slowcaptain]

Performance is good on my travel PC (i7-7700K, GTX1070, 24GB RAM).

You got a lot of firepower sir

 

[Slowcaptain]

I am struggling through I-mac's free editor- "I-Movie"- I find it somewhat
cumbersome; as I have found with most of the free ones. I have not yet tried any of the pro(cash) systems. As I am after is a little trimming, simple transitions and some easy sound editing, maybe a key or two.
I am looking forward to your responses.

VSDC and Shortcut. Although I could never make VSDC work - reviews are solid for it. Between the two my pick goes to Shortcut but very slow rendering.

 

[MrRobville]

I use Vegas Pro on PC for most of my editing, mainly because it is pretty versatile for other editing tasks as well. It's fit for basic color corrections. However, if I'm in the mood for more proper color correcting, I tend to use Resolve for that before transferring the footage to Vegas. Perhaps not the most efficient way, but it works for me.

 

[JohnEB]

Am I just looking in the wrong place?

Yes, looking in wrong place it used to be beta was free but try their web site, it is free but no 4K

 

[john2k]

Is there no 4k video editors for android devices?

 

[herman2992]

I've been using Cyberlink PowerDirector for years. Never used anything else, so can't compare. Sits on a pretty powerful Alienware PC, so no resource strain.

Only got my MP in December. This was my first effort...