Video Editing Software advice

[KentuckyBoiledChiccan]

My son has recently gotten into video editing and I'm excited to see his creativity flourish. In the past, we've tried different hobbies with him like drumming, martial arts, and swimming, and more but he never stuck with any of them. I've always supported his interests rather than forcing my own ideas on him. Lately, his video clips have been gaining attention on social media and he's fucking pumped about it. We've been planning to get him a new PC for a few months, and now I'm starting to focus more on making it happen. A friend who knows a lot about computers helped me put together a list of parts, including the screen and I'm executing it slowly. I don't know much about video editing software, though - so I need some recommendations. Bruno has been using some freeware for now, and I want to surprise him with professional software on his upcoming birthday. Any video editors here who can recommend a good software?

 

[Maertl513]

I use Davinci Resolve 15 for editing purposes, and Handbrake, if I want to reduce definition, filetype and so on. Aswell freeware.

 

[Prina]

+1 on DaVinci Resolve. It's what I use for editing footage from my Canon C200 cameras that shoot 4K RAW video at 1 Gb/sec. There are both free and paid versions (more options, flexibility and AI tools); both can give professional results.

The two other major editors are Adobe Premiere and, for Macs, Final Cut Pro but the downsides are that Premiere is an ongoing subscription and Final Cut Pro is only for Macs.

I've used both Premiere and Final Cut Pro in the past. All three are very capable and all have learning curves. I like Resolve because it doesn't have the baggage of the other two. Even though I use Macs most of the time, video editing gets done on a moderately high end Windows machine which makes a lot of the editing go much faster. If I were starting out, I'd try out the Resolve free version to see if I liked it and if so then I'd go with this bundle which includes both the paid Resolve Studio version and a video editing keyboard/shuttle wheel that makes editing significantly easier and is only $100 more than the software alone.

For video editing generally you want as much RAM & GPU (I have 32GB and a Nvidia 2080ti) and size & accuracy on the monitor (contrast ratio, lumen output & color gamut) as you can justify and may even consider a monitor calibration device.

 

[aamefford]

I'll add to Davinci Resolve. I have NOT used it much, but it does have very significant capabilities for the (free) price of the free version. I've used Adobe Premier a fair bit at beginner level along with my daughter for her 2 years of video editing in high school. The full creative cloud subscription for an educational license is sort of reasonable (ok, not really, but a bunch cheaper than the full price). It is fairly logical, and fairly straightforward to use, and very powerful.

If you use a Mac or iPhone / iPad, iMovie is actually half decent and comes installed with the OS. I've used it to piece together video clips into a single file and stuff on my phone. There is also something called "WeVideo" that is an on-line video editing platform that has a free tier, or may be completely free. My daughter used that during the Covid lockdown for her video class. It was functional, a bit slow, and a bit annoying. It was also free, and worked as expected, within the slow and annoying constraints. Link - https://www.wevideo.com/ It would be a good starter, as would iMovie if you use Macs.

If I were in your shoes - iMovie to start if you use a Mac, and then maybe progress to Final Cut Pro (Apple's "Pro Level" software, analogous to Logic X but for video) or Davinci resolve. If it looks like a hobby that could go wild or turn pro, definitely Premier Pro would be my first choice, Davinci would be tied for first, or second, just from what I've read that studios use (or used 3-4 of years ago). It seemed at that point that Adobe Premier was the preferred platform for editing, and DaVinci for color grading.

Take all this as advice from a Dad who likes the hobby and had to help his daughter out, and did pretty limited research on the subject back about 2020-ish.

EDIT - Or better yet, do what @Prina said above - it looks like he does this seriously, where I dabble with it every few months.

 

[Moondog Wily]

I have never played with Resolve, but have heard nothing but good things about it, both the free version and the paid versions. I have been using Premiere and After Effects for decades. Used to do some work in the Avid studio suite but that was 25+ years ago and a lot has changed in that world. It looks like Avid does have a free version for beginners with their Avid Media Composer editor (here is a link: https://www.avid.com/media-composer). Do note that Premiere is great, but when you want to really stretch your legs, After Effects is what gives you the room to start getting really creative. AE is included with most "bundles" from Adobe when it comes to their monthly subscriptions.

I think the long and short is, getting your son on any of the platforms will be fine. With Premiere, if you wanted to go that route, you could purchase a copy of their Creative Suite prior to their monthly subscription BS (I think CS 5.5 was the last one, maybe CS 6), but you will be missing out on many new features and it's life span for support on OS x y or z would be limited.

As for hardware, powerful GPU with lot's of RAM. Lot's of RAM on the MB as well and NVMe M.2 drive(s) for system and working drives (mass storage, old school spinning disks). With the current versions of Premiere, you can tell it how much RAM of your system it is allowed to use. I often look to "gaming" based components to build my boxes as they have the capabilities and focus on issues that are important in video editing as well and are often less expensive than the ones that are specifically targeting the video editor market.

If you son is OK with it, share some links with us that he is getting the views on ;~))

 

[d4rkst4r]

I've used Cyberlink Power Director forever. It was easy to learn and not a wallet-buster. If you're really getting out of the gate, make sure you funnel your dollars into a PC that is plenty capable first. Editing pprograms are resource hogs, and having the best software won't make a choked up computer render any better or faster.

 

[KentuckyBoiledChiccan]

Did some digging and he is already using the Resolve. The Adobe premiere seems to be the industry standard and student edition (with photoshop and another software the name of escaped from me) is only £16 a month. I think I will go that way.

I was made aware the GPU is essencial, and I will get it as the last puzzle around December, as the prices dropping almost daily, so I was told.

If you son is OK with it, share some links with us that he is getting the views on ;~))

His stuff is on tiktok, which I don't have. I will ask him to link me to it

Thank you all for all the advice you gave me.

 

[Moondog Wily]

Did some digging and he is already using the Resolve. The Adobe premiere seems to be the industry standard and student edition (with photoshop and another software the name of escaped from me) is only £16 a month. I think I will go that way.

I was made aware the GPU is essencial, and I will get it as the last puzzle around December, as the prices dropping almost daily, so I was told.



His stuff is on tiktok, which I don't have. I will ask him to link me to it

Thank you all for all the advice you gave me.

I don't do tiktok myself either, but I think my GF has it on her phone, so if I get a link and am not able to watch without an account, I will do so through hers ;~)) Let me/us know if you have any other specs your are trying to suss out ;~))

 

[cbieberstein]

If your son is already using Resolve, adding Adobe Premiere Pro to his toolkit would be a solid choice, especially with the student pricing. It’s a powerful editor with tons of professional features. I’ve used it before, and while there’s a learning curve, it becomes intuitive with time. If he’s getting serious about video editing, having access to both Resolve and Premiere will give him flexibility in workflows.

Also, since he’s into video editing, he might need to convert different file formats for projects. I’ve found this GSM converter form https://www.movavi.com/audio-converter/gsm-converter.html useful for converting audio files quickly without hassle. It could come in handy if he’s working with different media formats.

 

[Moondog Wily]

Hello. I'm looking for software for editing my GoPro videos. I used to use Lightworks and liked it, but it doesn't do 4k without buying the pro version. Since the pro version is $24/month, and I edit videos about once every 5 years, that's not worth the price. I tried Davinci Resolve 18, but when I import my videos, they all show up as Media Offline. I've tried about a dozen "fixes" for this, then gave up on that software.

Can anybody suggest decent video editing software?

BTW, I'm using a PC and would prefer free, or at least a one-time purchase price, as opposed to a subscription price.

I have always heard great things about Davinci, and I am sure there is a solution to your conundrum. I personally would work at it a bit more to try and resolve that issue. If you are only editing video once every 5 years, you could just pay the $24 for a month of Lightworks, and then not have to pay anything again for 5 years ;~)) Another option is OBS Studio. It is free and does have some basic editing capabilities, so you may want to give that a shot! I do not personally know of any other free apps. I am on the hook to Adobe for the whole package, so I am using Premiere/After Effects. You might be able to do a free trial of them and be done with it by the time your trial expires. Hope you can get your video resolved and edited!!!

 

[Anono]

Late to the game here, but Adobe CC, the entire suite, has student / teacher subscriptions. I think it's $19.99/month for at least the first year and ~35 after that. Yes, it's expensive, but if you and he think it might be something he wants to stick with, it will open up another tier (or 6) to video and media editing in general. Final Cut also gets used a lot, but I think Adobe CC probably is more ubiquitous throughout the world. My .02.