Eli the Computer Guy

Archive for the ‘Video Editing’ Category

As I have progressed in my business of making video classes I have decided to upgrade my camcorder to a high definition version.  It’s one of the fancy ones with an internal 120GB hard drive and surround sound microphone.  The camera shoots like a dream.  The videos it captures are crystal clear, and the sound quality from the internal microphone simply sings. The 1920 x 1080 resolution videos will stand the test of time with a clarity that is expected from modern consumers of video.

I was ecstatic to shoot my first video class using the camera.  Everything worked well, and I practically skipped home to plug the camera into my computer to begin editing the footage.  And then… everything went to hell.

My computer chokes, sputters and damn near dies when it tries to process high def video.  I have a decent Core 2 processor and 4 GB of RAM.  It’s not the latest and greatest computer, but I thought at least I could do basic high def video editing.  Apparently I was wrong…

Please keep this in mind if you are thinking about going out and buying a new high definition camcorder.  I never had a single problem with my standard definition camcorder, but like I say the high def footage brings my system to a painful halt.

So when you go out to buy your new camera make sure to factor in the price of a new computer with the package.  I’m not being melodramatic… my wonderful little system that runs Adobe CS3 products and video editing software easily cannot even begin to cope with high def video editing.

Like many wannabe amateur film makers I wandered over to Best Buy a few months ago and stared at the selection of video editing software on display.  I knew I wanted something reasonably powerful, but generally easy to use.  I wanted something I could easily cut, paste and edit videos together with a few bells and whistles.

The packaging for Pinnacle Studio 12 Ultimate caught my eye and I decided to spend the $100+ for the software.

Oh my golly… After putting together 2 30 minute videos with Pinnacle I can say that I darned near wanted to throw my entire computer out the window a few times.  It is frustrating to the point of insanity. 

I would accidentally swipe something with the mouse and all of a sudden the voice track would no longer match up with the video track.  I would spend half an hour editing and then have it all wasted for god knows what reason.  Simply changing the order of clips would nearly send me into a furry.

At the end of the day it does edit videos and you can create good products with it.  But for the love of all that is holy it is a complete pain in the ass to use.