Video Software

[MatEvo]

The last broads video I posted on youtube was back in 2007, but I made the decision this holiday to dust off the camera and get some footage. My next question is what software are people using to create online videos that doesn't cost the earth. Also where can I get music that is approved by youtube as most of it will have to be to music as everyone on the boat always decided to talk when I hit record.

[DAVIDH]

Sure you'll get many answers, but I use Shotcut, which is free and open source, so many people collaborate on it. I've found it quite easy to use, especially so since discovering there are many short video tutorials on how to accomplish a single task that might not be so intuitive. It does all the usual stuff with a timeline. You can zoom in to parts of the video, add slow motion, fade clips and audio in and out, titles etc. Probably lots more that I'm still to discover. I used it to make the 4 minute video I put up recently. As regards music, I'll let others offer their advice, but there's a lot of  royalty free music here: https://www.bensound.com/royalty-free-music/electronica

 

[FairTmiddlin]

Just google You tube music. There are thousands of tracks, all approved by you tube.

[SwanR]

I use iMovie to edit all of mine. Music copyright seems to have become more of an issue on YouTube. The page where you could search and check copyright status was being removed. YouTube’s reasoning included that a lot of people upload their videos as private to start with and then check whether any copyright issues are flagged. I’m not looking to monetise my channel and the tracks I use often come up as simply that all ad revenue will go to the copyright holder. As such I’ve carried on using music I own and keep mostly to artists that I’ve used before with no problems. 

[HEM]

We started off using Pinnacle back in 2003 when we bought a second-hand digital CAMcorder (not HD back in those days) using miniDV tapes.

In 2014 we "upgraded" to a HD Camcorder (Panasonic HC-V727) & needed new PC & new software.  Since our son had used Adobe Premiere Elements (PE) for some school project we moved to that (version 14).  This has served our needs up to now when I just got a new PC & have thus moved to PE 2021 (recently released).

The support from Adobe (from the sub-continent) such as it exists is minimal but there is a pretty good user-to-user forum which has solved some issues I have & given a number of tips which I have used.

A number of people report trouble with the "green line " or "purple haze" syndromes which appear to be related to the driver versions of certain graphic cards.  SInce PE does not really use the graphics engine its best to have a good CPU & not really invest in a graphics card (my PC uses the simple graphics within the CPU).  PE seems to use multiple cores / threads well when rendering.

A hint: although some video editting tools (including PE) offer the ability to export a completed video direct to YouTube its advisable to export to MP4 file on your PC, verify that its what you want & then you YouTube to upload.  Since YouTube (& others) keep changing their interfaces direct export usually ceases working after a time.

Bottom line: Video editting software is like with cars - you only have trouble with the one that you own!

I have a number of videos on YouTube - either travel (USA, UK, Mallorca/Ibiza) or flying...

[oldgregg]

I used to love Pinnacle Studio, it was great for quickly capturing, editing and then outputting your videos (often back to DV, remember those days?). The recent versions are a very different product, though.

It depends whether you're a Windows or Mac user, but I guess Premiere Elements or Premiere Rush would be quite good options nowadays. I have iMovie but have never actually used it. It's popular, though, and likely to be quite intuitive.

[HEM]

1 hour ago, oldgregg said:

I used to love Pinnacle Studio, it was great for quickly capturing, editing and then outputting your videos (often back to DV, remember those days?). The recent versions are a very different product, though.

I believe at one stage they fired / let go / <whatever> the development team & restarted with fresh (=cheaper) developers.

Quote

It depends whether you're a Windows or Mac user, but I guess Premiere Elements or Premiere Rush would be quite good options nowadays.

Premiere Elements runs on both.  For users of PE its a "must" to join the forum for advice:
https://community.adobe.com/t5/premiere-elements/bd-p/premiere-elements

Steve Grisetti of Muvipix.com gives a free 8-part Basic Training for Premiere Elements 2021

 

[SwanR]

1 hour ago, oldgregg said:

I have iMovie but have never actually used it. It's popular, though, and likely to be quite intuitive.

Anything I have wanted to know I have Googled and found the answer. Seems to work fine for editing my clips, adding titles and transitions, adding music as it pulls in my iTunes library and then exporting a decent quality file. I found the export to YouTube didn’t seem to work so always save to the Movies folder on my Mac and check it plays ok. 

[grendel]

I use either video pad or virtual dub for basic video editing

[Oddfellow]

Davinchi Resolve is incredible and free.

 

[catcouk]

I can't rate ShotCut highly enough. Very similar to the super expensive software I used at Uni. It is a bit fiddly though - not as straight forward as movie maker. However, as already said, there are loads of tutorials online.

[floydraser]

I've always used Microsoft Movie Maker simply because it was free and easy to use. I am aware though, that MS are not supporting it anymore so I'll be looking at some of the suggestions above for a replacement so thanks for starting this thread! 

I had a warning about music copyright once when I included in-car video crossing the England/Scotland border on the M6. Status Quo were rockin all over the World (or something) on the radio and their automated software picked it up. They didn't mind though and told me I could leave it in as it wasn't the main feature I guess.

Buy an instument a learn how to play your own music? Now may be a good time....

[BryanW]

12 hours ago, FreedomBoatingHols said:

Davinchi Resolve is incredible and free.

 

I'll second that and available for Mac or PC, bit of a learning curve though.

I use Final Cut Pro (Mac only) but it is pricey, on a Mac I would probably use iMovie if I wanted free software but I have had FCP for a long time now and got it at a good price.

For music I use "https://incompetech.com/music/" but it can be a little repetitive.