Video Editing What Is Your Opinion? Help Me!

Yeah, id go PC, i use to be an apple fan untill people showed me that a PC can be faster! I love Adobe and its line of Programs. Priemiere Pro and After Effects 6, plus Photoshop , Encore, and Audtion. I suggest those since they work soo well togetheer and its a whole package!

John

check out Sonic Foundry: Vegas Video 4.0, similar to the Adobe line. Great product with a small learning curve

I just landed a copy of Adobe's video collection (Santa has been really nice to me this Christmas ) and stuck the training video into my DVD - holely molely - talk about options.

I am waiting on my second drive to arrive before I load this sw up but it looks like a steep learning curve however once you are there it does look very well integrated. Besides I got an academic licence for it so it was half to a quarter the cost of anything else around.

Tried macs, tried PCs...I'm stickin' with the PCs. I use Premiere Pro and Vegas Video for any video editing. I've always been an Adobe fan, and Premiere Pro is just awesome compared to previous versions...but Vegas has its highlights, so I end up using both.

Apples final cut is supposed to be very good, but I cannot say that I have ever used it. I was trained on adobe premiere and that is what I know mostly.. its awesome and rather powerful.. but has some quirks. I have yet to try the new version tho... so we'll see. Avid is also awesome and basicly as powerful as you get, the problem with avid is that is has an ultra steep learning curve. Adobe is actually not too hard too learn. I can teach most people how to do pretty decent video editing within about 2 hours... actually I think my whole block of instruction was like 16 hours max... the thing with premier is that its designed similar to other adobe products, you have layers<tracks>, and filters. By figuring out what filter and or cropping needs be done, you can do a whole bunch of stuff. Masking and blue screening is easy as pie too, hell you can even export alias lightwave animation with cues to after effects and add computer animation if you have the time and guts to do it. Motion is simplistic, but can be manipulated well if you spend time and plan.

G-Man-
I assume you've been to http://www.avid.com/cgi/forumscgi/fo...=45&LastLogin= and have read what the users of Express Pro have to say - some aren't too complimentary, but then again, you don't hear as often from users who aren't having any problems.
As to whether to go with a Mac or a PC, I'm sure you'll find as many biased people here on sagerforums as you will on the mac forums, so we're probably not much help in that regard. As to which PC editing system to use, I'd agree with Steve, that Adobe Premier Pro is probably the biggest bang for the buck, especially if you plan on doing work mainly on your own projects.
However, if your aim is to eventually make your living as a freelance video editor or in the broadcast industry, then I'd have to say Avid is the way to go. Even with the in-roads FCP has made, and even if FCP is better than Avid Express Pro (that's debateable), Avid is still the de facto broadcast industry leader. And that's mainly because of its sophisticated higher-end products aimed at broadcasters and the film industry, as well as the huge number of Avid systems now in use when compared to other NLEs. As has been stated, the learning curve on the Avid is steeper than the rest because it is a more complex system, but once you've learned on the Express Pro you've at least got the fundamentals of learning on even more sophisticated Avid systems and, hopefully, some interesting work in the industry.

That was well put Bob .
It certainly cleared up a few questions I had about the position of various products in the market. Thanks for the input.

Ease up on the caps lock dude.
It was getting a bit loud there for a while .

G-man-
I think you're on the right track with Adobe, especially if you've got $800 for the Professional Video Collection which includes Premiere Pro, After Effects Pro, Audition, Encore, and even Photoshop CS. Keep in mind that these products also work with Avid's Express Pro which you could always get at a later date. Hop over to a site like www.studica.com for the details.