As far as I am concerned there are no worthy alternatives.

>>>As far as I am concerned there are no worthy alternatives.

I have to agree. Having just spent the last few weeks helping two different friends with Premiere and FCPX, I have to say Vegas is a dream. I own all of the usual suspects including Media Composer 65 and nothing is what I would call "fun" to use, except Vegas. I have been fortunate not to have many of the problems that some others have had with 11 and 12, which might have tainted my opinion of this old friend of mine, Sony Vegas. Love it, don't want to use anything else, period.

Agree about Vegas being my favorite too.

Althouh I am going to look into After Effects for advanced keying and compositing. Not sure if the latest Vegas is equally good for clean keying.
I rather stiick with Vegas than switch between another software during the edit..

Dan, I transitioned from Vegas 11 to FCPX in the last year. I edit ice skating shows using mult-cam. There is no tremendous deadline pressure, but I try to finish a show within 30 days. I got an iMac (i5 21.5" screen) and took my time learning FCPX. I still haven't touched Motion, but I am evaluating Sony Spectra Layers and I bought Sound Forge for the Mac, having used it on Windows for nearly a decade.

This wasn't done from a huge dissatisfaction with Vegas. As you and others have said, it is fast and functional. Windows service packs and version changes took their toll. I build my own computers and have been on a 24-30 month refresh cycle on the hardware, but seemed to get less performance increase each time. It is nice to have the iMac sitting there with no need to fuss with it every few weeks or months. It is quiet. It does other tasks like photo prep, audio ingest cleanly.

When I moved to FCPX, I also went to file based cameras (Canon HF-G10s) so the work flow is faster prepping for an edit. I can burn DVDs and Blu-rays on the iMac or Windows systems. If I wanted to open a legacy project in Vegas, I can still do that.

There are great tutorials and training for both FCPX and Vegas, so learning the new software isn't a huge issue. I had Adobe CS2, 3, 4 and 5 on the Windows system and never seemed to get around to doing a project on it. The Mac was more approachable to me.

Hope this helps. Samples of my stuff at http://vimeo.com/chipgallo

products I tested before settling with Vegas:
http://video-editing-software-review.toptenreviews.com/

THERE IS NO alternative to VegasPro 8.0b version even in products put out by SCS.

However, in reality there are many alternatives to VegasPro 12 and depending on your status of use, you may be forced to go elsewhere.

For Mac, FCPX is improving, but nowhere near where FCP was. It's a good question of what market this serves - so that leaves a lot of confusion. But if you are Mac hobbyist, then it is good to go and will slam SCS in the future.

FOR PROS- you have Adobe in the Clouds and you have Adobe in the Clouds...Avid will die soon!

>>>.Avid will die soon!

Their demise has been rumored for many years, but if you work in the film and tv business in Hollywood that works on deadlines, there is nothing that comes close to the avid workflow, not even in the same universe. I work in the Multicamera sitcom world and the turnaround time and time restrictions (22:38) and script revisions etc etc... no one offers anything that a 10 year old avid system does all day every day. I'm not a fan of using the software since I don't edit stuff in that world, but I work in that world and I talk to the editors all the time and avid just works. Even if the company went out of business today, I can't see anything replacing it, Adobe has light years to go to address the daily workflow issues of most Broadcast TV (and motion picture) editors.

To ddm, your point about Avid's model in the film and tv production business is well taken. BUT, more... we here to say more about business savvy...let's say Avid is the defacto operation in the top 200 pro shops. The fact that they don't make expenses and are unable to re-invest their systems development for the future even from this base of customer....then, business protocol spells disaster.

Same applies to SCS, if they can't get it together, for even the hobbyist NLE systems out there - the expenses are simply going to overwhelm their operation and their future in the market.

... but if you work in...

And there's the rub. It really depends on what you're doing with the software. For example, Vegas has no concept of a "project". Some other NLEs do and this might make them a bit more natural for feature length or even episodic projects.

It might be handy to have this sort of comparison in a chart since you might not otherwise know which NLE might be best for what you're doing without climbing a steep learning curve.

Rob

>>>we here to say more about business savvy

I agree, I'm never surprised when a company with decent to great products goes bust due to bad management or some other poor business decision, but Avid is quite successful in several major areas. ProTools is the absolute standard in most of the world for audio production, there, they really have no major competition. They make some impressive hardware as well. None of that guarantees that they can't collapse, they very well may have spent too much money trying to expand etc. But, if they did soon fail there would be a huge gap that no one on the horizon is even close to filling. I would not be surprised to see some sort of industry consortium form to keep the software in it's present form alive for a good long time.

Windows service packs and version changes took their toll. I build my own computers and have been on a 24-30 month refresh cycle on the hardware, but seemed to get less performance increase each time. It is nice to have the iMac sitting there with no need to fuss with it every few weeks or months.

Disabling updates & not downloading driver updates would do the same thing.

I'm perfectly happy sticking with V9. Was with V7 for many years, but moved to 9 for AVCHD capability (which I don't use at present) and Elastique (which I use constantly). No black frame issue, software is very stable. It runs on XPpro sp3, I've disabled updates from the beginning. Antivirus is the free Avast. System surfs the web, runs my webserver 24/7, does everything in addition to video/audio editing. No issues, it just runs.

Based on my experience I'd conclude you certainly don't need Mac to get stability and you don't need MS updates to get safety. And I can't imagine why I'd switch to an alternative NLE unless it was to conform to a house standard.

Avid is still used by most broadcast studios and heavy weight editors that I know and work with, but you need to outlay some serious tom to set up an Avid studio and you need to get all the add on hardware as well.

Avid allows you to reorganize clips in the bin that is sequence the clips then drop them on the timeline I am not sure if Vegas 12 can do this, but this process saves you a lot of time.

Could you produce content with Vegas that can match Avid? absolutely in fact it will do some things quicker so overall what you get for your bucks Sony Vegas wins hands down.

You have some limited ways to reorder clips before dragging them to the timeline. You can sort them alphabetically or by timecode (ahem) or by any of the other columns in the detailed view.

Vegas will also pay attention to the order in which you selected clips. So if I had Clips 1-19 sorted by name, and then ctrl-clicked clip 19 and then clip 15 and dragged them to the timeline they'd get dropped in the order I clicked them.

I don't see a way to reorder things in thumbnail view, which I guess everyone but me uses. That'd be a nice feature because you could create a kind of pseudo storyboard that way.

One thing that I think Avid probably does well is to support facilities with lots of seats and common media libraries. If you need a workflow like this where you have a common library and a talent chain (editor, compositor, audio finisher, colorist, review...) then I think Avid might better support you than Vegas.

Vegas is good for an overnight bivouac, Avid might be better when you need a permanent camp for a large group.

Rob

My point about avid is not that it is "better" than Vegas, I much prefer Vegas over Media Composer, I own both but the only time I ever use Avids software is when I have to check compatibility or submit something we shot on a smaller camera to post production so they don't have to bother with what to do with some odd format, although Media Composer is very friendly to all kinds of codecs, it's usually a problem dealing with the assistant editor who does all the prep work, if he doesn't know how to import P2 footage or 5D footage, it comes back to us, which is never what you want, make it easy and fast. If I have a Post Production supervisor who knows what he wants I give him what he wants, if there's a doubt, I convert it into something that's a complete no-brainer.

Another thing that gets overlooked is the talent pool of editors out there. There are so many highly skilled avid editors, and I'm not saying that any other editor is not skilled enough to deliver what these people are capable of delivering, lets take a simple 4 camera sitcom, on the surface it seems like an easy thing to edit, I would kill for the type of footage that a typical sitcom gets to work with. 4 highly skilled camera operators, all footage already color corrected, multiple takes from all angles. Who couldn't edit that? I've sat in on some of those sessions and I marvel at the skill... the speed... the effortlessness of a good editor in that situation. And the software, fuggetaboutit, all 17 takes of that one line in the script from all four cameras, cut out two lines, but now everyones on the couch, what? We're 4 and a half minutes LONG on a 22:40 show. It is a specialty, fun to watch, but I would never want to do that type of editing, and talk about pressure, you got ALL of the heavyweights breathing down your neck, the producers, writers, director the line producer worrying about costs, no thanks.

That's the world that Avid owns and no one else offers really anything close to that particular set of tools for that particular group of editors. None, Zero, nada. It's hard to contemplate them not being around, there is nothing that can step in, at this point to fill the void, the software would live on for quite a while, it would have to.

I have no plans to leave Vegas, but if I was, this is what I would be most likely to consider:

http://www.lwks.com/

I looked at the tutorial videos for Light Works. Awful software!!!

If that was the only NLE available I would sell my equipment and do something else.

DDM, I'm fascinated by the world of professional video editing (by "professional" I mean where large budgets are involved).

When you speak of time constraints and people getting panicky, is it because of the need to go from show performance to air in a matter of days, or is it because edit suites are expensive and only a limited number of hours are budgeted?

Also, how often does it happen that something goes kablooey and delivery is delayed while people are swapping boxes and plug-in boards?

So I've been playing around with some other NLEs
Oy vey!
Lightworks!
How many steps for a simple transition?
That would drive me nuts.
Same with FCPX.
Like editing with a twenty pound mouse!
I don't know any other NLEs, and I don't want to learn another if I don't have to.
I can only recall one time when I lost a job because I was wasn't editing with FCP.
Comes down to this my converted brethren: Sony Vegas is fun, easy and fast.
And I'm at the point where I don't care who doesn't know or understand this amazing editing software.
Our secret, their loss.
Avid Schamvid.
I've edited with it, once removed as a news writer, over the shoulder stuff.
Confused the hell out of me.
Lets face it,... it's what you know and what you are comfortable with and what makes you money in the end.
Sexier NLE,...at my age I don't think so.
Think I'll stay in my long term relationship.
Stand up and be counted in the fight against NLEs that dull down the joy of creativity.
That enough?
Thank you.
.

[I]"How many steps for a simple transition?"[/I]

And that's why no one in the editing world takes us here seriously :(

Bob.

it all depends on what you're doing, whether you're doing it on your own, and whether whatever you're using does what you need it to do....

vegas isn't after effects, so i use after effects when i need to - otherwise i'm a very happy vegemite, apart from when thinks go belly up or white screen, but those symptoms are not just vegas related - EVERY nle i've ever worked with (starting out with dynatechs emc through media 100, avid, etc.,) has crashed at some stage, either from known bugs, or from reasons entirely inexplicable in this dimension.

there's a plethora of alternatives to vegas, if you're curious enough download a trial and waste some time and energy seeing if it suits YOUR needs...

btw. if i did change nle it would be a backwards step to edius....

> And that's why no one in the editing world takes us here seriously :(

This forum needs a "like" button! Bob, you have been a roll lately!