Dad and I recently edited a 25-year video retrospective for the Westar Institute, and this has garnered dad the opportunity to do more video editing for them. The art director who’d been doing the job says he uses Final Cut Express, which is a Mac program. But dad is Winders/Linux. The main thing he needs to be able to do is sync to videos using their audio tracks so that he can cut to one camera when someone walks in front of/behind a speaker or get close-ups from time to time. We both use Pinnacle Studios, which has been sufficient for YouTube videos and the 25-year retrospective. And it may be sufficient for this style of editing – we haven’t tried it yet. He’s been informed that he’d be reimbursed for software expenses, so we could buy something if Pinnacle won’t suffice.
So, you budding directors out there, what would you suggest? Adobe Premiere Pro? Avid? Anything else?
I use Pinnacle Studio on my PC. You can do the technique you’re talking about with it (Actually known as using “B-roll”. The A-roll is your interview, and B-roll is any environmental shots you take for atmosphere, that you use to fill in where you don’t want to show your interviewee.) I tried a bunch of different video editors and Pinnacle was the one that worked the best. It is a resource hog, though, so if your computer isn’t powerful enough (like my laptop on the cruise) it will completely bog down.
As someone who uses Windows Movie Maker… Don’t use Windows Movie Maker 😛 (Witness the unhelpful advice! Woo!)