Like Reel Director, but for a Windows Laptop?

August 19, 2011 6:17 PM

I need suggestions for a video editor for work. Issues are: many formats, and I don't think the boss will go for buying me an iPad, which would be my first choice.

I work for a nonprofit. We have lots of video floating around, taken on a variety of different machines (so: .mov files from iphones, Flip video files, movies taken with other cameras that may or may not be in .avi format). I have Reel Director for iPhone (and love it) but I'm sick of trying to edit on the tiny screen and it's not possible to get the Flip files (whatever format they are) onto the phone easily.

So: any recommendations for something that will a) operate on a windows machine, b) that will allow me to integrate all these different source videos, and c) that is as simple to use as Reel Director?

I won't say money is no object, but we'd be willing to invest some money in decent software. As I said, my preference would be to just run Reel Director on an iPad, but that's not going to fly, so the cost would need to be somewhat less than a bottom of the line iPad.

posted by anastasiav to Computers & Internet (4 answers total)

A bottom-of-the-line iPad is $499. I haven't used Reel Director, so I can't really comment on direct feature comparisons, but there are plenty of options in that price range.

As far as editing goes, Pinnacle Studio HD is $69 on their online store. When I was in film school, I cut a ski video for some friends on a 2004-era Pinnacle package. It didn't compare with what I'm used to in terms of features or interface (Final Cut Pro and Avid Media Composer) but it was pretty easy to use and capable enough, and would probably be "friendlier" to an editor who didn't want all the complexity. I'm not sure re: importing video sources though. There are plenty of command-line tools that can convert video (a quick google found me this free tool, Avanti which seems reasonable.

If you want a bit more power and complexity, you can go to Avid Studio HD for $169. I don't have direct experience with Avid Studio HD, but it looks about on par with Final Cut Express (which I know) and seems pretty approachable, though definitely more complex than Reel Director.

Adobe Premiere Pro is $399 on Amazon right now, too. That's probably overkill for what you're doing, but it's a respectable little editing package, if you want to spend the dollars and take on the learning curve. Honestly, it ain't bad, and you'll have plenty of room to grow.
posted by Alterscape at 7:16 PM on August 19, 2011

Sony Vegas has done good stuff for me - easy to learn the basics and plenty more to explore. I've no experience with Reel Director to compare.
posted by anadem at 9:01 PM on August 19, 2011

Adobe Premiere Elements is about $70 and is actually fairly powerful for simple video editing. I like it a lot better than iMovie on my Mac, but they also have a Windows version.
posted by DMan at 9:18 PM on August 19, 2011

Premiere elements for the price Premiere Pro CS5 if you can afford it.
posted by jmsta at 11:08 AM on August 20, 2011