# Which software for video editing?



## niels123 (Nov 22, 2017)

I'm building & installing a new windows 10 pc for my father. I never shoot video, but he occacisonally does shoot in 4K with his 1D X II (birds). What software would you recommend for simple editing these shots? For example adding some background music, cutting a scene, make a fade-in transition, merge two scenes?


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## cayenne (Nov 22, 2017)

niels123 said:


> I'm building & installing a new windows 10 pc for my father. I never shoot video, but he occacisonally does shoot in 4K with his 1D X II (birds). What software would you recommend for simple editing these shots? For example adding some background music, cutting a scene, make a fade-in transition, merge two scenes?



For something that simple, take a look at this:

https://hitfilm.com/express


I think anything else like Adobe Premier (rental) would really be overkill for you....but the 4K thing...that might be a bit tough as that some places their low price or free stuff is HD only, but anyway, give that link above a look.

HTH,

cayenne


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## Neutral (Nov 22, 2017)

After evaluation of multiple options few years back I have chosen Davinci Resolve.
At that time that was version 12 now it is 14.
https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/
For me this is best video grading and editing SW, I tried many of them before I made my final choice
Also it has excellent support for GPUs, and it could use multiple number of video cards simultaneously for heavy video processing tasks thus providing excellent performance.
Could look a bit complicated at the beginning but mastering it not too difficult - there are tons of training videos on different features.


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## LDS (Nov 22, 2017)

niels123 said:


> I'm building & installing a new windows 10 pc for my father. I never shoot video, but he occacisonally does shoot in 4K with his 1D X II (birds). What software would you recommend for simple editing these shots? For example adding some background music, cutting a scene, make a fade-in transition, merge two scenes?



Some other suggestions:

* Adobe Premiere Elements 
* Shotcut
* Corel VideoStudio
* CyberLink PowerDirector
* VSDC Free Video Editor

BlackMagic DaVinci Resolv has a free version (with some limitations), but it's more complex to use and require a good GPU, or may not even start.


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## Neutral (Nov 22, 2017)

Neutral said:


> After evaluation of multiple options few year back I have chosen Davinci Resolve.
> At that time that was version 12 now it is 14.
> https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/
> For me this is best video grading and editing SW, I tried many of them before I made my final choice
> ...



Also in addition to that above:

No Monthly Cloud Licencing
Own for half the cost of a cloud subscription!
Unlike cloud based software, DaVinci Resolve Studio does not require a connection to the internet and there are no monthly subscription fees


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## Boyer U. Klum-Cey (Nov 22, 2017)

Adobe Premiere Elements is OK for quick small projects Reasonably easy to learn, & a decent support forum for typical questions, plus the price doesn't break the bank.

I'm a MAC person, but my expectations for the Windows version would be the same. HD speed & capacity, and memory size are considerations to be addressed as the files can be big, but fortunately the price of each also doesn't break the bank.


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## cayenne (Nov 28, 2017)

Neutral said:


> After evaluation of multiple options few years back I have chosen Davinci Resolve.
> At that time that was version 12 now it is 14.
> https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/
> For me this is best video grading and editing SW, I tried many of them before I made my final choice
> ...



I originally thought about recommending Resolve....but if someone is a true noob...there's quite a steep learning curve with Resolve...that and it is a beastly resource hog...you really gotta have lots of CPU, GPU, RAM and really good fast drives, like having off system SSD disks, etc for caching, etc.

I'm really wanting to get into Resolve 14, but I gotta get a new computer.
Trying to decide if I'm going with loading up a new 5K iMac pro when they come out...or trying to research and do a thread ripper system build.....

I'd want to put Linux on the latter....and while I do sysadmin work for my day job, not sure I wanna spend all the time and resources trying to figure out and tune a linux system to work with Resolve.

I try not to do windows unless I have to......

Anyway....guess I'll go buy my powerball ticket and hope for a winner to get some new computer gear!!!


C


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## Hector1970 (Nov 29, 2017)

I've used Magix for years.
Not sure if its easy to use as I'm on my tenth version so I'm well used to it.
It used to be a bit unstable but the current versions are very good.


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