The Spot book is a +10 - read the entire book first - then completely mine this forum for all the details. for perspective.....

Subject: RE: Two years later still disappointed with Vegas Pro
Reply by: Rob Franks
Date: 12/12/2014 8:25:15 PM

"Of special note is how regarded Douglas Spotted Eagle, was in being in the forefront of Vasst, the training videos, and eventually a really good book marketed thru Amazon. "

You found his books good? The last DSE book I bought was for Vegas 8 and it cost me 50 bucks plus tax and shipping. Of course speaking purely on a personal basis, I didn't find it that good. Most of the info was there (except for detailed surround sound work which is mainly why I bought it.... all of maybe 10 or 15 pages of stuff I already new :( ... anyway in spite of that I found it very scattered. Bits and pieces of a subject spread out all over. I ended up jumping all over the book for the scattered info and had to put it all together in my head. It was a bit disappointing.


Reply by: videoITguy
Date: 12/13/2014 6:44:54 AM

RobFranks, your criticism could be justice. But here's the deal, why don't you take a spin at writing a book, or even try creating a video with wide audience appeal that is going to be sold by Amazon worldwide. Yes, yes, I dare you. Try to seek a little income with your venture.

I argue with you, in that you just don't understand broadcasting media ( i.e. mass audience). Everybody today is so hung up on narrowcasting like Utube - that they forget really what it is like to fend for yourself in the mass markets.

Reply by: farss
Date: 12/15/2014 3:30:12 AM

By comparison the DV Rebels Guide is well written and focussed on a specific section of a much bigger topic. In the case of Spot's book as it's about Vegas where there's a lot of ways to get the job done and there's no real "Vegas" workflow then the task is doubly difficult. I'd also add in fairness to Spot that he was trying to fill a hole. apart from the descriptive documentation that comes with Vegas there's nothing else that I know of. There's plenty of excellent books on editing of course but nothing specifically for the Vegas user.

Reply by: Richard Jones
Date: 12/15/2014 4:06:35 AM

Vegas' own Manuals are pretty good (See Support - Manuals above). They can be downloaded or bought already printed (via Lulu) and offer a pretty comprehensive coverage of what Vegas can do. I doubt though whether any Manual could offer total coverage as there is so much going on in Vegas that is requires a wider or more general knowledge of things (e.g colour correction, use of Levels etc. etc).

In fairness to Spot, I found his Manuals (I've got them for Vegas 6 and 8) incredibly helpful when I started this video editing game and still refer to them occasionally. Do remember that the author has to try to cater for all levels of skills and knowledge and that, in some instances, what he writes will be too basic to be of much use to the experienced editor and that, in other cases, he might assume that the reader knows more than he actually does --- as an example, I had difficulty in understanding some of the terms, such as Ripple and others when I first started.

Finally, some of the webinar recordings and other videos available via this site are excellent.