Anyone who focuses on tools or brands is either insecure or chasing status in my eyes. Who cares what you use if it works for you?

Keep going @chell 💪

If VEGAS Pro works for you, then keep using it.

Vegas Pro 23 has been reworked in the whole video engine. So, it is a brandnew actual version now.

I never found any video editing software even half as fast and intuitive as Vegas. I'm stoked to be back with it.

Hopefully the underlying paradigm and design of it never changes into something stodgy and slow like other software.

I never found any video editing software even half as fast and intuitive as Vegas. I'm stoked to be back with it.

Hopefully the underlying paradigm and design of it never changes into something stodgy and slow like other software.

Gonna have to second that. I've tried davinci, and I was forced to work w/ premiere and ae for a few clients since it was the only way to get the job. (descrimination if u ask me lmao)

Davinci is great, but the node editing melted my brain. Prem, meanwhile, has always run horribly for me. It eats my CPU and memory, and the optimization for Boris FX plugins within premiere and ae is near non existent. Never mind how much they charge for it.

Vegas (and davinci tbh) genuinely seem to be overtaking prem in terms of.. mostly everything. If we're including ae, perhaps, vector motion graphics, 3d stuff; being able to link things from blender, yadda yadda and honestly, rotobrush (Smart mask 2.0 needs some work) - I normally use mocha's ML assist for roto anyway so it doesn't effect me, but yeah. Vegas is fast and intuitive and i can't see myself switching, ever.

At one point I decided to try Davinci Resolve (aka "the industry standard").  
Over time I became annoyed with its performance and workflow. It ate all my VRAM and crashed the GPU driver, simple effects such as Pan/Crop required too many steps to use and the timeline would often mess up, especially when deleting en event.
But one day, it just gave me a big fat no and refused to launch, right when I needed to do an important project.

Then I saw Vegas on sale and decided to buy it. It worked right out of the box.
Plug-In Chainer, ProType Titler, versatile effects, transitions, generators and rendering options are a bliss.
  
Sure, it has its fair share of bugs and crashes, but my experience has been positive so far.

At one point I decided to try Davinci Resolve (aka "the industry standard").  
Over time I became annoyed with its performance and workflow. It ate all my VRAM and crashed the GPU driver, simple effects such as Pan/Crop required too many steps to use and the timeline would often mess up, especially when deleting en event.
But one day, it just gave me a big fat no and refused to launch, right when I needed to do an important project.

Then I saw Vegas on sale and decided to buy it. It worked right out of the box.
Plug-In Chainer, ProType Titler, versatile effects, transitions, generators and rendering options are a bliss.
  
Sure, it has its fair share of bugs and crashes, but my experience has been positive so far.

I've heard the same from a few Davinci editors actually, though I don't think I used it enough to have that experience myself. It just felt so over complicated to do the most simple of things.

I've had issues with Vegas over the years but once I've sorted out my preferences and optimised things for my workstation I rarely get crashes or bugs anymore, at least with 22.

How long ago did you make the switch? How're you finding it thus far?

IMO, there is a substantial difference between Resolve and Vegas Pro in both their methods of use and target markets. Resolve is clearly designed and marketed for feature film and TV production by virtue of its departmentalised process tabs (media, cut, edit, fusion, color, fairlight and deliver) and that departmentalisation has long been promoted by BMD DaVinci in their advertising/promotions where specialist teams concentrate on their specialty (i.e. a 'cut' editor doesn't do 'fusion' editing) - each area of the production is edited by different teams - not dissimilar to feature film production in the days before digital. This is where DaVinci highlight collaboration and cloud.

On the other hand, Vegas Pro is way more usable for smaller or single producers/creators - like me - because most editing/FXing is available from the one timeline without having to switch between process tabs. Long live Vegas Pro!

Personally, I use Resolve as a stand-alone program (as I do with Mercalli 5 SAL) for some editing tasks. But node editing is a stretch too far. In one of Resolve's excellent training videos a couple of years ago, the node structure needed to create the desired effect in their example Fusion task seemed something like the structure needed to create some miraculous medical discovery.

Over twenty years ago, I tried a Premiere Pro 5 (I think it was 5) trial from a DVD disk. For a complete newbie with NLE editing at the time - I disliked it because it was clunky and unintuitive to use. Back then I went with consumer level but very limited ULead Video Studio - it was user friendly. Then I moved over to Vegas Pro and have been very happy ever since.

@chell
I switched to Vegas in March 2024 and I have been very happy ever since. It runs smoothly even on my weaker system and supports everything I need. I mostly use it for work (not related to film or TV production), studying and random stuff, so my projects are not too complicated.
Fun Fact: My Panasonic camera (HC-V230) actually uses AVCHD as its main format, and its native support in Vegas is a bliss.

I also purchased Sound Forge along with it a few months later to use the integration & because I got fed up with Audacity (aka "the industry standard").

@alexavil see, that's the one thing I love about Vegas. prior to buying a new PC, I was stuck to editing on a laptop and it allowed me to do all of these crazy timelines despite lacking performance. I could not do this in prem or davinci, it would literally die. Even with my current set up, prem struggles with more than 10 tracks, and it dies the moment sapphire, continuum and mocha are drawn into the equation. People joke about Vegas crashing all of the time but I edit 12 hours per day and I rarely see a crash.

Is that one of those camcorders? Man, I've wanted to try out one of those for yonks. we got a sony alpha 7s iii but it's so bulky and all of the footage is way too polished and professional. we ended up getting one of those smaller sony cams, sony zv1 ii but the battery life was horrible, it kept over heating and my phone camera ended up producing much nicer shots. Is panasonic any good for more filmic/analog stuff or easier to work with?

I've been thinking about trying out Sound Forge as I've been using Audacity for a decade and I still struggle with the janky interface and controls. It's easy to use and get what I need but something integrated would be brilliant. Once you try it out please let me know how it is!

IMO, there is a substantial difference between Resolve and Vegas Pro in both their methods of use and target markets. Resolve is clearly designed and marketed for feature film and TV production by virtue of its departmentalised process tabs (media, cut, edit, fusion, color, fairlight and deliver) and that departmentalisation has long been promoted by BMD DaVinci in their advertising/promotions where specialist teams concentrate on their specialty (i.e. a 'cut' editor doesn't do 'fusion' editing) - each area of the production is edited by different teams - not dissimilar to feature film production in the days before digital. This is where DaVinci highlight collaboration and cloud.

On the other hand, Vegas Pro is way more usable for smaller or single producers/creators - like me - because most editing/FXing is available from the one timeline without having to switch between process tabs. Long live Vegas Pro!

Personally, I use Resolve as a stand-alone program (as I do with Mercalli 5 SAL) for some editing tasks. But node editing is a stretch too far. In one of Resolve's excellent training videos a couple of years ago, the node structure needed to create the desired effect in their example Fusion task seemed something like the structure needed to create some miraculous medical discovery.

Over twenty years ago, I tried a Premiere Pro 5 (I think it was 5) trial from a DVD disk. For a complete newbie with NLE editing at the time - I disliked it because it was clunky and unintuitive to use. Back then I went with consumer level but very limited ULead Video Studio - it was user friendly. Then I moved over to Vegas Pro and have been very happy ever since.

@Dexcon I often watch another editor friend of mine while he works on his projects and I work on mine. I'll normally throw his stream up on my other monitor. I gotta say, you're right about the process tabs. We work for similar content creators and thus, similar editing styles - but watching his process broke my brain. From one tab, to the next, to the next. I was always wondering why the process was so convuluted. I didn't know it was intended more-so for teams than individuals which is now making much more sense to me now. Thanks for the knowledge!

Have you ever used silhouette standalone? I wonder if Davinci works similarly to their node based system integrated w/ boris suite plugins? Might look into that but I do remember it being more 'individual' when I played around with it.

Premiere Pro 5! Can't imagine how much it has changed since then. How long ago did you start using Vegas? Perhaps the lack of change with the Vegas UI has made me too comfortable. Vegas was the first software I used after Windows Movie Maker in what I think was 2009. The consistency with each version has helped me to know this program better than I know myself at this point. Somehow I'm still learning something new every day.

How do you feel about VP23 and the new visual look. I really like it, honestly. It's slightly modernized, a bit more visually appealing and the custom docking locations have been an absolute game changer for me. I don't need to use a vertical monitor for my tall timelines anymore! Yippie!

@chell ...

Have you ever used silhouette standalone?

No, I've never used Silhouette at all. But BorisFX's Particle Illusion (OFX plugin) uses nodes.

How long ago did you start using Vegas?

I got ULead Video Studio (it may have been an SE version) which came with a Panasonic MiniDv camera back in 2003 - the camera was Panasonic's first 16:9 domestic offering. Video Studio had a massive track allowance of 6 video tracks and 2 audio tracks but the audio track availability rose to 3 with the next version. After editing a few projects over the years (there weren't many projects at the time), it became apparent that my editing needs exceeded Video Studio's capabilities. That's when I purchased Sony Vegas Pro 10.

How do you feel about VP23 and the new visual look. I really like it ...

Ditto. Like you, the freedom to adjust the L, R and bottom frames to allow for even more custom window docking is excellent. Further, with the new video engine, I'm getting excellent playback on the timeline with GoPro 5.3K 25fps video and even with 8K Samsung S23 Ultra video - based on limited testing so far,

I am off on my next overseas trip at the end of the week so I'll be shooting in those higher settings confident that Vegas Pro 23 should handle them with ease.

@Dexcon

Absolutely spoiled with a whole 6 video tracks! I'm not even sure what I'd do with three audio tracks, let alone two. I think you made the right choice with switching, haha!

My playback has also been great for the most part, and I finally feel like Vegas is properly utilizing my GPU. I have had some issues on and off though to be honest, so I'm sticking to VP22 for the majority of my big projects until the bugs are fixed. That ProRes color management bug would've made it impossible.

Speaking of BorisFX, do you use Sapphire and BCC+ regularly? I'm wondering if it's just me, but I've been having some issues with effects functioning slightly differently. S_spotlight, for example --- In 22, if I place a spot light on a prores 4444 file (Roto of a person or such) - it would apply without issue. In 23, it seems to mess with the alpha channel and transparency ceases to exist. I've had some bugs with warpchroma and some other sapphire effects I use on the regular but i can ony replicate them sometimes. It's made my workflow impossible sadly so gotta live without the new features for the time being. ):

Have you had any issues with 23 outside of performance?

@chell ...

Sorry but I can't assist with Sapphire because i've not used it not even a trial version. With BorisFX, I've long had BCC and Mocha Pro, the latter being mainly used for some stabilisation tasks (especially where splines can better define the focus of stabilisation unaffected by other elements in the video that distract and confuse other stabilisers which process the entire image) as well as the Remove module which can often magically remove unwanted moving objects from a static video image (lots of caveats though).

BCC and BCC+ are usually used to develop "creative" stylised intros for travelogues - but they are only done from time-to-time. Otherwise, BCC is mostly used to assist with color grading especially using the Mocha feature in Brightness & Contrast and Saturation to better target specific areas of the image that need adjustment, something that Shadows/Midtones/Highlights in the CGP can't quite do as well especially, say, if not all highlights in the image need to be lowered.

Other than a bit of current testing in VP23, I'm not doing much editing at the moment while preparing for our upcoming travels. While away, I will be assembling the days shoot on a VP23 timeline and will then see how performance goes as the project increases into hours of basic media. Once back home in mid-October, it will be then time for the editing to begin.

@Dexcon Yeah, I love continuum. Great plugin, BCC+ and sapphire have been great tools for color grading and special effects. Mocha (roto and tracking) are my specialty and I loooove the program. Been using the Boris suite for years now and I don't think I'd be able to do what I do without it - hence my disappointment with the bugs in 23! Hopefully it'll be fixed with a patch in the near future!

Can't help but be curious - what are you shooting? I hope you enjoy your travels!

@chell ...

... what are you shooting?

Totally tourist-type stuff - the start off destination (the wonderful island-city-state of Singapore), the cruise ship back to Australia and the shore excursions along the way.

I don't put too much on YouTube, but the following is from Copenhagen 2 years ago.

The few other videos on my YT channel (Dexcon) are mostly of heritage steam and early suburban electric trains that occasionally travel along my local suburban line in Melbourne (sadly none for quite some time now).

Elsewhere in theworld, heritage steam trains are huge in the UK these days, and the back story on how they got saved from destruction during the1960s is most fortuitous.

@Dexcon Ahh! I love this stuff. Haven't been back to the UK in yonks, but there's much to see and really rich history throughout. I think my hat comes off to Vienna, though. Beautiful city, insane history, great museums, all that. I might take a little gander of what you do have on your channel. Been all over West Europe and the Balkans, but I've never been to south-east asia. Maybe that'll be my next stop, eh? I hope you enjoy it!

On my end, I've been practicing my compositing lately (when I have time between client work) - trying to put various actors in other shows/movies - getting the lighting right, clean roto, all of that. I love it. Super satisfying! It really tickles my brain when I manage to fit somebody into a scene and it looks just right. Vegas for life!

I think the last one I did was Walter White from breaking bad in the Grand Theft Auto 6 trailer.

 I think my hat comes off to Vienna, though. Beautiful city, insane history, great museums, all that.

@chell ... I was in Vienna on 31 Dec 24 and New Year's Day this year so saw lots of NY fireworks. But during the afternoon on 1 January in the city centre, the temperature was something like -4 C with a feels-like of -7 C. Being NY's day, there was no warmth to be found in a department store because they were all closed, but I had a super-excellent hot chocolate in a coffee shop on Karntner Strasse up near St Stephens. BTW, I've visited Vienna twice before but during warmer weather - it is a terrific city - and the Sisi Museum at the Hofburg Palace is brilliant.

London and Paris are absolute favorites, but elsewhere in Europe my favorite city is without doubt Zurich - and Switzerland in general.

@chell

> prior to buying a new PC, I was stuck to editing on a laptop and it allowed me to do all of these crazy timelines despite lacking performance. I could not do this in prem or davinci, it would literally die.

My thoughts exactly, Resolve would also mess with my sound devices (I have both speakers and headphones, but sometimes it would complain the sound device is missing).

> Is that one of those camcorders?

It's a small camcorder that I got many moons ago (about ~2015-ish). It films in AVCHD (*.mts) by default, but you can also use *.mp4. It's only 10 megapixels so it might not be so advanced by today's standards, but it outputs in 1920x1080, 25fps interlaced and it can do up to 90x/3000x Zoom. It came with its own piece of software called Panasonic HD Writer LE that allowed you to manage the recordings, but Vegas can detect AVCHD-formatted SD Cards and will bring up the Device Explorer, which will allow you to browse and import the footage.

Note: AVCHD uses AC-3 as it's audio codec, so make sure you have the decoder.

> I've been thinking about trying out Sound Forge as I've been using Audacity for a decade and I still struggle with the janky interface and controls. It's easy to use and get what I need but something integrated would be brilliant.

I had a few issues with Audacity that made me switch to Sound Forge:

• It would often fail to detect my audio devices.
• The default effects are not real-time, so applying something like noise reduction is too janky.
• It would sometimes freeze and crash during recording or while making edits.

Once you download SF, you'll notice it operates in a similar way to Vegas. You'll find many familiar options and features, including the Plug-in Chainer. Keep in mind that SF is not a multi-track editor, but it's fine for individual files, and you can open multiple data windows/tabs.
Vegas can detect an installation of SF automatically so you should be able to use "Open (Copy) in Audio Editor" straight away, make your changes your changes, then save and it will be reflected in Vegas. I prefer using copies because I can start over in case of an error.

There are some features which I particularly like in it:

• It can work with *.mp4 without any plugins or ffmpeg.
• It can play whatever sound data you have in your clipboard and show you information about it (View > Clipboard > Contents/Play).
• You can copy data, then create a new data window from it (Ctrl-S, then Ctrl-E).
• Most effects are real-time, so you can preview them and make changes on the fly.

Overall, I'm happy with it.

Just an update that Vegas is working pretty smooth so far. Missed this GUI a ton, it's like returning home.

@chell Wonderful... Keep fighting on Chell, you are not alone in this. I've been defending this gem from 2004, lol

... relic from a bygone age? ... vegas in 2025???" "is that SONY vegas?!" "Why don't you just use prem like everyone else? it's the industry standard."

Perhaps you should remind them that 'prem' dates back to 1991 ...