Please excuse my "newbie" enthusiasm to the video world. For the past few months of introducing myself to the Vegas Video program(s) and its capabilities, I've just been in creative heaven! Having been in the audio-only world for the past. . . two decades. . . (Yikes, I'm getting old!). . . it's a pleasant change, and a long-held dream come true. Honestly, I have no other experience with other video editing products other than what Sonic Foundry and the companies that support Sonic Foundry have to offer. (In other words, I don't own other video editing software/hardware for comparison.)

With that said.

SpiceMASTER 2 just adds more cool effects to the video and its transitions. (Boy, does that sound lame! - chuckle!) I appreciate the choices. What made me really happy was that everything worked. Nothing crashed, so far. (And, as always, I say. . . ."So far"!) I experimented only briefly with a picture within a picture and transition effects utilizing the new SpiceMASTER 2 plug-in and was really pleased with the results.

I probably posted this thread too hastily without giving this product more time and attention (only about 8 hours of experimentation so far). The interphase is a bit different than the original SpiceMASTER Deluxe (and SpiceFILTERS vol. 1). It has its own keyframe (and again wildly suggests that you turn off Vegas's own key-frame). Once I became familiar with the newer layout, SpiceMASTER 2 became easy to manage while editing the desired effects. Thankfully, there are a generous number of presets to help the "newbies" like myself!

What was exceedingly exciting was that the SpiceMASTER 2 was free for me. I had purchased the original SpiceMASTER Deluxe in January which made me eligable for the free upgrade.

I'm really freaking happy! :)

I'm not usually so enthusiastic about software and hardware products as a whole. I've spent countless hours. . . days and weeks, actually, . . . tweeking my computer and hardware to accomodate other digital audio/midi recording software. Most of the trouble has been my own learning curve to these products, especially Emagic's Logic Audio Platinum software. It's a knock-out program that offers great audio and midi editing control. The final product, a well sounding recording, is excellent. However, Emagic's program does have one steep learning curve. I now feel quite comfortable with it. . . after about 2 1/2 years of usage.

MOTU products??? ARGGHHH! But once they work, they work wonderfully!

This is not the case with Vegas Video 2, Vegas Video 3, and now Vegas 4.0. Admittedly, I've only been using the Vegas Video 3 (and Vegas 4.0) software for the past 3 months or so. Within the first day of usage, I had a comfortable control with its editing and even its rendering capabilities. I've always been pleased with the end results whether its rendering a small video project for the web page or editing a 2 hour video-taping project for a small community theater.

Happy video making, folks!

Respectfully,

Ted Fiebke, RN
Too Live Nurse