It's true you don't "need" the Trimmer for editing but it's such a useful tool that I would never be without it and do a large portion of my editing from within that Window.. It's a matter of personal preference I know!

Richard

The first thing I do with any version of Movie Studio is "nest" the trimmer window with the preview window. This will give you two tabs under the window so it is easy to select whichever window you desire.

Next, in Preferences, I choose to use double-click to send clips to the trimmer, rather than the timeline.

Therefore, when you select a new clip to use in a project, you can drag it to the timeline or double-click to send it to the trimmer for pre-editing. I do ninety-nine percent of my trimming in the trimmer, but I am almost always working on short clips, unless I have filmed a performance or ceremony.

I do most of my editing in the camcorder by choosing what and how long to shoot. The main thing I do is shoot a few seconds before and after what I think I'll want is the finished project, to have some room for fades or transitions, if needed. Likewise, with pans and zooms, I shoot a few static seconds on each end. The more you edit in the camera, the less you need to do at the computer.

I know editors who have never used a trimmer. I could not live without one. It all depends on how you work, starting with how you shoot your video.

Hope this helps.

My shooting almost all tends to be long form events or performances so i'm rarely assembling, dicing, & slicing a bunch of clips. Still though, even on the rare occasion i do multiple pieces i never found the trimmer to be as easy as doing the editing on the timeline.

Jillian reminded me of a case where someone else shot their kids' play and asked me to edit. She was so proud of the fact that she had paused the camera between scenes so that i wouldn't have to waste my time editing out the empty time. Problem is, she had hit the record button *AS* the first line of each scene was being spoken and it took the camera a second or two after that to start recording, so the first line or two of each scene was missing. This was also back in analog days and the editing decks i was using needed 2 to 3 seconds preroll to sync frames before cutting in the new material, which means another line or two was lost.

The woman was infuriated and demanded that i go edit the missing material back in. Even when i played the original tape for her to show what was missing there she blamed me for not being able to 'rewind or whatever' to get those missing seconds back.

So, by all means edit in camera if you wish, but make sure you have sufficient head & tail! Back in the analog days i always advised people doing their own shooting to start recording, count 5 seconds, then signal action. At the end, count 5 again, then stop.