I'm not a pro at this, but I purchased VV about two weeks
ago and I feel like I'm only limited to my imagination. It
was tough for the first few hours but after I got started
on a project ... it was quite easy and my project is
exceeding all expectations. I've never used Adobe Premier
but VV seems to offer everything I want and more.

I used to use Premiere for any video work I did. But since
getting Vegas Video, I have not once touched Premiere. I
don't even have it installed anymore. There's no
comparison.. Vegas Kills it.

I've not used Premiere (but, am tempted to give it a try,
only because the name comes up so often). Like you, I'm
not afraid of "steep" learning curves (I have found that
word steep generally denotes a program that has a lot of
flexibility, or one that is poorly concieved). As strictly
an ameteur videographer (albeit a demanding one)I have
grown through several gernations of Pinnacle's linear
editing products (and produced some decent results), have
toyed with my nephew's Avid editing station (he is a pro -
shoots on a big BETACAM), and have a lot of experience with
Pinnacle's entry NLE, StudioDV.

For my money, (and, of course, given my limited view of the
world) VV2.0 is the best editor out there. Many tout
Pinnacle's scene detection as though it is a feature one
simply won't want to live without. However, VV gives you a
stream of continuous pictoral icons that allows you to see
where you are throughout the length of the captured video,
and, more importantly, you can use simple keyboard commands
to navigate precisely to the frame at which you want to
make a cut, then, you simply issue a short set of keyboard
commands, and the cut is made precisely where you want it,
every time.

The Studio interface is more mouse dependent. You can
enter exact time values to make cuts, but one has to
experiment by trial and error to enter values placing the
cut exactly where you want it. If you make cuts using the
mouse, accuracy suffers, as it is difficult to move the
mouse dependend cut "sliders" to exactly the point you seek.

Where Vegas could use some improvement (compared with
Studio products) is in it's titling . . . Vegas allows for
importation of titles created in outside programs (a trick
I haven't mastered yet), or via it's text generation plug-
in. In my opionion, both are capable, but both seem clunky
when compared to the Studio setup, which allows you to open
a window showing the background frame of video onto which
you want to overlay a title. You can type the title,
stretch it, reposition it over your video, change colors,
fonts, extrusions, etc, very quickly, very precisely.

The other major area where Vegas is lacking, is it's output
to tape (someone correct me if I'm wrong here, please, I'd
love to be told I have this all wrong).

VegasVideo can render to AVI's, and, VegasCapture can open
those AVI's (one at a time), and output them to tape. But,
unless you open a previously rendered AVI on the VegasVideo
timeline, you cannot string more than one AVI together. In
the FAT32 world, that limits projects destined for output
to DV to around 18 minutes in length. While you can
assemble multiple AVI's on the VegasVideo timeline, output
to tape would depend upon simply playing the timeline to an
external monitor, and capturing that "preview" to DV.
Transitions will either have to be pre-rendered, or you
will see the jerky effects of recompression on your
output. The whole experience will be to dependent upon the
processing power and the relative stability of your
computer setup. I run a 900 mhz machine using both WinME
and Win2000, and have yet to use this feature to produce a
defect-free video. There always occurs some little
computer timing glitch that produces unacceptable artifacts
in the output.

VegasCapture can output beautifully glitch free AVI's, but
only 18 minutes at a time . . . no means by which to
combine segments that I have found.

StudioDV, on the other hand, can import AVI's (type 2) back
to back on it's timeline until the cows come home, and will
play them back losslessly to tape with no problem (and,
since you aren't making a new AVI, only playing back pre-
created ones), project length is of little concern.

I have been using these two programs in tandem, VV2.0 to do
the really creative and precise editing, then rendering
sections to AVI, then, importing all these segments into
SDV where I add titles, then output to tape.

Results have been great (to my ameteur eyes . . . and a few
outside viewers who should know).

This hat's off to SF for one excellent piece of work . . .
I love VegasVideo.

Caruso

Sorry, forgot to mention VV2.0's unlimited tracks, both
Video and Audio, it's ability to easily separate video from
audio.

Makes it very easy to alter the relative speeds of video to
audio or to remove an unwanted background remark and
replace it with some more desireable sound.

You can import background music, easily coordinate musical
cues with significant video events, etc., overlay two video
images and have them play simultaneously, create PIP and
moving video, all this an more (no, I don't work for SF,
LOL).

Last night, I was working on some vacation video shot back
in 1987 on one of Sony's early Video8 machines. One
segment was too dark to make out the faces of my subjects.
Using VV2.0's "brightness and contrast" plug-in, I was able
to lighten that segment just enough to make it look quite
acceptable. Voila! Footage I would have discarded
previously is now quite an acceptable addition to my final
footage.

VegasVideo is great!

(again, sorry if I'm too lengthy or too gung-ho)

Caruso

Sorry to be so lengthy here.

I forgot to mention one other small thing Premiere has over
Vegas. With premiere you can make video clips be any speed
you want. So you could enter 100% speed, or 107%, or 1007%
speed. Vegas will only let you go up to 400% the speed of
the clip (and that's manually... the highest you can make
the speed by means of the Velocity Envelope is 300%).

I'm no expert with either program, but I have used both.
Premier definatly took me longer to learn, but this might
not be a fair comparison because I was already quite
accustomed to Sound Forge when I started using VV.

As far as features are concerned, the lack of available
plug-in's for VV makes it somewhat limiting as a stand-
alone program. For certain effects, you will always have
to use some other program!

When I was working with projects in Premier, I couldn't
view my effects without rendering them first - maybe it was
just me or the version I was using. With VV all of my
effects could be instantly previewed with no problem.
Without this feature, I wouldn't be able to fudge around
with a transition to get it 'just right'. I found the
titling adequated for my needs, but I need to practice with
the pan/zoom feature as I don't quite get it yet (I want to
make scrolling titles).

The print to tape is going to be a problem for me as well.
My Sony computer has DV motion, a capture program, pre-
installed, but it doesn't like the files VV outputs. IF
anyone knows of a cheap or freeware program for printing to
tape, please let me know!

Regarding Premiere's rendering to view effects feature, it
wasn't just you. That's how the program was made, and that
feature really blew. Vegas Video makes it SO much easier.
With Premiere you have to re-render each time you want to
review your effect, and in the long run, it'll wind up
costing you hours worth of time. So while Premiere may have
more plug ins (like fish eye, lens flare, etc), it takes a
helluva lot longer to manipulate.

And as far as printing to tape goes, you said it "doesnt
like the files VV outputs." Make sure when you render your
project into a final movie, you're using the NTSC DV or
NTSC DV Widescreen formats (or the PAL DV if you're a
European). The print to tape function only works with files
rendered in this particular format.

The problem is an incompatibility with the Microsoft DV
driver and Sony DV Gate. No worries, here's the fix for it:

http://www.sonicfoundry.com/download/step2.asp?DID=223

Once you run this utility, you should be able to print to
tape, from your Sony, to your DV camera, using the SF Video
Capture tool.

I have VideoFactory right now and I am debating on what to
buy: VV 2 or Prem 6. I have used the demo version of VV 2,
but there is no demo of Prem 6 to compare. The Prem 5 demo
is guite old and not a fair comparision. I tried it and
didn't really like it. I missed Vegas' ability to preview
in realtime. I have read the other replies and I would
agree that VV seems to be the easiest to use.

Here's the real question to SF: Will you provide an
affordable upgrade path for those of us who are faithful SF
customers?

I have SoundForge 5, Vegas LE, and VideoFactory. Can SF
provide a 100-200 dollar range upgrade to Vegas Video 2.0?
I can get Prem 6 with a FireWire card for as low as $300
and sometimes with a heap load of extra (and sometimes
useful) software.

Also, the lack of plug-in's does make me think hard about
my choice. I find Vegas my favorite because the interface
is so easy that I can focus on the creative aspect and not
have to worry about "how" something is done.

That's my take.

Hey all, don't forget Pixelan Software's "Spice" package
for Vegas! If you're looking for something comparable to
Adobe AfterFX, here's your ticket:

http://www.sonicfoundry.com/products/NewShowProduct.asp?
PID=452

For all you pros out there looking to breathe new life in
you Vegas projects, this is probably the way to go. In my
opinion, this really is gonna make VV a more competetive
product.

Nick LaMartina

I'm not experiencing problems with the SF video capture
application (other than it's lack of the ability to print
batch jobs). The trouble I have is that DVgate Motion
(which will allow batch jobs) doesn't like the files that
VV renders. I did make sure to render as NTSC DV with
still no luck. I'll post results after I try the patch
posted above and also another fix was mentioned that I will
have to attempt.

I'm also very glad to know that there are plug-in's
available for VV - I've been looking everywhere!