Why Vegas is losing me and others

x-dim wrote on 7/31/2018, 11:19 PM

I´ve been using Vegas for general editing videos and tv shows for 9 years now. Since Sony Vegas Pro 9 to Magix Vegas Pro 15 now.

When Magix bought Vegas. I was excited because I've believed than gonna update some important features. Like that's ugly transitions or poor video fx. things that Sony doesn't update since x64 version (and just do that update to work on x64 systems). but wasn't the case

I beg to Vegas developers update this:

1- Transitions. (15 years old designs mostly) (make them contain optional sounds inside the same layer)

2- better color correcting tools (like the awesome Color Lumetry from Adobe)

3- Make some kind of special layer like the famous "stickers" (than any free video editing cellphone app can do, but this $499 professional tool can't).

4-Something like custom animated overlays with quote point (like vMix transitions) to help us to make tedious overlays that take at least 3 layers or an external software like After Effects in my case.

5- The adaptative windows for video effect and transitions are anything but useful. Take color corrector, expand it or contract it and not gonna be any improve on your color wheel picking tool. I made in Unity 3d in 10 hours much better color correction tool for a mapping project, was not so hard.

6- If renders fails, save the part of the render that was ok (this is the most important in my list).

7- "No need to reencode this video" for videos the same codec for every format, not just *.AVI PAL/NTSC. The first time I saw that 3 wonderful words "NO NECESITA RECODIFICACIÓN" (in Spanish) I was amazed that Vegas was smart enough to understand and accept as good a video made in other machine but with the same codec as a part of another project and save a lot of render time. Image how good that will be on h.264 or h.265 files!

I´m paying for the creative cloud (Premiere pro included) and Vegas Pro just because my team uses it. But I can´t understand why so big companies don't look at the real needs of their clients and just do things than no one was asking for!

We need our work in less time and look great, with the less space for errors. And not spend hours of our time watching a machine render because our editing tool just crash. At any random time, or need to do several small pieces of a project and then re-encode it and try 2, 3, 10 times to make it. after we spend 10 hours editing. In 2018 after 16 officials version and thousands of compilations Is just unacceptable.

Thank You

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Comments

DrNeb wrote on 1/19/2019, 10:44 PM

Hmm, I get some people's frustration...I do, but I've been using Vegas since 2000 - so before it was Vegas and computers couldn't really do the sort of sfx laden animations I do now. In fact, I broke a couple of Maxator 130s trying to shove **** up a very small pipe lol. I'm also what you would call an expert on cultural production - both historical and technical. I have 4 degrees including one in research! What bugs me about this post is the idea that software just works...a clever lie to use a Dr.Who phrase :), that Apple propagated. Sure, Crapple and propriety software on Crapple machines do play reasonably nicely...reasonably, but if you buy one of Crapple's overpriced paper weights which are really media consumption machines (Lev Manovich, digital theorist) and not creation machines...you will see the spinning silver ball of death, just as you get the odd crash on a Windows machine. And here is where the real problem normally is...with Crapple and Windows - it's an under-powered system with bottle necks that causes 8/10 issues or crashes in Vegas - I base this on nearly 20 years worth of experience and research. 1/10 issues on Windows machines are caused by incompatible hardware and software...or worse cheap hardware and 1/10 crashes are bugs within the software.

As for some of the issues the OP brings up - transitions...do you have pro-suite, if so ProDad has 100s and they're great and you can create your own too. Colour correction tools...hmm well a good cinematographer will fix 9/10 problems as their filming. The windows that house all the bits and pieces within Vegas are fine too...perhaps with this caveat that a duel monitor helps. I'm not even sure what the sticker layer is about...it sounds like a kiddy creation tool to me ;).

If you read between the lines of the OP, I think the issue is this is a person who is wedded onto the overpriced Adobe paradigm where you need I don't know how many programs to do what Vegas can do as a whole program. In Vegas I have all the fxs I need to create ******* Star Wars so long as I have the full suite (so hit film). And this isn't hyperbole, the technological-eco-system has matured and with a little know how anyone can make Star Wars these days, and Vegas makes it easier than ever. Even though Vegas's 3d compositing system seems limited, it actually is very usable too. In fact the limitations, have allowed me to create a 3d depth technique within my animations without the need for a 3d camera or glasses...this technique is still a little rough, because I only stumbled across it in the last week or two, but to have two or three images working in concert and composited together which then adds 3d depth perception is pretty cool. I just don't think you could have stumbled on such a technique using Adobe or Final Cut, and yes I have used both of these programs...don't get me started on the dog's breakfast of Final Cut! And if you need more 3d compositing tools...there is always HitFilm which is only 300 odd dollars. Heck, the full Boris Continuum is only 600 odd dollars.

If I had t ask for anything in regards to Vegas, it would be to update the audio to full 64bitfp including audio recording, because as a specialist on the the analogue emulation experience. But I'm being selfish, because 64bitfp audio along with VST3 and a decent midi input screen would allow me to drop Sonar and use only Vegas for both sound and vision. I also use Blender for my animation, but having one program to do the majority of my work would be about all I could really wish for in regards to Vegas.

Finally, the price...sure I've spent just over 1000 dollars on Vegas since 2017...and another 400 dollars between 2015-17 but I understand that without capital our software will never continue to be developed. And I can tell you that I do not want to get into software encoding and design...I may have technical abilities and degrees - but I come at cultural production as an artist as in the romantic and modernist tradition. One of the biggest issues within contemporary cultural production is artists who have no technical skills, and technicians thinking their artists. Sorry, I probably digressed in that last point lol.

Ben