Video Editing & Creative Software

motosera · Jun 25, 2020

Nice list! I use Lightworks - which I have found very easy and is well supported and widely used in the pro industry too. Nice subscription model ~£20/month, or the free version is fully featured but limited to 720P output rendering. Fully customisable effects, and 1,000s of user available free to download from their support forums.

For Youtube artwork etc I use Canva, which is completely free to use.

Pooley · Jun 25, 2020

Davinci Resolve is brill, I have managed to make some fantastic edits with it! Best part about it is that it's free

Not mentioned on your list is GIMP, another great bit of software capable of big results and is also free.

I come from an Adobe background and studied using all the software, but the licenses are just too expensive for me to use as a hobby.

Moto Mengy · Jun 25, 2020

I only use free software!

I've made all of my motovlogs with the free video editor Shotcut. It's kind of like Openshot (which I also tried) but with more features. I like it. Haven't tried Da Vinci Resolve, maybe I'll give that one a try too.

I use GIMP for photo editing, I like it. If I just need to crop something then I simply use Windows Paint as it's quick and easy.

For photo/vid capture I'm just using the built in Windows 10 snip/recording tool. It's worked great so far!

UncleL · Jul 5, 2020

You should probably add that the Davinci have paid full version as well which adds on top of the other things pretty decent noise reduction and better h264/265 hardware codecs (talking about things useful for youtubers). The license is 280 GBP ish.
It's also worth noting that it contains Fusion which is sort of Adobe AfterEffects comparable software. So as a package it makes it really powerful software.

Drakhen99 · Dec 21, 2020

I know this is old, but thanks for the list!!! As a new-ish YouTuber, I may have something to provide people just starting out (followed by my own workflow):

1. Determine what your acceptable level of effort is. Programs like Adobe Premiere Pro and Davinci Resolve have steep learning curves for anything beyond basic, whereas other programs have more of a drag & drop interface for medium-level efforts. BUT, you'll be switching to APP or DR if you want to go more advanced. I wanted certain features that I knew early on would be important for me, so that cut out some programs and made me want to challenge myself to a pro-level NLE from the start, and those features became first-day tests for any new software package I tried)

2. Like was said before, don't be afraid to switch programs, just realize that you're starting over from scratch. I used VSDC for about a day (found it unintuitive for myself) and HitFilm Express for about 2 weeks (found it was clunky and again, unintuitive)

OK, so here's my list of software used, and a bit of my workflow:

1. Davinci Resolve. Hands-down, the program for me! Also, I'm using DR17 Beta 5 now (I was using 16.2.7 for the last few months). It's pretty darn good, and I've only found 1 or 2 bugs in it so far. I am VERY tempted to buy a license to get the extra features & performance, but haven't pulled the trigger just yet.

2. Paint 3D and GIMP for thumbnails and image manipulation. Paint 3D for cropping, GIMP for the rest. I've found some tutorials online and now it's second nature for me to add text, a color outline for said text, and then a drop shadow. Also, borders for the image to make it pop.

3. Handbrake. If you're using a newer GoPro, some resolutions and framerates require the HEVC codec, which is $.99 USD on Windows 10. Handbrake, which is free, can convert the video files to whatever resolution and framerate you want (useful if you want to overlay what was originally 4k/30fps on top of 1080p/60fps footage, for a picture-in-picture. If you use the Nvidia encoder, it's super fast too, taking about 2-3x footage length to convert (ie, 3 mins of footage takes 6-9 mins to convert).

-John

mymotorrad · Mar 30, 2021

I started with Final Cut Pro Trial. I have a MBP 16, 6 core i7, 16gb, 500gb HD and a AMD video in it. I liked it a lot, but the trial ran out and I switched to Resolve 17 which is a beta. I had some glitches in it that required me to do a couple projects over in Premiere. I get Adobe CC for free at work, I just don't like it that much. It's powerful, but not the most intuitive. I may end up buying the FCP suite as I can get the ed discount, $199 and it works well with the Mac or just use Premiere and Photoshop. IDK. I wouldn't mind a faster computer too, but it works. I work off of WD 1TB SSD USB-C drives.

Drakhen99 · Mar 30, 2021

FWIW, Davinci Resolve 17 is out of Beta, and in fact they released 17.1 already. It's far more stable than the beta versions.

One of the beta versions ate a project... it was slightly corrupted, but doing a "Save As ..." on it to create a duplicate, worked to refresh it and not lose any of my work.

-John

mymotorrad · Mar 30, 2021

Drakhen99 said:
FWIW, Davinci Resolve 17 is out of Beta, and in fact they released 17.1 already. It's far more stable than the beta versions.

One of the beta versions ate a project... it was slightly corrupted, but doing a "Save As ..." on it to create a duplicate, worked to refresh it and not lose any of my work.

-John

The attractive thing about Resolve is that there's a linux version. I could see myself going there in the future if I want to get new hardware I pay for. Not a fan of Windows, just use it when I have to and I don't game. Might be interesting to see the rendering speed difference with Linux and a decent video card. My laptop has a AMD Radeon Pro 5300M 4 GB, which is probably on the lighter side.

HippoDrone · Mar 30, 2021

I still use Filmora, is on version 9 now, does everything I need it to and is so simple, even I can work it!

kyoshima · Aug 16, 2021

Thanks for your recommendation!
I use Filmora too. So simple! and I also use movavi for advanced video editing.

Promio · Sep 26, 2021

Moto Mengy said:
I only use free software!

I've made all of my motovlogs with the free video editor Shotcut. It's kind of like Openshot (which I also tried) but with more features. I like it. Haven't tried Da Vinci Resolve, maybe I'll give that one a try too.

I use GIMP for photo editing, I like it. If I just need to crop something then I simply use Windows Paint as it's quick and easy.

For photo/vid capture I'm just using the built in Windows 10 snip/recording tool. It's worked great so far!

Recently I found a good article about free video editors, like the top ten of them. And I tried only three: Video Toolbox, Wevideo, and Fastreel. My personal choice is going to Fastreel as a gamer. Just like to make cool highlights from CS: GO and Warface with templates they offer.

Moto Mengy · Sep 27, 2021

Promio said:
Recently I found a good article about free video editors, like the top ten of them. And I tried only three: Video Toolbox, Wevideo, and Fastreel. My personal choice is going to Fastreel as a gamer. Just like to make cool highlights from CS: GO and Warface with templates they offer.

Ironically, I no longer use Shotcut and have switched to the free version of DaVinci Resolve, which I've found to be MUCH better.

Drakhen99 · Sep 28, 2021

I'm on the Studio [paid] version of Resolve 17 now... and the hardware acceleration for encoding/decoding GoPro footage is worth the cost all by itself. Between the smoothness of playback during editing and the speed of rendering, I'm a happy camper and it takes less time to edit my videos.

Quite the learning curve though - I feel like I'm just now hitting my stride with editing.

-John

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