Vegas Pro 8 [OLD VERSION]
by Sony Creative Software
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Software Reviews of Vegas Pro 8 [OLD VERSION]
Customer Review: Stable, Powerful, good value for money
Summary: 5 Stars
Coming from the Pinnacle products, I was very pleasantly surprised by the stability of the system: so far no bug, no crash, no re-install. Also, the software seems to be relatively light since it runs without any problems on my old machine: P4 3Ghz, 1 Gb of RAM, XP SP3. In addition, it is a very powerful editing tool that comes with DVD architect, very powerful as well: more famous competing products like FCP or Avid Xpress are at least twice as expensive. What is also very nice is that you can download for 30 days a trial version from the Sony website that is almost not limited (except for color correction): you can make sure that Vegas will run smoothly on your machine and that you get used to the interface. I highly recommend this product.
Update after a few months of use: I noticed that there was no plug-in for image stabilisation, a bit cheap for a Pro version, knowing that Pinnacle Studio 9 had such a plug-in and was sold less than $100. If you want such a plug-in, you will have to buy the Mercali plug-in, starting at $50...
Also, cleaning the sound track from undesired noises is not at all practical with Vegas pro, and in the end very limited. There are a lot of plug-ins but none really to efficiently remove unwanted parasite noises, such as wind or applauses. Here Sony clearly pushes you to buy Sony Sound forge, which is unacceptable. I bought Magix Audio Cleaning for $35, it is light, simple and in the end quite efficient.
For these 2 reasons, I still recommend the product but if I could, I would downgrade it to 4 stars.
Customer Review: Awesome, and easy to learn!
Summary: 5 Stars
I bought this to do a video production and had to do it in less than 2 weeks working only at night after my "day job." It only took me 1 evening of "playing" and a little reading of the manuals to figure out all I needed to get started. It is ABSOLUTELY worth the money. I have not used the fancy Adobe products that cost almost twice as much, but I can tell you that THIS product can do just about anything you want at a professional level.
NOTE: You DON'T need a high end video card, but I DO recommend a dual core processor. I rendered a 15 minute video on a Pentium 4 2.66 GHz with 1.5 MB of RAM, and it took over 1 hour to do it. Vegas DOES support dual core processors, and even video processing over a network, which I assume means you can "borrow" CPU power from other computers on your network. Didn't try it, but it sounded intriguing.
If you need some high end NLE software, but don't want the higher end price, THIS IS IT!
Customer Review: Excellent
Summary: 5 Stars
I demo'd both Sony Movie Studio Platinum and Vegas Pro 8. MSP was priced right for it's features, but VP8 hands down outweighed MSP. For home movies/videos/occasional user, go with the MSP. For the serious hobbyist and professional, go with the VP8. MSP limits the number of tracks you can have per project, VP8 is unlimited, which gives you better control of overlays and takes. I added Cinescore after using VP8, and it integrated seamlessly. No Regrets! Using Vista on a 3 Gig Pentium D with 1 Gig RAM -- No hangups!Customer Review: The definitive review
Summary: 5 Stars
Having read the other reviews let me just say that I think this is the best version of Sony Vegas, I have been using it since V1, but it wasn't until V4
when Sony bought it that I got excited about it. It started as an audio editor and I know many professionals, including demonstrators for competing products that do much of the audio editing in Vegas because it is so intuitive. It is great for anyone wanting to learn because there is much training materials available from people like Douglas Spotted Eagle and Gary Kleiner. This is a very deep program and so you can be a beginner and be productive, but as you advance you can learn the advance functions. Many forgo buying a compositor such as Boris or Adobe After Effects because much of the ability is contained within Vegas.
Much of the criticism on the reviews here of the program is due to their buggy computers not the program. I use Vegas currently with Vista 64bit and all though it was not made for Vista, it run flawlessly, they will have a Vista 64bit version by Sept 08. Just being able to do 30 bit color render puts them ahead of the pack. There are so many things that distinguish its superiority over programs like Apple Final Cut Pro (audio tools, Acid support etc) and Adobe Premiere (needs $1000 card for effective efx preview)the couple of reviewers that have compatibility problems should download the trial version and I have had excellent knowledgeable support from Sony support with native english speakers.
There are two junior versions of this program, one in particular the platinum version of Sony Movie Studio is an incredible bang for the buck.
When you consider that this program also includes Dvd Architect is an amazing value. The fact is I have used the competitors software, Vegas is the software of choice for independent filmakers and many use it for its audio tools alone or for making slide shows. It has won awards this last year for excellence and has forced the competition namely Apple and Adobe to change their interface (elim A/B timeline, to a single time line)
and so copying is the highest form of flattery.
One of the reasons Vegas is the most intuitive program for video editing is that originally it was designed by musicians, not film editors. Other programs mimic the way film editors had been editing for nearly 100yrs.
It started as an audio program that added video edit capability and being lazy musicians, they made it very easy to use. The fact is that it is also a deep program and when you consider it all the bit color, compositing, the audio editing it provides all the tools you need and if you master them, you will be a great editor
Customer Review: Download Demo
Summary: 5 Stars
After various trials with other software i'm going to buy this after using the demo for 5 days.
Have tried various consumer products, the worst of which was definitely Pinnacles rubbish but this has offered me as much as I can ask. The principle thing it does is work. I know this sounds odd but every other piece of consumer video editing software i have tried is buggy and crashes frequently, or wont read a format. This didn't crash once in 5 days and created a 2 hour multi source format dvd (including H.264 from a panasonic Hd SD1) with no crashes no fuss, just worked.
For me $500 is alot to pay for software (as a consumer doing this for friends and family) but after the hours tearing my hair out with substandard software im buying this.