What do you use to edit video?

[amateur]

Thanks for this thread because I've also been on a quest to find the right video editing software. My needs are very simple. I just want to cut out and save good scenes from some films so that I can free up some storage. I've had problems trying to use Windows Movie Maker. After I publish a clipped scene, I cannot open it again in WMP or even VLC. I can a blue band and a faint ghost of an image across the top. I'm not doing something right. Anyone got a clue?

 

[xater]

mkvmerge, it works for avi too, although the result will be mkv, the encoding is the same.

For DVDisos, I use DVDRemake, you can select scenes to be left out (like company logos, trailers to other movies, or simply scenes not wanted)

 

[Joelle]

@ All Responders.

I'm blown away by all the help and responses by so many really goodgifted, and talented dudes/dudesses that share liberally and generously what they know.

I'm always amazed by the goodness and class here, thank all of you as I'm hoping to learn this.


Joelle

 

[scorres]

amatuer

I took some time and thought about this and tried movie maker
to clip full a dvd. There are a couple things I need to know though.
Have you ever had success using it for any purpose? In my settings under
tools/options/compatabilites I have them all checked except for ffdshow
video decoder.
They suggest that you try knocking out one of these at a time to see if it works.
I suggest making short clips as you test this.
Also make sure you are playing the right file. Each time you make a movie,
it saves a file called untitled.MSWMM. That is the backup file. the movie should be somewhere else with a wmv extention.
I wouldn't mind troubleshooting this further if you need, because this is a great program,
and fun to use.

xater's rec. above is the quickest free solution for you, if you don't mind mkv.
It's non-visual, so get out the notepad and do this
00:00:00,00:00:00,00:00:00,00:00:00,00:00:00,00:00:00,00:00:00,00:00:00
then load your movie (into MPC or VLC)and insert the times you want it to split. beginning and ending.
00:05:33,00:11:44,00:22:44,00:55:33 this will makes 5 pieces, delete the parts you don't want, and then the original.

I use AVI MPEG ASF WMV Splitter by boilsoft, but you gotta pay or find a crack for it.
It is the easiest, but it doesn't do mp4 flv mov etc.

 

[ircaddicts]

I use blaze medio pro or virtual dub depending on the format of the vid

 

[amateur]

I took some time and thought about this and tried movie maker
to clip full a dvd. There are a couple things I need to know though.
Have you ever had success using it for any purpose? In my settings under
tools/options/compatabilites I have them all checked except for ffdshow
video decoder.
They suggest that you try knocking out one of these at a time to see if it works.
I suggest making short clips as you test this.
Also make sure you are playing the right file. Each time you make a movie,
it saves a file called untitled.MSWMM. That is the backup file. the movie should be somewhere else with a wmv extention.
I wouldn't mind troubleshooting this further if you need, because this is a great program,
and fun to use.

xater's rec. above is the quickest free solution for you, if you don't mind mkv.
It's non-visual, so get out the notepad and do this
00:00:00,00:00:00,00:00:00,00:00:00,00:00:00,00:00:00,00:00:00,00:00:00
then load your movie (into MPC or VLC)and insert the times you want it to split. beginning and ending.
00:05:33,00:11:44,00:22:44,00:55:33 this will makes 5 pieces, delete the parts you don't want, and then the original.

I use AVI MPEG ASF WMV Splitter by boilsoft, but you gotta pay or find a crack for it.
It is the easiest, but it doesn't do mp4 flv mov etc.

Hey, thanks a lot for this thoughtful, well-researched follow up! I wasn't expecting that anyone in the community would put such time into an answer. To answer your question, sometimes the program will work and sometimes not. Also, I've saved stuff to storage and then sometimes find it won't play later. I'll try the steps you suggest and see if I can make any headway on the compatibility issues. I'll also try the other programs you suggest.

I've always just saved whole DVDs in the past, but the newer high res versions are really eating up the storage. I'm trying to keep my whole video collection on a 500GB portable drive. That's not as much space as it used to be. I've got a bunch of films with only one or two good scenes and I'd like to trim.

Thanks again. I'll follow up.