FS7: How I choose between Resolve, Premiere Pro and Sony Catalyst.

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Publimix

Veteran
Somehow I would like a program like windows moviemaker easy to use simple and with auto-edit. But that doesn't exist (I think).

I need a video editor to make short 1-3 min. teasers and to view footage, sorting and make rough timelines with some sound, music and titles, all pretty basic.
I have a powerful windows pc. Clip management is very important, so many HDD's, SSD's, cards and usb-sticks and different formats. That leaves only a few options:

Premiere Pro, which I have since I use other adobe applications for my old business (book-publishing and during my cheese-making times also used it to make designs for cheese-wraps and advertisements).
Blackmagic Resolve (free version).
Sony Catalyst suite (trial and own catalyst prepare).

Using and trying three three editors ended up with a chaotic HDD full of libraries, copy's clones etc. So I must choose one.

I really like premiere pro, it has endless possibilities. Three problems: price (I do not use it every day as a tool) and the problem that the clips in the media bin keep refreshing, this makes working with it impossible. (Saw on the adobe forum that this problem exists for a long time, was solved and then again appeared.) Third problem is that one need prelude to sort and manage clips. I do not like the price, I used to buy adobe software, now I hire and the updates I get are not stable. Other software I use is photoshop and Indesign for publishing books, the older versions are more than capable of doing that, so I don't need 'better or newer'.
(So there is a dilemma with Adobe, one has to use CC 2015 to have the newest software, but the newest software is buggy and not necessary so updating is silly.)

Sony Catalyst suite looks OK, but the editing part is a bit too basic, and it doesn't work with dual monitors. And making a library with catalyst prepare is easy, but the library is only easy to view with catalyst prepare itself, the file-structure of the library is very difficult to view with other software because it makes lots of folders and sub-folders..

Blackmagic Resolve is worth it's price a billion times since I use the free one. It does what is has to do. The only problem is sound, sometimes playback with sound doesn't work. I think it has to do with my soundcard (tascam 1800). The problem is that it takes some time to get used to the workflow, but Resolve has the best manual of them all.

So I worked that out, or not ???
 
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Professional Editing = Premiere

Davinci Resolve = not only color correcting (which really can be done in any software) but advanced and time efficient grading and animation of power windows used to readjust Exposure or color within very specific scene elements.

Catalyst = fast cheap way to add LC709A to dailies if you shot log.

I use/own all three.
 
Publimix said:
Three problems: price (I do not use it every day as a tool) and the problem that the clips in the media bin keep refreshing, this makes working with it impossible. (Saw on the adobe forum that this problem exists for a long time, was solved and then again appeared.) Third problem is that one need prelude to sort and manage clips.
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You missed the big one: you can't buy to own Premiere anymore. You can only lease it on a monthly basis. And if the lease runs out, you lose access to all your prior work because you won't be able to open the files anymore.
 
Hi Dennis,
I would love to call premiere 'professional', it has so much tools (which I don't need) but it crashes a lot and I cant't browse my files without endless refreshing thumbnails. Professional tools has to be good and reliable and here premiere pro cc 2015 fails. I use adobe software for at least 20 years but I really started to hate cc 2015. Each time I startup my computer I get a notice to 'update' (just like adobe acrobat, eternal weekly update :cheesy:). I would buy a stable version of premiere, because it can almost handle all media-files. But rent a collection of 80% not-needed-software that has to be updated daily and doesn't work all the time, no.

I like the edit part of davinci, it is good enough for my kind of work. And it is easy for Log clips too.

Catalyst is good but it messes up the file structure (when used as intended).

Since I use Davinci and own Catalyst Prepare I will not continue cc 2015 (and use old versions of Photoshop and Indesign).

My subscription stops in November so I have some time to decide.
 
I gave Resolve 12 for drive on a couple of projects in the last week . This system with color correction setting within it , is powerfull.
My only comments 1) Its still in beta so it can have a crash, not that common, crashes less than premier 2015 apparently 2) crop function within the NLE has edging issues . 3) How the hell do you do chroma keying ? . Need to figure that out. 4) Needs further integration with other codecs. eg doesn't seem to recognise "animation" codec out if AE etc.

Finally IMO Resolve will replace Premier leaving only Photoshop & AE.
 
If your premiere is crashing for whatever reason, Davinci will almost surely crash sooner or later. A good modem machine with clean O/S shouldn't crash that often. It could your motherboard or video card, RAM, anything is possible.

I'm on CS6/PC more or less permanently and crashes are so rare I can't tell you the last time I had one. I also had CC on Mac for a while to work on a project, but the project ended so I stopped paying, but again no crashing.

Look for a used Production Premium suite like CS5 5.5 or 6 and forget paying monthly for software.
 
Dennis's suggestion above is what I would recommend as well.

If you know Premiere I would look for a copy of CS6 Production Premimum. If you only work on your own material, you don't have to worry so much about getting footage that will not work in PPro CS6. Just know if you get a new camera keep in mind what software you depend on to get your work done.

I haven't given Catalyst Edit a run through yet but intend to once I have a gap in editing.

Resolve I know pretty well but I am reluctant to use it in a production environment just yet. Too many gotachas with codec limitations, still funky stuff with audio levels (even though they have replaced the audio engine). There is tons to like about it but you don't want to meet a technical dead end in the middle of a job.

Hopefully, within the next year we will begin to see a shift away from ProRes as SMPTE's edict on making (a newer version of) Cineform the standard codec going forward as it becomes real in the marketplace. If you don't know about it, you can read the press release below:

https://www.smpte.org/news-events/n...eform-codec-standardized-smpte®-vc-5-standard

News on it right now is pretty thin but I suspect we will see some more evidence of it in the coming months. Hopefully we won't have to wait until NAB 2017 for it to be rolled out into software applications.
 
Premiere would be ideal if it weren't subscription only and they fixed the bugs instead of adding new bugs every few months. And that Creative Cloud Desktop behaves a lot like malware.

That said, CS6 would be my vote for best version of Premiere. Stable, fast, consistent, and very usable, as long as you don't have to edit a CODEC introduced in the past year or so.
 
Any codec introduced in the past year or so just use a software like clip rap or some other transcoding software, transcode to proress and never look back. I still use CS6 for most of my projects with no issues at all. It even color grades pretty good when your in a hurry, 32 bit float system good enough for most stuff.
 
Can't you just subscribe to Premiere Pro CC on a month by month basis? (i.e. just pay for it when you need it?)
 
I've been using FFmpeg to rewrap the XAVC, however, it's not a simple matter, because there's no container that accepts h.264 and PCM audio in the same stream, so the audio gets converted to AAC in the process.

Better solution has been to shoot on external recorders in Prores HQ and deal with the heavy data. I can easily play 4 2160P Prores streams in multicamera on CS6 and one full screen on the 4K monitor and Windows Task Manager reports CPU utilization between 2 and 3%.

LUTs are nice to have, but shooting with a burned in LUT in camera takes the dire urgency to have Lumetri out of the picture.

Sadly, everyone is moving in the direction of subscriptions now. Maya 2016 will be the last version that can be purchased. Avid and Edius are subscription now, as are some other types of applications. There's not much resistance on the part of the buyers and so more software vendors are shifting to this business model, which makes the barrier to entry in the production world even higher, because the cost over many years is now more than outright ownership.
 
Ever given FCX a thought? I understand that you would have to switch hardware and that might be counter productive cost wise.
But for $299 it has matured into an outstanding app over the last few years.
I run Premiere in our edit suite, but I agree that CC is both buggy and annoying these days. And don't get me started on the rental model.
In my home edit suite I have been purely FCX for the last 2 years
 
Yoak said:
Ever given FCX a thought? I understand that you would have to switch hardware and that might be counter productive cost wise.
But for $299 it has matured into an outstanding app over the last few years.
I run Premiere in our edit suite, but I agree that CC is both buggy and annoying these days. And don't get me started on the rental model.
In my home edit suite I have been purely FCX for the last 2 years
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I was going to write this but was concerned it would flame a PC vs Mac debate.

FCPX would fit Publimix's needs 100%, the media management is superb and if you add a couple of really cheap plugins, colour finale and trackX, you can do most, if not all, of your colour correction inside FCPX and never worry about going over to Resolve. Once you go trackless editing with a track based NLE feels like going back to the land time forgot.

My business partner will often do client attended sessions with FCPX because it's so fast and he makes use of the auditions feature a lot to have several live edits at a flick of a mouse button. To be able to colour correct with all the titles and lower thirds live has been a godsend as it kills the nitpicking dead in realtime, gets an instant decision and more importantly a client sign off and payment.
 
Hi Nirv,
Now find someone who wants to exchange a new 2500 dollar PC for a fast mac.

Or turn it into a Hackintosh of course.
 
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What is "a powerful PC?" Nobody can give any advice if you don't tell the details.

Btw Adobe gave a warning not to switch to Mac OS 10.11 as the production suite products are not compatible yet.

(It's great to see how busy these guys are working with my annual contribution of 600€ </sarcasm> )
 
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Publimix said:
Hi Nirv,
Now find someone who wants to exchange a new 2500 dollar PC for a fast mac.

Or turn it into a Hackintosh fo course.
Click to expand...

FYI: Apple offers 0% interest rate for 2yrs financing. A fully equipped iMac 5k is about 140€ a month. That should pay off..
 
But first the 1.000.000 question, is FCP X really capable of handling 4K?

The PC I build can be converted to a M(H)ackintosh. Intel I7 5920, 32GB Ram, Asus x99 board and Gforce Nvidia gtx 970. Endless SSD and HDD, external soundcard (Tascam). USB 3.1 etc.

And I am pc and mac minded, so I don't have to feel guilty.
 
Publimix said:
But first the 1.000.000 question, is FCP X really capable of handling 4K?

The PC I build can be converted to a M(H)ackintosh. Intel I7 5920, 32GB Ram, Asus x99 board and Gforce Nvidia gtx 970. Endless SSD and HDD, external soundcard (Tascam). USB 3.1 etc.

And I am pc and mac minded, so I don't have to feel guilty.
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Of course FCPX is really capable of 4K far more so than CC. FCPX handles XAVC like it's DV.

You're wasting your time thinking about hackintoshes. Every OS software upgrade will likely kill your hackintosh and you'll be waiting for hackers and crackers to catch up.

Good news, Macs also use HDDs and SSDs and your external audio device will likely also be compatible too.
 
Upgrading OS not always necessary, how much XP computers still out there?
But you have a point there. But we bought all the parts with Hackingtosh in mind. And while I don't have to do it myself (dear son loves to build PC's) I maybe give it a try.
It should be as easy as using one HDD for Mac and another for Windows, plug HDD in and you get another computer. (so they say on the Internet and thus it it true). :)
 
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