Photos are great, but increasingly the world is turning to video. To create compelling videos, you need the right software to helps you achieve a fast and easy workflow that lets you shoot, edit and publish rapidly.
In recent years, there’s been a massive spike in the number of devices, both dedicated cameras and smartphones, that are capable of shooting in 4K. Capturing 3840×2160 pixels, 30, or even 60 times every second, combined with audio, create some incredibly large file sizes, often many gigabytes in size.
This means you need a video editor that’s capable of handling videos like this and not just one, you’re likely to have many and its not uncommon for me to have 100GB+ of footage from a review, combining GoPro, Drone footage and content shot on smartphones.
As we go about our lives, many of us capture videos, but rarely spend the time to edit clips together to tell a compelling story, or create long-lasting memories. You might need to edit a video for work, or for a school assignment, or even just for a family birthday party, so the next question is – what software are you going to use ?
Video editing software usually comes in two flavours, expensive and hard to use, however I’ve recently been trying out a VideoProc that offers a great set of features at an affordable price.
DESIGN
Quick, easy, simply to use
The design of a video editor can vary considerably with some going for a more complex timeline and layer approach, while others take more approachable UI that is welcoming for new users.
The interface of VideoProc is quite simple to use, with the ability to add video files, or even a whole folder of clips, its incredibly fast to get started. Once your videos are in VideoProc, you can get to work, rapidly applying filters, trimming clips, rotating footage and applying audio and text overlays.
Getting around the UI takes just a couple of minutes before you’re flying and it’s all organised and labelled very logically.
FEATURES
Stand out features of this display.
In 2020, the video editing market is diverse and solutions to the problem definitely vary. Recently we’ve seen the introduction of online video editing services like video cutter, cropper and merger to name a few. While these promote a low barrier to entry (free, no installation required, convenient to edit short videos), they often have restrictions on file sizes and output video formats which doesn’t align with the growth in 4K video we talked about earlier.
Online video editors are much more basic than most desktop editors and that lack of advanced editing capabilities means I’ve never found one that provided much value. Of course there’s plenty of other considerations that impact your workflow as well. Having shot content on your phone or GoPro, would then need to be uploaded, edited, processed, then downloaded. This places a massive dependency on your internet connection. While the NBN has improved the average bandwidth at home, we’re still talking about timely delays in the editing process that could be avoided by editing locally.
My typical workflow is to connect the devices with footage on via USB to my PC, transfer the footage, import to video editing software, then edit and publish. In my experience having the software locally, enables the export process to use the GPU, allowing the frames and audio to be smashed together faster.
Once in edit mode, you’ll cut out the boring parts or mistakes from your video clips, merge multiple into a single edit, rotate clips, add effects (vignette is my fav) add subtitle, adjust the speed of clips and add some music. Dive in deeper and you’ll find some advanced options, like the ability to correct lens distortion, something that works great on wide-angle GoPro footage, but there’s also deshake, denoise, A/V sync and cropping also available.
After having edited videos for a years, one of the most frustrating things is being handed a video file with a weird codec or in a strange format. Thankfully VideoProc has an amazing list of supported formats (MP4, HEVC, M2TS, MKV, etc) which makes importing almost any video file a breeze. Those videos also come in a range of video resolutions, frame rates and aspect ratios – 4K 30/60/120/240 fps for example. Dive into the Option > Format screen for a clip and you can configure these settings, then press the ‘Apply to All’ for a fast application against all open clips.
At times, you just need to convert files from one format to another and VideoProc’s covert media feature is great at working with video, audio and even DVDs files. It supports a massive 370 different input codecs. While the industry has largely settled on MP4 with H.264 compression, its amazing how many devices still use different formats.
One of the other nice features is the ability to download videos from online. In the era of remixing content, having the ability to grab content online easily is a real asset. You can search for a free online tool to do this, or browser extension, however my experience is that this often leads you to less than reputable sites asking you to install java or other plugins, creating a risk to your machine and your data. Best to avoid and use a tool like this if possible.
This Video Downloader is actually really well constructed, with the ability to easily drop in a URL to something like a YouTube, Vevo or Vimeo video and you get options to download in basically every video quality including 4K. Even better, the application can download a whole playlist, channel in a batch process. There are also options for an output format, so you complete a download and conversion in a single step, saving you time.
Just when you think that’s enough features for any single application, there’s another. VideoProc also includes a screen recording. This enables you to capture a video recording of your screen and even annotate that recording live. You can choose to also include your webcam and microphone, making it a great tool for teachers or trainers to create on-demand learning material.
PERFORMANCE
GPU-enabled performance
When it comes to measuring the performance of a video editor, its immediately clear when you hit the go button as to how long of a wait you’re in for. As with gaming, video editing, specifically rendering the final video, or converting videos, leverage the GPU to accelerate the process.
With modern hardware, editing 4K footage is fairly easy, but it’s the exporting that is brutal, especially if your videos tend to be longer, like a video podcast for example. Having the application leverage all the hardware you’ve invested in, just makes sense and mans the job gets completed faster.
Something I was impressed by was the ability to still use my PC while a render or conversion was taking place. Other video editors will consume 100% of the system performance which basically means its time to grab a coffee when you hit export. It seems VideoProc, is a good citizen and respects the fact you may want to still do emails or browse the web while the process runs in the background.
PRICE & AVAILABILITY
How much and when can you get it?
VideoProc is available now for Windows and Mac. You can try it out for free with clips up to 5 minutes long, but fairly soon you’ll likely progress to buy. For a 1 year license, VideoProc costs US$29.95 (A$49.65), or US$42.95 (A$71.20) for a Lifetime license for a single PC.
If you’re someone who works across multiple devices, then you should consider the Family license for use on up to 5 computers which will cost you US$57.95 (A$96.07), a significant savings over multiple single PC licenses.
To check out VideoProc, please head to https://videoproc.com
OVERALL
Final thoughts
The feature list of VideoProc is seriously impressive for the price. This feels like 4 great applications rolled up into one product which represents great value for money.
The video editor offers a great set of features and if you’re after a simple editor without the timeline and complexity, then you should definitely consider VideoProc. The software offers the tools that many social media creators would love and that 4K support is fantastic. A great example of this is to take a single video clip and slice multiple clips from it, to then merge them together as a single file.
Overall its a well rounded product and something you should definitely try out for free and if you like it, go on and buy.
You can get more information about how to use VideoProc at the video below, or head to https://videoproc.com
