A
kind of MAGIX.
Regular
visitors to the site will know that from time to time we need to film
stuff; be it footage from the latest action cam we're testing, or a
video showing off a new product in all its glory. Unfortunately the
footage we capture can't just magically edit itself prior to be being
uploaded to YouTube, so we needed a rugged and versatile editing
programme to make us look good. We think we've found it in the MAGIX
Movie Edit Pro 2016 Plus.
Built
for Windows 7, 8, and 10, MAGIX Movie Edit Pro 2016 Plus is a
feature-packed editing suite that can give your footage that special
cinematic finish. For those who might be making the switch from the
likes of Final Cut Pro or even iMovie, you will find a familiar user
interface. You import your tracks (up to 99 video and music tracks in
the same project!) into the bottom slider area, while the top left of
the screen shows the preview of the film, and the top right contains
all the many effects, titles, and fiddly bits you can add to your
clips. It is so intuitive that we were able to import a few clips,
chop them into order, and export the project without reading any of
the documents or watching any tutorials. Easy.
Once
you do start to edit things and generally muck about with your
footage, you'll notice what good value for money MAGIX Movie Edit Pro
2016 Plus is. Seamlessly included is the NewBlue Titler EX package,
worth over £100 itself, as well as dozens of customisable templates
to quickly edit footage specifically from action cams. Speaking of
which, as more and more of us are filming our adventures (or, you
know, our bicycle commutes to the office) on action cams, this is a
brilliant suite for quickly and professionally lopping your footage
into something usable.
You
might already have seen our review of the 3D Printed Centriphone, but
the video was actually edited (very quickly and easily) on the MAGIX
Movie Edit Pro 2016 Plus. Check it out:
As
you can see the most crucial thing about editing that was to be able
to slow down the high-speed footage captured by the camera. The
programme lets you go nuts with speeding things up and slowing them
down, and as you can see in the finished product, the rendering is
achieved very smoothly.
Also,
just for balance, we recently reviewed the Kitvision Chronos Time Lapse Mount, and again we edited the footage in MAGIX Movie Edit Pro
2016 Plus to speed up the exceptionally slow images:
But apart from playing around with the speed of the video, generally cutting, cropping and moving clips around is so easy. Adding titles and text is a breeze, and there is also a very clever object tracking ability whereby on-screen text can be pinned to and follow moving objects in the footage. There is also a wealth of transitions and fades, and accessing them is as simple as clicking on the start of a clip next to where it joins another. This kind of reminded us of our old go-to video editing software, Windows Movie Maker. Just like that older, simpler programme, the emphasis is very much on ease of use.
For those thinking ahead, 4K footage can be edited without a problem, as can clips filmed in HDR. You can actually go into each individual uploaded frame and adjust the colour and hue, perfecting the right look of everything before exporting. Oh, and get this: you can also use MAGIX Movie Edit Pro 2016 Plus to edit 360 footage if you've filmed it with a 360 camera or captured a cool panorama photo. It is something we've yet to fully get the hang of, but the online support from MAGIX should see you right, if indeed your film making career is heading in that direction.
A solid and versatile package with a lot more in it than you would expect for the askingprice, MAGIX Movie Edit Pro 2016 Plus would suit both casual footage capturers and die hard budding film directors alike.
£69.99