Audacity is a free and open source audio recording and editing software.
N/A
VEGAS Pro
Score 9.6 out of 10
N/A
MAGIX Software headquartered in Berlin offers the VEGAS Pro line of video editing applications which combines the company's Sound Forge audio editing suite and a wide range of movie production features and effects.
VEGAS Pro has more features than iMovie but is nowhere near as complex (or robust, for better or worse) as Adobe Premiere Pro. It is also not as robust as the Avid video editing suite, including Avid Media Composer. However, I do not have much familiarity with that product line …
For just a quick down and dirty audio recording from computer source, Audacity is a no-frills solution that any user can get up and running with quickly without the intimidating functions seen in most standard DAWs. This would be a great tool to start with to record church services, or basic live performances where someone wouldn't want to use a full DAW like Ableton Live or Studio One.
VEGAS Pro [in my opinion] has so much potential to be great. So many powerful features for audio and video editing. Unfortunately, after the sale from Sony to MAGIX [I believe] the software has become less stable even on CAD-certified workstations. [From what I've experienced] there is no customer service telephone number or support email address. All support requests must go through their website and my last requests have gone unanswered after a month. When Sony owned the software I [was] able to get on a live chat with a tech who would solve issues in minutes, not days. Not true today [per my experience]. With the decline in reliability and lack of customer support, I can no longer recommend a MAGIX product.
One of the things that I love about VEGAS Pro is that I can do automatic tracking control to an object or image, this is a very remarkable function in VEGAS Pro, because this way you can add better mobility to the video in general, in addition , you can focus the video view to a specific object.
The image edits with the VEGAS Pro filters are really fantastic. For us, having a good visualization and definition of our images is very important, which is why this function has provided really remarkable results. We have been able to modify the tonality of the images that we add to the video and we have also managed to change the colors thanks to the filters available for video in general. These filters are very varied, I can add a filter to give my image a warm touch, a touch of cold or sunset.
At the bottom of the platform, the audio barrier is shown, where you can add several audio tracks and thus be able to modify the audio of the entire video for every second that passes, however, this function is much more impressive as it also allows you to add another audio barrier to play two audio tracks at the same time.
The autosave is fantastic, VEGAS Pro has an excellent autosave system capable of saving all the progress that has been made in the video that is being edited, the autosave does not consume additional capacity to the computer, so it is very easy to have it activated and not worry about computer performance.
While Vegas Pro does handle 4k video, I find that it still struggles a bit to keep up when playing back or processing 4k. I suspect this is at least partially due to the fact that the computer I am using for Vegas is not quite powerful enough to really handle 4k efficiently.
With no subscription fees unlike other products on the market, I am very confident I will continue using Audacity for my simple audio editing needs. I'm not an expert in audio editing, I'm sure what works for me as a more general user in a public institution would not suit someone more experienced, but I'm very happy with the quality of work I'm able to produce.
The best and easiest editor I have ever used. I have used everything as an Emmy-Award-winning news journalist, and this program has always done what I needed it to do. Nothing less than the best out there and can get the job done.
Audacity is for audio prodcasts only and not for video podcasts. Audacity does not have a transcript development feature. Audacity can not edit using the transcript feature that does not exist. I use another program to develop a transcript and edit using that transcript. Then I move the file into Audacity for final processing.
Audacity is great for this, it doesn't require a network connection once downloaded, and previous versions of the software are still functional in my experience. I have never experienced the program crashing, lost work, corrupted files, anything of the sort.
I have never had issues with speed in Audacity, I don't integrate it with other software but the program runs smoothly even with larger jobs. I haven't measured the CPU while using Audacity, but I imagine it's not high compared to other, more professional or specialized programs in the same category.
We have not used direct support for Audacity, other than using the information available on their website, which resolved the issues we were experiencing so we had a good experience in that regard. As this is Open Source FREE software, I don't believe there is direct support available. In saying that, it has the following great support options:
Online documentation and FAQ
Online tutorials covering all functions
Online user forums where questions are asked and answered by other users
Online wiki with more information
With these options most issues should be able to be resolved to get full use from Audacity.
Because Vegas Pro is widely used software, the user interface is similar to smartphone editing tools. That is why learning time is very short in Vegas Pro. Whenever you have a question YouTube is your best support assistant. You don't need to contact anyone.
Again I found it helpful to write up a step-by-step tutorial for coworkers based on our institution's standard practices. This combined with support from coworkers to answer questions is very effective for simple everyday use of Audacity. The support in-program is minimal but troubleshooting in the internet age is straightforward.
Easier to use than Garage Band. I have tried to use Garage Band for the same thing as I used Audacity and have had to give up. Not as easy. With the simple things that I have been able to accomplish, Audacity does it faster and better than anything I have tried. I have also used Pro Tools, however, that is more expensive
I had Adobe Premiere but I don't like having to subscribe. VEGAS Pro is a one-time purchase which was a better economical and financial decision for me. My friends that are editors didn't like when Apple changed Final Cut so I did not elect to use it when I had the chance to. I believe it is just as good as other platforms just not as high profile.
I feel that Audacity is useful, simple, and suited both to casual users and more advanced use cases. There are options for expanding functionality in complex situations, but the option to not mess with it as a beginner is perfectly fine and suited to most everyday uses in my institution.
