Not a Deal: Should I Use DaVinci Resolve or Premiere Pro?

[Reid Rosefelt]

My last video was my last straw with Vegas Pro.  I've been using it for over a decade, but I am sick and tired of its bugs and constant crashes.   I know I am not the only one because Google searches tell me there ar ecountless people out there with the same problems.   I was fine with the Vegas Pro problems in the past because I only made videos occasionally.  But now I am in production 365 days a year editing my YouTube videos and it is unbearable.  It is also slowing my output.

 Today I will download DaVinci Resolve and the demo of Premiere Pro and start checking them out. 

I don't mind paying the money for Premiere Pro.  I just want the one that is absolutely the most rock solid.  I'm sure they both have the features I need. 

I have a feeling that Adobe is the safest bet, but I know there are a lot of DaVinci fans out there.

Thank you, everybody!

Reid

PS It will be such a relief to unsubscribe from Magix and all their Vegas Pro deal emails. 

[TheSteven]

Premiere Pro is an industry standard.
On the Mac side there's also Final Cut.
 

[X-53mph]

Do you have a top notch video card?

I tried da Vinci, but my laptop couldn't take the pain.

[Byron Dickens]

 

 

13 minutes ago, TheSteven said:

Premiere Pro is an industry standard.

So is DR.

 

DR costs way less, too. Studio is $300. One time. Ever. BMD has yet to ever charge for updates.

 

The free version does probably 80-90% of what studio does. Only thing you're missing is some of the highest resolution formats, some of the effects and the ability to use multiple graphics cards.

[Brian Walton]

1 hour ago, Reid Rosefelt said:

My last video was my last straw with Vegas Pro.  I've been using it for over a decade, but I am sick and tired of its bugs and constant crashes.   I know I am not the only one because Google searches tell me there ar ecountless people out there with the same problems.   I was fine with the Vegas Pro problems in the past because I only made videos occasionally.  But now I am in production 365 days a year editing my YouTube videos and it is unbearable.  It is also slowing my output.

 Today I will download DaVinci Resolve and the demo of Premiere Pro and start checking them out. 

I don't mind paying the money for Premiere Pro.  I just want the one that is absolutely the most rock solid.  I'm sure they both have the features I need. 

I have a feeling that Adobe is the safest bet, but I know there are a lot of DaVinci fans out there.

Thank you, everybody!

Reid

PS It will be such a relief to unsubscribe from Magix and all their Vegas Pro deal emails. 

Give them both a test on your machine.  I use both depending on which machine I'm on.

DR is great if you have a machine that can handle it, it is more pickly about hardware/processors.  

 

Try rendeing the exacat same file with edits and color grading, etc.

[Soundwise]

I'm happy with Filmora, as it enables me to get same quality results faster and easier than Vegas Pro or Magix Movie Edit Pro.

[Reid Rosefelt]

2 hours ago, TheSteven said:

Premiere Pro is an industry standard.
On the Mac side there's also Final Cut.
 

Final Cut Express was the first editing software I ever owned.  My first short was done on a big old Avid, but on my second I worked  with a professional editor and he used Final Cut.  That's how I learned.   But my current Mac is ancient and I very rarely use it.

The irony is that when I discovered Vegas I liked it much better.  ?

Edited February 25, 2021 by Reid Rosefelt

[antler]

If you're considering alternatives, don't forget about HitFilm either. Don't know how it compares against the competition, but I quite like it.

[Justin Broad]

As much as I would like to recommend Davinci Resolve, it runs like a dog on my Dell latitude 7490 (i7, 16gb ram, 500gb SSD). Premier Pro (the money hog that it is) runs pretty snapy 

[Byron Dickens]

I'm surprised it runs at all.  I don't think BMD recommends ANY laptop.

 

DR does all of its processing on the GPU and I think a graphics card with 2gb is the bare minimum.

[PhonoBrainer]

My guess is, you can do everything you need to do in premiere elements? Except for live streaming, does premiere pro do live vid? I don't think so.

P. Elements is dead simple and cheaper, I think, and has a crapton of effects and transitions, with hardly any learning curve.

Don't forget After Effects for the wow! type stuff.

[Eusebio Rufian-Zilbermann]

On my older machine Davinci Resolve ran horribly on a 4GB video card (R7 370). On my newer machine, with a modern 16GB video card it runs pretty well.

I find it easier than Vegas Pro/Premiere Elements/Avid Media Composer for the kind of things I want to do. It is a "big beast" with a bit of a learning curve, and sometimes clicking around the UI isn't enough for finding things, but there are plenty of videos on youtube showing how and where to make edits and adjustments .

I would still rank myself as a beginner with it, but here is an example of the results:

 

 

[Starship Krupa]

I've been using Vegas Pro for my single-camera videos for years now (meaning about one a year). One thing I notice when browsing NLE's is that some of them crow about how they support multi-camera. I don't quite understand this in the context of an NLE where obviously I can import multiple videos from whatever sources I choose and dissolve and cut all I want. Does it refer to being smart enough to keep different files shot at the same time in sync or something like that?

[Byron Dickens]

Yep.

[Brian Walton]

1 hour ago, Starship Krupa said:

I've been using Vegas Pro for my single-camera videos for years now (meaning about one a year). One thing I notice when browsing NLE's is that some of them crow about how they support multi-camera. I don't quite understand this in the context of an NLE where obviously I can import multiple videos from whatever sources I choose and dissolve and cut all I want. Does it refer to being smart enough to keep different files shot at the same time in sync or something like that?

Not only that but it typically refers to alo a playback where you click on camera shots from a multi cam view and each switch creates a cut and switch in the timeline.  This dramatically reduces editing time with multiple realtime sources.  Many people use 4 or more cameras to capture an event.  Non video centric folks don't have several cameras so the concept makes less sense to them.   I consider it essential.  

[Tezza]

20 hours ago, Reid Rosefelt said:

My last video was my last straw with Vegas Pro.  I've been using it for over a decade, but I am sick and tired of its bugs and constant crashes.   I know I am not the only one because Google searches tell me there ar ecountless people out there with the same problems.   I was fine with the Vegas Pro problems in the past because I only made videos occasionally.  But now I am in production 365 days a year editing my YouTube videos and it is unbearable.  It is also slowing my output.

 

Reid, have you had any support from Magix regarding your problems with Vegas? there's a few simple things that can cause instability with Vegas, also it can depend on your hard drive setup and your editing codec. I know there is a lot of stuff out there about crashes with Vegas but I wouldn't go just by that because Vegas is the most pirated software around and a lot of the complaints come from users using the cracked version of the software. In addition, with those using 4k there tends to be more complaints about video editors in general because it can be difficult to edit.

If you do a search on "Adobe Premiere Crashing" or "Davinci Resolve crashing", you will see a few posts as well.  But most of this is again, people trying to edit huge video files on badly setup computers and in codecs that are not necessarily native. You might get away with this for short videos but when you start using the thing 24/7 then changes might need to be made.

It might be that your computer and your editing workflow needs to be set up differently now that you are doing more work. If your goal is to create Youtube videos then the requirements for that should be easy to set up. You don't need high data rate for that. If you were doing feature films or doco's etc then it would be different.

Still, if your heart is set on trying something different it can't hurt to trial some others but they will have more hardware requirements than Vegas which can run on anything. It might be good to try the demos out and see if that fixes your crashing issues, if it doesn't then maybe attention should go towards set up. I wouldn't shell out the dollars though until you've proven that it is the software at fault and not something else or you could find yourself with a lighter wallet but the same problems.

Edited February 26, 2021 by Tezza

[Leslie Fuller]

For ease of use, you can’t beat Vegas Pro for speed!

The way I have to work on YouTube videos, which is some quick editing on Vegas then into DaVinci Resolve on PC, before sharing the edit and moving it over to Resolve on Mac to complete.

Originally, it was Vegas to iMovie, then Vegas to Final Cut Pro X for a couple of years until a disaster with upgrading the Mac from Mojave to Catalina, and then Big Sur forced a switch to DaVinci Resolve.

Premiere Pro would have been an option, but it is the sheer cost!

Although Resolve has a learning curve and can seem quite complicated, I find the free version of Resolve (thanks BMD!) a pleasure to use.

 

[Dave Maffris]

I use DaVinci Resolve, and once I got the learning curve down, I liked it enough that I sprung for the paid version. The free is quite full featured, so it's a great value. The negative is that it takes a lot of GPU to work well. Your computer should have at least 8GB of VRAM--I had only 2 on my studio computer, and the thing froze a lot or I got "out of GPU memory" pop-ups that made me reboot, etc.  I was able to score a new graphics card (NVidia GEForce 3070) and that solved the out of memory issue. Still have some lag in playback issues, which I think has something to do with the amount of effects I use, and the fact that the program caches a lot and although I have a lot of HD space, it's not unlimited. 

Try the free version, if it doesn't work for you, no sweat...it is used in Hollywood, too. Think of it as using Cakewalk instead of Pro Tools (the industry standard)...you can get the job done. If you are skilled in color compositing, etc. (I'm not) or just want a pro-level program, this is the one for the money--And, it includes the Fairlight audio module, so you also have a capable, pro level audio console built in. 

https://www.blackmagicdesign.com/products/davinciresolve/

[Reid Rosefelt]

I don't know exactly how long I've worked with Vegas, but I'm guessing about 18 years.  And it has always crashed.  (If there is somebody here who uses Vegas every day and finds it  stable, I'd like to hear about it.)  In the beginning I thought it was my computer,  but over the years my computer power and RAM has skyrocketed.  Shouldn't 64 GB be enough?   Rightly or wrongly,  I just can't go on with it.  I have to at least try something new and hope for the best.  It is well worth the money to me to find out.

I got a good deal on Premiere through my wife's work and I went for it.  I have a few weeks to cancel, but I can't imagine why I would. 

Yesterday I watched tutorials all day and I think Premiere is superior in a lot of ways.  There are some things I like better about Vegas, but  I will just have to get used to the new interface.  Premiere is a lot more like Vegas than Hitfilm is, so it's not too bad.    

Plus there are all these plugins, including free stuff, that are available for Premiere that don't work on Vegas.  I look forward to that.  A lot of times when people advertise "works with all editing programs" you look and there are a lot of logos there, but no Vegas.  There are exceptions, all green screen stuff works, but not everything.   For example, now and then I subscribe to Viddyoze, which I use in my YouTube videos.  None of their alpha channel stuff works with Vegas.  I have spent hours trying to convert files and have had a lot of correspondence with them.  So this is something I pay for and can't use. 

There are other things I have had trouble with Vegas.  The videos from my video capture program don't work in Vegas.  I have to load them in Hitfilm and output them.  So I'm going to see if they work in Premiere. 

It has very nice synergy with Photoshop, a program I'm well-versed in.  A lot of concepts I grasp instantly.  You can even bring in Photoshop docs with layers!

Finally, I'm getting  icons from sideshowfx for both my regular and XL Streamdecks.  A few minutes of setup and I'll have pages and pages of icons ready to go.   I won't be digging through the manual. 

https://www.sideshowfx.net/products

Sideshow  doesn't yet see a market in making them for Vegas. 

Magix....   don't get me started about that company.  I'll be a broken record.   There are a lot of players out there that I'm not crazy about, but Engine! Wow that is in a class by itself.  And what have they done to Acid? 

I believe that they buy something like Vegas that has a user base.  That's what they buy.   And they have us and they don't care about us.  They don't try to earn our continued loyalty by fixing bugs and adding features.  The new features are just add-ons from other companies, and mostly in their suite.   I am getting off that train and I'm not going back.   

 

[Brian Walton]

2 minutes ago, Reid Rosefelt said:

I don't know exactly how long I've worked with Vegas, but I'm guessing about 18 years.  And it has always crashed.  (If there is somebody here who uses Vegas every day and finds it  stable, I'd like to hear about it.)  In the beginning I thought it was my computer,  but over the years my computer power and RAM has skyrocketed.  Shouldn't 64 GB be enough?   Rightly or wrongly,  I just can't go on with it.  I have to at least try something new and hope for the best.  It is well worth the money to me to find out.

I got a good deal on Premiere through my wife's work and I went for it.  I have a few weeks to cancel, but I can't imagine why I would. 

Yesterday I watched tutorials all day and I think Premiere is superior in a lot of ways.  There are some things I like better about Vegas, but  I will just have to get used to the new interface.  Premiere is a lot more like Vegas than Hitfilm is, so it's not too bad.    

Plus there are all these plugins, including free stuff, that are available for Premiere that don't work on Vegas.  I look forward to that.  A lot of times when people advertise "works with all editing programs" you look and there are a lot of logos there, but no Vegas.  There are exceptions, all green screen stuff works, but not everything.   For example, now and then I subscribe to Viddyoze, which I use in my YouTube videos.  None of their alpha channel stuff works with Vegas.  I have spent hours trying to convert files and have had a lot of correspondence with them.  So this is something I pay for and can't use. 

There are other things I have had trouble with Vegas.  The videos from my video capture program don't work in Vegas.  I have to load them in Hitfilm and output them.  So I'm going to see if they work in Premiere. 

It has very nice synergy with Photoshop, a program I'm well-versed in.  A lot of concepts I grasp instantly.  You can even bring in Photoshop docs with layers!

Finally, I'm getting  icons from sideshowfx for both my regular and XL Streamdecks.  A few minutes of setup and I'll have pages and pages of icons ready to go.   I won't be digging through the manual. 

https://www.sideshowfx.net/products

Sideshow  doesn't yet see a market in making them for Vegas. 

Magix....   don't get me started about that company.  I'll be a broken record.   There are a lot of players out there that I'm not crazy about, but Engine! Wow that is in a class by itself.  And what have they done to Acid? 

I believe that they buy something like Vegas that has a user base.  That's what they buy.   And they have us and they don't care about us.  They don't try to earn our continued loyalty by fixing bugs and adding features.  The new features are just add-ons from other companies, and mostly in their suite.   I am getting off that train and I'm not going back.   

 

Premiere Pro is worlds better than Vegas.

But the pricing model is annoying.