Pinnacle Studio 9

Pinnacle Studio 9

by Adam Cochran
May 2004

Pinnacle Studio 9 is one of the best video editing programs I have ever used. I am not into the high end stuff, I just like to edit my home movies with a little creativity. Studio 9 allows me to do this.

I have been a fan of Pinnacle Studio 7 when it came bundled with one of my computers. Back then it was just a toy since creating a high quality video required too much hard drive space and more storage than a CD-ROM would hold.

Now DVD burners are priced under $150, hard drives come with 120 gigabytes standard and computers can handle over a gig of RAM. Home video editing is making the same transition from professional to home users that digital photography made a couple years ago. Pinnacle Studio 9 is just the tool to make that transition easy and fun.

Studio 9 is one of those programs that is very simple and intuitive on the surface, but as you play with it, you began to realize how deep its features go below the surface.

There are a variety of other programs that make the movies for you. All you do is load the video into the computer and click the "make movie" button and poof you have a movie. Pinnacle will do this, but it will also allow you to add sound effects, transitions and lots of advanced special effects.

For those who really want to get into the fancy stuff, Studio 9 also has a tool that allows you to manipulate the surround sound.

Studio 9 not only lets you add effects, transitions and sounds, it also allows you to manipulate the timing and length of these elements. You can even add your own on screen subtitles, titles and credits to your movies in a variety of styles.

If you want to get into DVD authoring, you can add menus with basic to very advanced backgrounds and "buttons".

When it comes to saving your video, Studio 9 will let you save it in a wide variety of formats and qualities. I have posted a very low quality video that I made on this site. You can save your videos in a wide variety of formats and qualities ranging from super low Windows Media or Real Player formats or high quality DVD formats with multi-channel sound.

Although Studio 9 is very easy to use, you will want to have the manual handy. Learning how to play with the time, sound and effects can be frustrating to beginners. I would like to see future versions improve the interface with their titling tools. Using the templates they provide is often frustrating as they place multiple fonts, sizes and justifications in a single title. This makes it difficult to customize for your own titles and phrases.

If you are interested in Studio 9 do a little studying up on their website before you buy. There are a variety of packages available. If you are looking for a hardware/software solution Pinnacle offers packages that include hardware for hooking in your analog or digital video camera. If you have a digital video camera (mini DV) and a firewire card, you don't need any additional hardware. If all of your videos are on analog formats (VHS, 8mm, Hi8) then you will probably want to buy one of the packages that includes such hardware.

Studio 9 is the perfect software for anyone wanting to get into video editing as a hobby. We have recommended previous versions to listeners for the past couple years and will continue to do so as Studio 9 adds new tools and functions that make video editing fun and as uncomplicated as possible.

Castellini on Computers Rating (1-5 mics)
Recommended Market:	Anyone looking for the right tool to dive into video editing as a serious hobby.
Approximate cost:	$99-$199
Company and Web Site:	Pinnacle Systems