Product Description

VideoStudio Pro X2 Ultimate Win

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #52 in Software
• Brand: Corel
• Released on: 2008-10-01
• Platforms: Windows Vista, Windows XP
• Format: Unknown format
• Dimensions: 3.20 pounds

Manufacturer's Description

Corel VideoStudio Pro X2 Ultimate is the ultimate digital media package delivering everything you need to take your video editing to the next level, includes Corel VideoStudio Pro X2, Corel WinDVD 9 Plus Blu-ray, Corel DVD Copy 6 Plus and Steinberg WaveLab LE 6 audio editing software - a total value of over £150. Step into full HD editing with a complete suite of high-definition production tools. Import video from HDV, AVCHD, Blu-ray Disc and JVC HD camcorders. Enhance your footage with free-form creative tools or professionally designed templates. Even paint, write or draw on your video. Create professional soundtracks with WaveLab 6 LE and full Dolby Digital 5.1 support. Author standard DVDs, AVCHD or Blu-ray discs with animated menus. Play back your productions with WinDVD 9 Plus Blu-ray

Why to Buy

The Most complete HD solution
Import and work with video from HDV, AVCHD, Blu-ray Disc and JVC HD camcorders. Edit HD video quickly and smoothly "" even on midrange PCs "" with unique Smart Proxy editing. Create HD menus and burn projects as DVD, AVCHD or Blu-ray discs. Save time encoding with support for dual-core and quad-core CPUs. Play DVDs, AVCHD and Blu-ray discs movies with a full version of Corel WinDVD 9 Plus Blu-ray, the world's number one playback software!

Professional, easy-to-use editing tools
Create compelling, Hollywood-style video projects. Enhance video with free-form creative tools or professionally-designed templates. Edit quickly with automatic audio and video crossfades and create sophisticated picture-in-picture and montage effects with transitions in overlay tracks. Easily create professional soundtracks with Steinberg WaveLab LE 6 and full support for Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound.

Unique special effects
Paint, draw, or write on your video with the new Painting Creator. Recreate the appealing look of true cinema and old film with NewBlue Film Effects. Add sophisticated animated titles with two independent title tracks and enhance projects with professionally-designed overlay objects, frames, and Flash animations.

Any output, anywhere
Author stunning DVD, AVCHD and Blu-ray discs with professional motion menus. Output video to camcorder, PSP, iPod or iPhone. Minimize re-encoding and reduce rendering time with MPEG Optimizer.Upload videos directly to YouTube "" the most popular online video-sharing Web site.

Box Contents

Customer Reviews

Good for amateur Hi-Def
I've been trialling this software for a few days now, and for my purposes I think it deserves a better rating than the 2 stars it has at present. I set out looking for a video editing package that a) can import, join or create simple transitions, and output the AVCHD files produced by my Panasonic HDC-SD9 camcorder very quickly and without loss of quality option (i.e. has a smart render option); b) has decent DVD authoring software that can author AVCHD files to DVD as well as Blu-ray; c) supported 5.1 surround sound; d) is reasonably quick to render and renders to as small as possible file sizes; e) has flexibility to output to HDD as well as DVD and produces files that play on my PS3; f) is very easy to use but flexible enough to play around with settings; g) doesn't cost the earth. I also wanted a decent selection of transitions and effects but as I am not big on creating all singing and dancing movies these features were very much secondary. My purpose we to easily capture, create, and easily distribute family video that is capable of being played back via a variety of mediums.
So to start I did a bit of research on the net and found the following 5 packages to be front runners: Serif MoviePlus X3, Pinnacle Studio 12 Plus/Ultimate, Adobe Premier Elements 7, Corel Video Studio x2 Pro Ultimate, and Sony Vegas Movie Studio 9 Pro Pack. I then downloaded the trial versions as set about testing according to my criteria. Remember I am an amateur so I am only looking for the easiest or most obvious way to do something from each package. That is my disclaimer.
So now down to the results... First the rendered output quality of all packages appeared similar, although the rendering time did vary slightly (by about 15%). Corel was the only package that supported an obvious Smart Rendering option. Adobe and Pinnacle provided most transitions and effects as standard. Serif and Corel were the easiest to use.
Adobe PE7 does not support 5.1 surround sound and its output capabilities appeared limited. I did however find one setting that produced an AVCHD H.264 file that played back on my PS3. -> Eliminated.
Serif would not recognise the .MTS files produced by my camcorder; however renaming them all the .M2TS worked. Also it will only produce output with max 1440x1080 res, not the 1920x1080 I wanted. -> Eliminated.
Pinnacle would only produce AVCHD output to DVD/Blu-ray disc and not directly to HDD and even then settings are limited to only one ("Best Quality"). Also it's worth noting 5.1 audio is only supported by the Ultimate version and I could only find the Plus version to trial. -> Eliminated.
That left Sony and Corel; both met my above basic requirements pretty well. Initially I liked the Sony as it offered a lot more for not too much more cash and I looked hard for reasons to buy it over the Corel; but the deeper I dug the more times Corel came out on top... I found the Sony DVD authoring package harder to use, the Corel editing UI was cleaner and it was easier to find the features you needed, Corel did obviously Smart Render but Sony did not, and finally the Sony crashed and I did not experience same with Corel. So the final verdict is Corel Video Studio x2 Pro Ultimate. It's far from perfect (hence 4 stars) but for my purposes it's the pick of the bunch. One small niggle I have with Corel is that the application window can only be full screen or minimised, so you can't resize it to get at other apps while it's rendering.

An easy-to-use but powerful video suite
Corel VideoStudio Pro X2 Ultimate comprises four main applications: VideoStudio X2 (a video editor), WinDVD 9 (video playback), DVD Copy 6 Plus (for copying and converting discs), and WaveLab LE 6 (an audio editor).

A true mark of a good application is if it allows you to do what you want without having to read the manual.I applied this test to VideoStudio and I'm happy to say that it passed with flying colours. I created a professional looking photo slidshow, complete with audio, effects, and titles, not once having to refer to the bulky manual supplied.

The program's minimalist interface makes it easy for to find your way around. On the left is the preview player which allows you to check that your project is looking like you intend it to. Next to it on the right is where I could import and organise my library items (such as images and) videos. And at the bottom, you'll find the timeline where you can drag and drop images, videos, effects, titles, and audio to create my slideshow.

As with most video editors, VideoStudio splits video production into three stages: caputre, edit and share. The tabs at the top make it intuitive to accomplish each stage. Click on "Capture" and you can import media from a DV camera, discs, and even mobile devices. I was rather disappointed not to be able to capture video using my built-in webcam, however.

Once you've captured what you need to (or if you already have the media files saved on your hard disk), you can start editing. This process really is as simple as dragging and dropping. The hard part is deciding which effects, overlays, titles, and audio to use - but you'll have fun experimenting and deciding.

When you're happy with your video, you're ready to "Share". This stage allows you to output your project to many different formats. You could create a video file (like AVI), burn it to a disc, export it to a mobile device, or upload it to YouTube.

You'll find that there are probably different ways of doing what you want. For example, I went straight to the main video editor to create my slideshow but I found out later, after exploring the program more fully, that there was an easier way of creating slides. When you launch the program you have three choices: go straight to the video editor, go to the "movie wizard", or go to the DV-to-DVD wizard. Had I chosen the movie wizard, I would have seen the many slideshow templates on offer.

So my advice is to experiment and you'll be rewarded with a video production that you'll be proud showing off to your family and friends.

Even though I've focused on VideoStudio in this review, the other applications in the suite are well worth exploring too. WinDVD 9 played everything I threw at it without problems, and even supported HD DVD. Again, I liked the uncluttered interface and was pleased to find the A-B repeat function (which most other media players don't have).

DVD Copy 6 converts files for the Web or mobile devices like iPods. An animated and rotating menu in the left-hand corner guides you through all the options. If you have a video or audio file, the chances are you could convert it to something that your gadgets will be able to recognise.

WaveLab is a competent audio editor. It's great for editing the sound files that you use as background music for your videos. If you've never used an audio editor before it takes a bit of getting used to. But if you've used Audacity or someting similar you'll feel right at home. I have one gripe about this program, though: launching it always prompts the User Account Control which is very annoying.

Extremely easy to use and a solid feature set!
I have to give Corel their due at creating an interface which is so easy to get to grips with. It's pretty much no learning curve as long as you've used Windows programs before, and this ease of use is reflected through both the import / touch-up and movie creator sections.

It's not too light on features for such an 'entry' product, either - there are some nice features to improve your raw footage (again, very easy to use) which perform functions like colour correction and so on. The interface isn't too cluttered with these, either. As expected there is a wealth of transitions to place between your clips such as fade, swipe and such like. The special thing is that you can apply these transitions to overlay / picture-in-picture tracks as well as the main video timeline - in fact, the whole process of creating these picture-in-picture effects is very accessible even for beginners to video editing - impressive!

The smart-sound feature is very clever - it automatically produces backing tracks to the correct length for your movie. VERY handy if you've ever had to fiddle with cutting and splicing audio to fit your clips!

Blu Ray support is very welcome, and helps to future-proof the product as more devices become available to record / burn Blu Ray footage.

A good, all-round product. It's no Adobe Premiere (which you wouldn't expect at this price) but it covers the entry-level specs for the home video editing market, plus a bit more ground as well.