Good video editing software (Windows) ?

What does she currently use on her Mac?

I use Final Cut Studio so depends how much you are willing to spend and how much of a heavy editing enthusiast she is.

I'm unsure of windows movie maker but iMovie has been pretty decent for casual users on Mac and I think one of the better Windows editors are Corel VideoStudio or Adobe Premier.

If she's doing it professionally, then Adobe Premiere.

By Shun Go To PostWhat does she currently use on her Mac?

I use Final Cut Studio so depends how much you are willing to spend and how much of a heavy editing enthusiast she is.

I'm unsure of windows movie maker but iMovie has been pretty decent for casual users on Mac and I think one of the better Windows editors are Corel VideoStudio or Adobe Premier.

Right now just iMovie. She feels that shes outgrown it and was looking at final cut. My thing is the macbook pro isn't built for the type of sruff she's doing. Before we got final cut i wanted to look into any good Windows alternatives.

Edit: i completely blanked on the Adobe products.

Adobe Premiere is a good alternative to Final Cut since it works on both Windows and Mac OS X. It's not as feature heavy or streamlined as Final Cut but makes up for being cheaper. I think Final Cut as a software is better, but Adobe Premiere might be what you need since you both can use it on both computer.

Adobe premiere cc isn't an alternative.
It's becoming a lot more popular than final cut, especially compared to FInal cut X.
There are independent film makers who still use final cut 7 which is a solid choice.
But IMO, adobe is far more intuitive than final cut.

But as someone who has used final cut, premiere and avid professionally,
Premiere is my favorite.
But it ultimately it depends on which UI makes more sense to her as she'll learn a lot faster with the one that she understands logically.

Oh she can try Da Vinci resolve.
It's the standard color grading software
But they made a shift to include editing features recently.
Best of all it's free!
But the full feature version is $1000

So would it make sense to just go for the 20 a month for premiere pro? Especially coming from iMovie?

Yes. I don't think you lose out and she can use it both on OSX and Windows. That MBP should be decent for video editing in Premiere, the thing you lose out on is time it takes to encode the video, which is where the i7 shines. The editing part should be fine. Have her give it a try.

I prefer final cut only because I am not a fan of Adobe's new subscription model. I've been getting by with Lightroom, Photoshop CS6, Final Cut Studio/X, Logic, etc. for a while now and I'm so used to being able to stick with a suite rather than having to pay through subscription.

I've just been really used to the suite of apps I've had so far so they're second nature to me.

I do stand by my Adobe Premiere recommendation because it seems like what you and your wife would benefit most from. I know that Adobe's newest products are subscription only, I'm not sure if all of them are. If you can maybe get a copy that isn't subscription based? Unless you don't mind the subscriptions.

By Smokey Go To PostSo would it make sense to just go for the 20 a month for premiere pro? Especially coming from iMovie?

Yup. Pay the $20 on the months she wants to use it.
There are tons of premiere tutorials on youtube.

Cool. Gonna go with Premiere Pro since it can be used on both machines. Downloaded the 30 day trial. She spent a few minutes and said "Yep, this is definitely a step up". I think she said she's done about 25-30 videos in iMovie and is just ready for something a little more advanced. This way she can do encoding with my 6 core 4930k which I can only imagine is tons faster than the dual core i5 in the MacBook Pro.

In my experience, intel i5/i7 isnt the initial problem that creates lag or what slows down on encoding time. The first bottleneck is the busline bandwidth. There are ways to reduce encoding time and have realtime playback.
The physical issue is that tons of data are being pushed from the south bridge and northbridge chipset.
and the biggest stressed areas are the bus and HDD and not the cpu. in most cases the cpu wont even be as stressed as you think it will be.
the solution is to diversify data flow on buslines to several HDDs.
The gist is having the OS on a ssd.
Premiere cache folder on a dedicated ssd.
Media files on a 7200rpm hdd. Theres a few more you can do. Theres a video on optimization. Ill post a video later. Im on my phone.

Oh you can also do raid 0 or raid 1 setup on the media drive. That will help a ton too.

By Smokey Go To PostCool. Gonna go with Premiere Pro since it can be used on both machines. Downloaded the 30 day trial. She spent a few minutes and said "Yep, this is definitely a step up". I think she said she's done about 25-30 videos in iMovie and is just ready for something a little more advanced. This way she can do encoding with my 6 core 4930k which I can only imagine is tons faster than the dual core i5 in the MacBook Pro.

Oh yea, do an NAS setup where she can safely store her files. That way she can do work on the MBP and encoding on the rig.

Raid 0 NAS.
And switch to dual xeon e5 family.
Once you spread data flow, you'll see that dual xeon shredding data like nothing.
Do it smokey. We believe in you.

If she wants to step her game up a bit, she can also import from Premiere to AE and do some effects/typography too.

By K@do Go To PostIn my experience, intel i5/i7 isnt the initial problem that creates lag or what slows down on encoding time. The first bottleneck is the busline bandwidth. There are ways to reduce encoding time and have realtime playback.
The physical issue is that tons of data are being pushed from the south bridge and northbridge chipset.
and the biggest stressed areas are the bus and HDD and not the cpu. in most cases the cpu wont even be as stressed as you think it will be.
the solution is to diversify data flow on buslines to several HDDs.
The gist is having the OS on a ssd.
Premiere cache folder on a dedicated ssd.
Media files on a 7200rpm hdd. Theres a few more you can do. Theres a video on optimization. Ill post a video later. Im on my phone.

Well even with that my machine should def help. Ive got 2 SSDs along with a mechanical HDD. One lf those SSDS is primarily for the OS. The other for gaming and is 700ish GB. Shes been doing all of her work on a 256GB SSD in the Mac so Im sure we could make it work on the main PC.

Her main complaint to me was how long it took for a 8 min video to encode which probably lines up with your HDD statement.

She sounded pleased and overwhelmed with Premiere which is a good thing i think. She likes to just dive into stuff and learn on the fly. Premiere is a definite step up in that area.

Best way to reduce encoding time is have more cores.
Thats where xeon comes in and shines

By Smokey Go To PostShe sounded pleased and overwhelmed with Premiere which is a good thing i think. She likes to just dive into stuff and learn on the fly. Premiere is a definite step up in that area.

https://www.skillshare.com/classes/adobe-premiere