Review by Daniel Jolley

After an absence of many years, Ive recently started posting videos to YouTube again. Ive just been doing clunky editing using Windows Movie Maker, but I want to start using some of the fancy features I see in so many other videos these days picture in picture, special effects, a fancy opening, etc. So its the perfect time for me to fire up the newest version of Pinnacle Studio Ultimate and try to learn how to use it. I had an older version of this software (16, I think) but I was lazy and never really applied myself to learning it. Good enough editing just isn’t good enough anymore, though, so I have to step up my game.

One big con with this product is the complete lack of documentation that comes with it. OK, I understand that printed manuals are taboo now in the digital age, but would it kill you, Pinnacle, to actually post a user guide of some sort online? Its a big problem because I am currently unable to edit any videos taken from my webcam. The audio plays at supersonic speed, making me sound like Mighty Mouse on helium and I have yet to find any way to fix this (or explain why it is happening). It happens on previous videos I open as well as new videos I film using my webcam software within Pinnacle. Having the ability to open my webcam software within Pinnacle Studio 19 Ultimate and record my video there is a nice feature but it does me no good for the time being. The audio is fine, though, if I try to edit other videos or live screen captures. I wish I could wait and post this review later on, after Ive had more time to figure out my problems and actually use this program, but Vine program rules demand that I post a review now.

So, all I can really talk about here are the features Ive read about. One new feature I really like is audio ducking. It seems like everybody and their brother are using musical backgrounds on YouTube these days, and I hate that because as often as not the music is too loud and makes it hard to hear what the person is saying. Auto ducking allows you to tone down the volume of the background audio during the narration of the video. If you’re going to use music in your videos, I highly recommend taking advantage of this feature.

If you’re a really fancy videographer and have a setup with multiple cameras, Pinnacle Studio 19 Ultimate features a really great tool for synching your videos for up to six camera angles and two audio tracks. That is probably not a feature I will be using, but I have watched some tutorial videos about it and find it really impressive. People also seem to be excited about the addition of project bins, which afford you the advantage of grouping all of your files for each project together.

Obviously, given the problems Im having importing webcam videos, I cant give this product five stars. Even if the problem is entirely my own fault, it should not be so difficult to find help in identifying and troubleshooting the problem. Overall, this looks like really good video editing software not very intuitive but certainly powerful. Ive encountered no error messages or slow processing times working with my files, so it seems to be a very stable video editing program (unlike several other programs Ive used in the past). If Im able to fix my audio problem with webcam captures, Ill update this review or add that information as a comment.