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We already briefly tested Sony Vegas in our editing software comparison. In the meantime, the software was taken over by Magix and a software package called Vegas Post 365 was assembled, which puts all programs into a subscription with a few extras. There are different variants of this and likewise purchase versions. Between the individual programs there is supposed to be a link, similar to Adobe. What is inside the surprise bag?
The editing department in the package is called Vegas Pro, the compositing, effects and motion graphics department Vegas Effects. Added to that is Vegas Image for photo, graphics and image editing. Sound Forge for sound and Vegas Stream for livestreaming and recording. Vector graphics software is not included, but in the livestreaming and recording tool Vegas Stream, which was bought from NewBlue FX, the title generator Live2Post is also included.
Vegas Pro
The editing department in the package initially looks quite simple, everything as usual by drag and drop. But some things work somewhat differently after all, and some functions are at first a little difficult to find. In order to get started, one should best first look at the icons at the lower edge of the screen and their functions. Then one understands approximately the philosophy of the software, which is made less for keyboard artists and more for mouse pushers.
One of the most important icons is the one for activating and deactivating Ripple Edit, which by default is on Ctrl+L. Fortunately, the keyboard assignment can be set, because apart from JKL almost nothing here is unfortunately as one is used to. There is only one timeline in which work has to be done. One also first has to find the trim window behind the video preview window. There it is good that the user interface can be configured similarly to Premiere and the workspaces can be saved.
In addition to the normal colour wheels, there are also the range-limited colour wheels, with which one can set the range limits, which are also displayed as lines in the waveform display. Under certain circumstances, this can save the secondary colour correction.
The colour wheels can individually be switched to RGBY controls. What makes grading considerably easier for keyboard and mouse users, however, is the integration of the mouse wheel and above all the numeric keypad. As in other colour tools, the parameters can be reset with a double click.
Some functions are quite practical when things have to go quickly, such as the automatic crossfading of picture and sound when one pulls clips over one another, or the handle in the upper corner with which one can fade audio and video in or out. But the editing workflow itself takes some getting used to.
If one clicks above the timeline or into an empty area, loop markers are automatically created, which are also relevant for deleting. With the mouse wheel the timeline can be zoomed and moved with a mouse click on the scale. But when one has become used to this navigation, one is quite fast on the timeline and can quickly push together a tutorial.
The common features such as adaptable workspaces, adjustment layers, nested timelines, scene detection, multicam, 360-degree video and HDR editing are present, and the format support is respectable. Speaking of fast: I carried out the software tests on a ThinkPad P15. Intel Core i9-10885H at 2.40 GHz, 32 GByte RAM and an Nvidia Quadro RTX 4000 with Max-Q Design. Everything always ran fluidly.
Added to that are plenty of usable effects that can be keyframed. Corner Pinning, Stabilization, Mesh Warp, Hypersmooth SlowMo, Warp Flow Transition, Lens Correction, Automatic Slideshow, animated text templates and even a Primatte Keyer from Boris FX are included in the large package.
Social media knights will be pleased about the “Remove Black Bars” effect, which with only one mouse click places a vertical video, zoomed and blurred, once again into the background in a 16:9 timeline. In addition, there is an OFX interface, so that other third-party plug-ins such as the widespread Red Giant/Maxon plug-ins are supported, which perform well in Vegas Pro.
New AI plug-ins are available, such as colourisation and style transfer, but more on that later. Practical, above all for the production of tutorials, is the integrated Screen Capture Tool.
For good sound there is a VST interface. Some standard effects are supplied, and on top of that there is the mastering tool Ozone from iZotope. If one knows the speed of the song, one can set the grid to beats per minute instead of timecode.
Text to Speech
The Text-to-Speech function is really great. For that alone the software is worth it. I have already been using the online platform Speechelo for text layouts and timing in editing for some time. The results, however, can only be used for layouts because they sound very artificial and above all, the manner of speaking usually does not fit.
In Vegas, by contrast, the results are readily usable, at least for social media and productions that are not quite so high-quality. Even the speaking speed can be regulated by plus or minus 20 per cent, and there is a large selection of different male and female voices.
In addition, there is a good translation function, naturally with matching voices. This is naturally excellent, for example, for multilingual tutorials. In theory, one can export Vegas Pro projects as Premiere projects or FCP XML. Premiere, however, crashed during import in both cases. This is not surprising insofar as the Premiere versions are not even internally backwards-compatible.
Importing a Premiere file into Vegas Pro also triggered an error message. The XML import, however, even worked with size keyframes, which, because of the different interface system, were executed not as Zoom In but as Zoom Out.
Vegas Hub
What for some is the cloud is in Vegas the Hub. Here one gets cloud storage, audio and video footage, tutorials and a connection to the Vegas Community. Added to that is a free Mobile-to-Timeline app for Android and iOS, including up to 100 GByte of cloud space, with which one can upload videos and photos from the smartphone into the Hub. These features, however, are available exclusively in the subscription models and not in the purchase versions. In the footage selection there is much that is usable, likewise with the music and sound effects.
AI for everyone
Naturally, Vegas has a few AI tools at the start that one knows in a similar form from Photoshop. What one can do there with images can be done here with videos. There would be the colourisation of black-and-white films, which works astonishingly well, and the style transfer, with which different art styles are transferred onto the video. This can be a real eye-catcher for music videos or social media clips.
Some examples can be seen on my page postproduction-tutorials.net. These, like the trailer that I produced with Vegas Pro and Vegas Effects, were created only with audio and video footage from the Hub. Apart from my logo, naturally.
At the moment, the following languages are available for translation: Spanish, French, Italian, Japanese, Chinese (simplified), Korean, Portuguese, Danish, Dutch, Indonesian, Hindi, Malay, Thai, Polish, Russian, Swedish, Finnish, Arabic
Sound Forge
For those for whom the already extensive sound editing functions in Vegas Pro are not enough, individual audio clips can be sent to Sound Forge by right-clicking.
But caution: the program works destructively. Therefore Vegas asks whether one wants to edit the original file or would rather make a copy. For all edits can indeed be previewed, but then have to be rendered directly into the file.
There is also no multitrack mode with which one could, for example, lay out sound effects. The program is more suitable for normalising, surgical interventions with background noises, sound processing or burning a CD.
Loops in the flexible Acid Wave format can also be created very well with Sound Forge. With these, one can then build a soundtrack directly in Vegas Pro, as I did with my trailer project.
Vegas Image
This image editing program loads very quickly and is a rebrand of Imerge Pro, which comes from the HitFilm stable FXhome, with a few small adaptations for the Vegas workflow.
It feels like After Effects for images, because effects and settings can be placed here on image layers and adjustment layers. These are then rendered in non-destructively. Naturally, there are the usual blending modes, and the mask generation is cleverly solved. The files can be exported in the Vegas Effects format. If they are imported there, one immediately has access to the individual layers and can animate them.
For this, during export the software automatically creates a TIFF image with alpha channel for every layer. If the file is modified in Vegas Image and exported under the same name, it then updates itself in the opened Vegas Effects.
This is admittedly not as interactive as with Photoshop and After Effects, where one can alter layer styles and text content, but at least large images are taken over at their original size, so that no resolution is lost when zooming in Vegas Effects.
Vegas Effects
The effects module of the package is a modified version of HitFilm Pro, and one could describe it as a simplified version of After Effects. Through a right-click in Vegas Pro, clips can be opened in Vegas Effects. But unfortunately always only a single one, for which the effects set in the editing department are also not carried over.
Copy and paste of clips between the program windows does not work either. At least the effects applied in Vegas Effects are transferred directly into the editing program after a click on the Save button and displayed fluidly.
The selection of supplied effects is respectable. Alongside the usual standards such as glows, warps and colour correction, there are some that do not belong to the basic equipment of After Effects, such as Pixel Sort, Chromenator, Derez, Hyperdrive, Split Screen Masking or Neon Path.
For simple animations there are the so-called Behaviors. These are presets for movement and text animations. Sub-compositions can be created by selecting one or more layers and choosing “Make Composite Shot” with a right-click. This can be pulled back into a Composite Shot by drag and drop.
Nevertheless, the possibilities are limited in comparison with After Effects. There are no markers, no scripting and no connection of effect parameters. The text layers also cannot be animated as extensively, and there are no shape layers. Texts and masks can be extruded in Vegas Effects, but without bevel. Therefore, the edges are very hard and tend towards aliasing even with optimal project settings. That is a pity, because unlike After Effects, Vegas Effects has a real 3D workspace. A 3D particle system with some good presets is also present.
The imported 3D objects can be configured very extensively, and their rendering is then at least quite usable for motion graphics. Because the software has not existed in Vegas clothing for very long, one still does not find all that many good tutorials on the internet, and the online manual only scratches the surface. Since the functions are almost identical, however, one can watch some HitFilm Pro tutorials.
3D import file formats in Vegas Effects
- Autodesk 3ds Max, .3ds
- NewTek LightWave 3D, .lwo
- Wavefront Technologies, .obj
- Autodesk FilmBox, .fbx
- Alembic, .abc
- GL Transmission Format, .gltf
- GL Transmission Format Binary, .glb
Vegas Stream
The livestreaming and recording package lies, in terms of features, approximately between OBS and vMix. It is very clear to operate, and one can, without problems, produce complex magazine programs with several cameras, inserts and animated graphics alone.
In doing so, not only the master but all other sources can be recorded in parallel onto the hard drive. As the crowning touch, a Vegas Pro project is also automatically generated from it, so that one can fix the complete live recording in post in no time.
This recording function is very effective for producing tutorials. Streaming can be done to all common platforms, also via RTMP, and there is a virtual webcam so that one can stream in video conferences. In addition, there are NDI input and output, Data Source Spreadsheets and social media integration.
With the title tool Live2Post, which comes from NewBlue FX, attractive animated live graphics and lower thirds can be imported, in which names and texts can still be exchanged during streaming. And this even via external data sources such as Excel tables or Google Spreadsheets. Only a greenscreen keyer is still missing for me here, but perhaps that will come in a future update.
Conclusion
The package around Vegas Post 365 is already a great offer, especially if the budget is not so extensive and one does not necessarily have to work in the Adobe universe. Everything that one needs for production is included. The functions and interactions among the individual software tools are admittedly not as varied as those of Adobe, but there are some things one searches for elsewhere in vain.
Anyone who occasionally produces tutorials, livestreams and trailers is well served here, and the footage alone, the Text-to-Speech module with the translation function and the Element 3D Light in Vegas Effects are already worth the subscription, which even as a large package, at currently 22.49 euros per month, costs only a good third of the Adobe Cloud package. Naturally, there is a 30-day trial version for download, so that you can test in peace whether one can work well with the workflow.
