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Vegas Movie Studio Platinum Pro Pack takes HD video and audio production even further with tools for professional-level sound design and more video effects and transitions. Use the included Sound Forge Audio Studio software for precise audio editing and CinescoreStudio software for soundtrack creation. Upload movies to YouTube, burn to Blu-ray Disc, or author DVDs.

User Reviews about Sony Vegas Movie Studio 9 Platinum Pro Pack

I got this last year and after about six months of on & off playing with it, I am starting to make decent edits. But this product is def. not user friendly & probably not very high quality control with packaging.

I wanted to add some sound effects to a recent home video. Since I had purchased Platinum Pro Pack because of 1001 royalty free sound effects, I went looking for those sounds everywhere on my computer, My Music folder, Sony Vegas install directory but could not find them. Finally, after searching on web, I learned that sound effects are on the CD and not copied automatically.

Then I looked for Cinescore, could not find it's installation file on the CD, so I downloaded it from Sony's website but then I needed serial key which was not provided either.

Finally, one of the free plugin also require serial key but it is also not provided.

As far as Sony Vegas is concerned, I have enjoyed using it, the interface is complex but not impossible to figure out by mouse click or randomly playing with it.

Now I am starting to play with SoundForge and it seems pretty good too. There is not much need to read manual.

I just wish that my CD came with everything it advertised. I will call Sony Support today. Also will check with Amazon. And update here later. -- Missing Cinescore!!!

All of the reviews you have read about this not being user-friendly are dead on. All of the reviews you've read about this being great are dead on. I had no background in movie editing and was upgrading from the Corel movie editor (a VERY basic editor). I was worried about some reviews mentioning how Vegas Platinum would crash so I made sure my computer had an I5 processor and 6 gigs or RAM; never had a problem with Vegas even slowing down. I imagine the hardware of today has caught up to the software created for complex editing.
When I first got Vegas I was overwhelmed, confused, and frustrated to a ridiculous degree! It is NOT user friendly if you are not versed in the more complex editors in this price range or the pro-level editors. I repeat, it is NOT going to be easy for you right out of the box if you're not experienced! I bought the training book for Vegas Pro from the Vegas site because as frustrated as the program made me, I knew it was because I didn't know what I was doing. Although the book was writen for Pro, Platinum works just the same.
And here is why this program gets high marks, it works mostly like the professional software! The book (and online tutorials like on youtube: WATCH them, they help!) showed me how to's and keyboard shortcuts that make editing so much easier and faster. After some practice with 3 or 4 videos and (honestly) about 7 or 8 days of practicing, about 45 mins each time with the book and some test footage, I can proudly say that editing and splicing video is easier than making peanut butter and jelly. Space bar, enter, S key, putting your pointer on the top corner of a clip to create and adjust the length of a transistion,those few things alone will have you editing faster than you would have first thought when you were pulling out your hair the first few times you used Vegas!
For me, the book is great to have as a reference 24/7, and I would recommend it or some kind of book to help you if you're not well versed in this stuff. To me, $50 for a book made $500 worth of difference in how I feel about Vegas Platinum now.
I couldn't give it 5 stars at first because it is just too difficult to pick up right out of the box (other reviewers are dead on about this), but if the problem with the product is me and not the product, I really can't fault the product. If I can't drive a stick shift, I can't fault the car for not being easy to drive! And what happens after you learn how to drive manual? You realize its more fun!
5 stars. -- Powerful and difficult

I've experimented with several video editing software programs: Adobe Premiere Elements 7 & 8, Corel Digital Studio 2010, Roxio Creator 2010, and the video editing software that is included in the Sony Vegas Movie Studio 9 Platinum Pro-Pack. I tried all these programs on a PC running Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit, with an Intel Core i7-920 processor, 9GB RAM (DDR3-1066MHz SDRAM), and a 1GB NVIDIA GeForce GT220 graphics card. I'm not a techie. I struggle with technology and can barely operate a cell phone. I'm one of those boomers who could never get his (now antiquated) VCR to stop flashing the time. And I love Movie Studio 9. Not just the video editing part of it, but the DVD Architect Studio and Sound Forge Audio Studio software that is part of the "Pro-Pack."

There is a learning curve to using the software, and as relatively powerful as my PC is, Vegas Movie Studio (the video editing program itself, not DVD Architect or Sound Forge) has crashed on me a few times. The learning curve is made less steep by easy-to-follow tutorials that are built into the software. And while I can't say that I find the software wholly intuitive to use, it's intuitive enough that I don't feel overwhelmed by it.

The camcorders I use for recording video are: a 2nd generation Flip HD, a Vado HD, a JVC Everio GZ-HD300, and a Samsung HMX-H104. To make editing and connecting video clips in Vegas Movie Studio easy, I convert the video clips from these camcorders before attempting to do anything with them in Movie Studio. At present I convert them to WMV format or MPEG2 depending on how I plan to share them. For conversion I use a piece of software that came with the Roxio package called Video Convert 12 AKA Roxio Video Copy & Convert. I tried a couple of shareware converters (sorry, I don't recall the names), but figured I might as well use Video Convert 12 since I already owned it, and it's a real no-brainer to use. So when I go to create a movie in Vegas Movie Studio, I just use clips that I've already converted, sometimes from different cameras and formats, to WMV HD 1080 or MPEG2. (An example of when a crash has occurred is when I tried to load about 17 WMV HD 1080 clips, each between 1 and 2 minutes long, into Vegas Movie Studio at once.)

I typically create movies to put on DVDs, so that I can easily share them with family and friends who can just pop them into their DVD players. (I've never used Blue Ray so can't comment on that.) DVD Architect makes this pretty easy, though I find it somewhat less intuitive to use than Movie Studio. Again, there's a learning curve. But I have been able to create DVDs with menus that everyone I've shared them with has been able to view without any problem.

Sound Forge works great for me. I use it with a Blue Snowball Microphone and the sound quality is consistently excellent and it is easy to apply special effects to recorded sound. (For example, I recorded a short birthday greeting for my 2 year old granddaughter recently, consisting of my voice and me playing harmonica. I applied some special effects to the parts of the recordings with harmonica and left the voice parts alone, and for this grandpa this was as simple as making toast, and it was equally easy to attach the end result to an email.) Like Vegas Movie Studio, Sound Forge Studio 9.0 has easy-to-follow tutorials built into the software.

I like Premiere Elements 7 & 8, and seem to have fewer problems with them than some users report having, perhaps because my multi-processor PC is fairly powerful. But if I had to choose one video editing software program/bundle, I would go with the Sony Vegas Movie Studio 9 Platinum Pro-Pack (or, after assuring myself that it is relatively glitch-free and if I could get it at a bargain price, the recently released Sony Vegas Movie Studio HD Platinum 10 or the HD Platinum 10 Suite, both of which are sold here at Amazon). -- My hands-down favorite video editing software.