video editing help

[scifibarbie]

Hey guys,

Most of you are pretty smart (I think) .

I was wondering if anyone could recommend an easy to use video editing program.

Im trying to make some mini clips about 1-2 minutes in length from a video made when one of my teachers from japan visited.

I converted the files easy enough, now i need help chopping them up into little tiny bits. I converted them to *.wmv files thinking hey, moviemaker..its windows right..oi vey! Should i convert them to another file format, say *.avi or something to make working on them easier?

Any help would be most awesome!

thanks
scifi

[darkstorme]

I assume you're using Windows?

If you want to chop it up, I'd grab the original video (converting to/from wmv can be lossy) and put it through VirtualDub.

If you want a nonlinear editor, sadly, WMM is about as good as free gets on Windows.  There are a few Linux options, but the fact of the matter is that unless you're prepared to shell out for a professional editing suite, the choices are limited.

Hope that helps!

[Dorganath]

If the source videos were MPEG, you might look at Womble and one of their products.  I've used MPEG-VCR for chopping commercials out of my old DVR recordings. It was basic as anything, but fast and it did the job for simple editing.

[Tanman]

Check out VideoSpin. Seems to be a fully featuyredvideo editor that can import majority of files. And best of all..its free! (it can out put to a file but not a dvd)

[G.Giant]

Also, do you have the original files?  As mpgs or whatever?  Because it's best not to turn them into wmv or avi or anything until after they've been edited.  Work with the original video files in the highest possibly quality and then compress the finished product.  

It's also best not to compress the video file at all if you're going to put it on DVD, because you'll really notice the compression lowering the quality on a TV screen.  

Good luck!