Alternative to buggy Premiere Elements?

[brian505]

I'm a long time user of Photoshop Elements and have been reasonably happy with it.

Recently, I decided that I wanted to produce videos for family consumption.  I purchased Premiere Elements.

The number of times that Premiere Elements has crashed is really frustrating.  It's happened during multiple different operations. I question how much QA was done on this product and it was released months ago -- so I would expect many of those bugs to be fixed.

What would be a good alternative to Premier Elements?  I'm still looking for a relatively simple video editing/production solution and it's not clear to me which of the Adobe products should be considered.  Maybe it's time to look elsewhere.

Thanks

[Steve Grisetti]

You don't say what hardware or even operating system you're using, what model of camcorder or phone your video will be coming from and how much you're willing to spend, but all of those are factors. Also how deep you wan to get into video editing and what you plan to do with it when you're done. That's why there are so many alternatives: There are so many variables, and one size most definitely does not fit all. And a product that is not a fit for you may well be a perfect fit for me.

That said, at the Premiere Elements level you should check out CyberLink PowerDirector, Vegas Movie Studio Platinum and Pinnacle Studio. If you want more professional features  the Premiere Pro CC package is the industry standard. And if you want a free program that might well do everything you need, you should definitely check out DaVinci Resolve.

As I said, there's no one size fits all solution. It's like shopping for a car. Only you can decide what fits your needs. So plan to do lots of test driving.

[brian505]

Steve,

I appreciate your detailed response.  I'm on high-end PC with Windows 10.  Video will be mostly coming from mine and other family members iPhones.  I would spend up to $300 on this but am still looking for something simple -- I know that many are moving to subscription model so that might work better for me.  Not looking for pro features.

I'll check out the alternatives that you mentioned.  I wasn't sure if there were other Adobe products that I should be looking at (apart from the more "pro" Premiere Pro CC).

I would stay with Premiere Elements if it was more stable. As a software architect, I can't tolerate software with those issues.

Thanks . . . . Brian

[Bill Sprague]

"I would stay with Premiere Elements if it was more stable. As a software architect..."

I'm only a 10 year user.  Started with version 9.   I use off the shelf consumer cameras and have never had any "bugs" cause me trouble.   Apple, in their need to push, can get ahead of "conventional".   Phones using variable frame rates and H.264 are examples.  I don't have an iPhone, but if you set it to "most compatable" choices, you may not have any trouble with Premiere Elements.

Good luck!  Steve list of choices is good.   But, it may be that Apple wants you to buy in to nothing besides Final Cut Pro on an Apple computer. 

[Steve Grisetti]

I'm a 16 year user of the program. I've edited with every version of Premiere Elements Adobe has ever released. And with rare exceptions (Version 8.0 was kind of messy, necessistating Adobe to quickly release a patch) I've never experienced bugginess.

But as we always say, your mileage may vary. That's why there are alternatives out there.

(By the way, you may notice that I did NOT recommend Adobe's Premiere Rush as an alternative worth looking into.)

[brian505]

The project that I was working on, when I experienced crashes (in different places), was combining 50 videos that I'd received into one "birthday greeting".  Looking at your post and others that I have seen, maybe it was something to do with all the different frame rates.  Those videos were probably created on a wide variety of devices.

[Bill Sprague]

"notice that I did NOT recommend Adobe's Premiere Rush"

I've tried it.   The workflow concept is to start with shooting and editing on your phone.  Quickly get it to YouTube and then polish it on your computer.   In may case, it doesn't work because the live connection between phone and computer is way to slow.   When I asked an "expert" the answer was that it is aimed at very short videos.   

[Bill Sprague]

"Those videos were probably created on a wide variety of devices."

That makes sense.  It may also be that a single clip or even a few clips have flaws.  Too many different frame rates, codecs, formats, etc. could make any software choke!

[Lee in Ohio]

@Bill Sprague One of the common issue I run into: it seems when I have green or blue screen keyed image in a higher track the the program plays up to the start of that imaged and there the video freezes and the audio keeps on playing.  The only solution is to save my work, exit and restart the app.  Then is usually works right by that point.  I say usually.  Sometimes nothing fixes that issue.  I windup moving the image to another track or some such tinkering.  Sometimes even sliding it a few frames fixes it.

[Bill Sprague]

Lee,

You brought a 2 1/2 year old topic back to the top!  I've passed through two versions and one computer since then.  I still don't have problems with Premiere Elements.  I've also been experimenting with a couple other video editing programs and follow their respective blogs and forums.  It seems that video editors are complex enough that they all crash occasionally.  

[eric154A]

I have had nothing but problems with premier elements 2018, Adobe no longer supports it after only 2 years, so their support told me to kick rocks. I'm just out $75, and now looking for a better alternative. I can't image it will be too hard.

Windows 10 Pro, i7-8700k, RTX2080ti, 32gb ram, 256ssd, Windows is up to date, and I have tried 4 sets of nvidia drivers, reinstalled the program, and elements crashes every single time. 4k video came from a gopro hero 7 black.

[Steve Grisetti]

Please see my original response to the original poster above. There are lots of alternatives out there, but only you will know what works for you.

[Bill Sprague]

"4k video came from a gopro hero 7 black."

What were the record settings.  Any chance it was HEVC/H.265?  

[Lee in Ohio]

@brian505  I've had the same issues with Premier Elements.  I've run several editions on a couple of machines.  Curently running on Windows 11. With a high end AMD Ryzen 5 5600G  Processor with Radeon 3900 graphics processor.  32G RAM.

Like previous version on previous machines it crashes a lot.  Freezes.  Sometimes the audio continues and the video freezes.  I like the product.  Have used it for years going back to version I do know what.  I have looked at other software.  But I know Premier.  I like it.  I do not want to take time from my work flow to learn something new.  I just wish they would fix the #%$@ thing so it worked.

@Steve Grisetti .  I've learned so much from your YouTube videos.  Thanks buddy.

[John T Smith]

There are 3 people in this message, talking about different problems
brian505 has Win10 and is editing iphone video from many different people
Lee in Ohio has Win11 does not describe video that is being edited
eric154A has Win11 and is editing 4k video from a gopro
.
iphone video almost always uses Variable Frame Rate and needs to be converted to Constant Frame Rate with https://handbrake.fr/ open source transcoder/converter
.
gopro video is also problematic, especially at a high frame rate, and may work better after handbrake
.
I mainly edit my own Canon SX510 camera MOV files at 1280x720 and 30fps and output to DVD
.
I have also added cell phone video from an Android cell phone with no conversion needed
.
I will not buy a 4k camera, but I did want to test my new computer with some 4k video
I downloaded some sample files from https://4ksamples.tumblr.com/ - zero problems
.
What I have, with ZERO problems
Windows 11 Pro 64bit version 22H2
Premiere Elements 2021 upgraded to version 2021.4
Intel i9-10900k in Motherboard ASUS Prime Z490-P
64Gig Ram and GTX 1650 MSI-GeForce-128-Bit-Graphics with 4 Gig video ram
- nvidia STUDIO driver (NOT the Gaming driver)
- motherboard automatically turned integrated Intel video off when installed GTX
TEAMGROUP 512Gig SSD for Windows and programs and usual MS Office Documents files
500Gig SSD Temporary work files and output when creating new video files
1T SSD Video and sound files from camera and other sources

[Bill Sprague]

I mainly edit my own Canon SX510 camera MOV files at 1280x720 and 30fps and output to DVD
.

By @John T Smith

I admire your loyalty to your camera!   I have a long time favorite Panasonic TM900 that I don't use much anymore.   It is about 2 years older than yours and still works well.  My current favorite takes great video but also flies while doing so!

[John T Smith]

I do pictures and home/vacation video with my Canon and it works well for my needs... if I was doing video of sports or other 'fast moving' subjects I might have to consider a different camera, but 'normal speed' movement is not a problem with what I have... the Canon even has a 'sort of good' wind noise reduction mode for outside

I don't remember the model but I used to have a Panasonic movie only camera that recorded to 8mm cassette tapes and required a Firewire connection to get the video to my computer... when that camera died (drive motor) I bought the Canon that saves video to an SD card so getting the files to my computer was as easy as connecting a USB cable and using Windows file manager