Roxio VideoWave 7 Professional review

Verdict:

Review Date: 15 Nov 2004

Price when reviewed: inc VAT

Reviewed By: Ben Pitt

Our Rating 2 stars out of 5

Review
Specs

VideoWave is a well-established video-editing program that has always had the interests of inexperienced home users at heart.

Version 7 sees a new look for the software as part of its integration with Roxio Creator 7, a suite of media-editing and disc-burning applications. It's still available separately for only a little less than Creator 7.

VideoWave's CineMagic mode allows you to select some raw footage and a soundtrack, choose from a number of styles, including a Silent Movie or Martian Disco, and leave the software to create a fully edited video. The results can be amusing, but the novelty soon wears off. The StoryBuilder is a little better. It is entirely wizard-based, but leaves your footage largely free of nonsensical effects.

VideoWave's manual editing tools are fairly conventional, with a choice of storyboard or timeline to compile and edit clips. In the timeline, view effects, text, soundtrack and video overlays each have a track, although with barely any user control over the effects and transitions. Using them usually just involves placing them on the timeline.

This should mean VideoWave is easy to use but, sadly, the opposite is true. Navigating the timeline is fiddly and you can't adjust the start point of effects or text without upsetting the end point. Previews are generally smooth, but complex effects make the preview window unresponsive and even the mouse grinds to a halt.

There are some welcome features, such as Motion Pictures for panning and zooming across video clips and customisable DVD menu layouts, but VideoWave can't hope to compete with Adobe Premiere Elements for power. If you just want something simple, stick with Windows Movie Maker 2, which comes bundled with XP Service Pack 2.

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