Anyone sign up for the James Woo Shotcut Course?

Hi, newbie here and I was wondering if anyone has signed up to the James Woo course " Video Editing Made Easy With Shotcut Video Editor"?
It seems the Shotcut lead developer has reviewed it for accuracy and recommends it.

I was wondering if it’s good for a rookie, and I mean a complete video editor rookie, like me?!?

Thanks,
Steve in Central Vermont

I haven’t signed up, but it looks like quite a nice structured introduction to Shotcut. There are loads of free video tutorials around for Shotcut, but no series that is as well structured as this seems to be. At $29 it won’t break the bank and if you are not satisfied within 14 days James offers a refund.

I cannot say anything about the quality of this course but I was also a complete beginner when I started using Shotcut (I only used a video editor in 6th grade for very simple trimming and adding an audio track.). I recommend Mr. Eko’s tutorials on YouTube which helped me quite a lot at the beginning (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLkBD4aaXW2ILnOZ-b2QUmwWcCGCuqRg_5). Later I just used the forum or other videos on YouTube and that worked for me.
If you think you understood the basics, you could try the tutorial series of jonray, a forum member, which introduces a plethora of techniques (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhX5p_umORM).

To Elusion & samth, I decided to sign up for the videos. So far, I’m liking what I’m watching.
I did come across Mr. Eko’s tutorials and I’ll watch them too. I’m the kind of person that needs to watch several different videos just to get an idea of one thing that I’m trying to accomplish, especially if I’ve never done it before. And like I said in my original post, I am a COMPLETE newbie to this video editing stuff and some of it seems gibberish to me at first.
I’ll catch on eventually.
Thanks for the support and suggestions.

Steve

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That is good to hear.
If you need help for something particular, you can always ask (after you searched the forum :wink:). There are many around who are able and willing to help :smile:.

And with me being 60 years old…you can teach an old dog new tricks, it just takes longer for 'em to learn!!!

I checked out the trial versions of:
Adobe Premiere, Camtasia, VideoPad, ACDSee Video Studio, Magix Vegas Pro, Magix Video Pro X, Videopad and Coral Video Studio

and the following free for non-commercial use programs:
DaVinci, OpenShot, Windows Movie Maker shudder and, of course, Shotcut.

The paid software does offer a lot of things Shotcut doesn’t feature but, really, especially as a complete rookie there is nothing you’d miss using Shotcut. For ye ol’ homevideo show, cutting and rearanging downloaded videos and friends planted on your HDD Shotcut is comparatively quick to start, very tidy and easy to manage with eyes that aren’t trained and used to media editing software and tools.

When I was looking for video editing software, OpenShot and Shotcut were the first programs I tried after reading a couple of newbie help pages for video editing beginners of the below zero budget variety. Looking at all the “professional” and expensive solutions after that was actually quit sobering:

  • Shotcut loads quicker than most paid programs, because it has a clean interface and doesn’t try to roll over you with a million tools and plugins you’ll never need.
  • Everything I needed was ready for use and easily understood with a couple of quick reads in the FAQ and forums, and a minute or two for specific tasks in between editing. I made my first compilation of favorite musik videos with transitions and a couple of text titles in under 4h. Most of the 4h were used for the acutal editing and (rearranging) work and not studying. (HINT: Print out the keyboard shortcuts page you can find on the website, it’ll help you immensely)
  • It’s rather hard to completely f*:[k up your settings because there are just barely are any. No 10 pages of settings (e.g. as in Adobe Premiere) with two words per sentence you’ve never seen before in your life, just what’s really necessary to get the show on the road.
  • Shotcut is really easy to customize, just click all items in the menu to make them visible and then move their windows around and see where they best fit on the interface for your liking, or remove them if it gets to crowded.
  • Last but not least: It’s free for non-commercial use. I say it last because in my opinion that is just not the most important point when looking for the right video editor, I’d choose Shotcut over all others almost anytime even if buget size wasn’t an issue at all. (Almost because: If you do a lot of work with the audio track, e.g. dubbing on a slightly more professional level, then you’re faced with Shotcut’s, in my opinion, biggest problem and weakness: cutting, arranging, editing and mixing audio is not it’s forte.)
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Great review!! Obviously you’ve got some experience in video editing and your praise of Shotcut is a good one!
I like it, I’m not used to it, and this is my first rodeo with video editing software.

Excellent tip on printing out the keyboard shortcuts, that will help me a lot.

Thanks again,
Steve in Central Vermont

No-one has mentioned the Tux Designer tutorials on Youtube. They are really good. Recommended!

That is true but for a complete beginner I think they are not simple enough. If you are just new to Shotcut and have some basic video editing knowledge, they are perfectly fine and helpful.

I have that Web site bookmarked as well!
I have a lot of videos to watch but it’ll be worth it in the end.

It’s hot here in Central Vermont!!!
Stay cool,
Steve

The course was good enough, so the quality will be good.

So far…so good! I haven’t spent the time I wanted watching the videos but I have made it through half of them.
He’s very clear in his presentations and he covers a lot.

I like it!

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