Video editing software
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Video editing software is application software which handles the editing of video sequences on a computer. In the simplest case the video is stored as JPEG image files in a directory. The software typically shows one image on a large area on the screen and a view of the directory. To handle many files in the directory, it is possible to zoom out, so that a single file only covers one pixel-line in the editor, or even less, for rough cutting. A play button lets the software automatically advance to the next image, thus playing the video. Additionally JPEG images can be losslessly rotated 90 degree or mirrored and hence the editing software also supports this. Of course multiple files at once can be selected for any such operation. In this respect it is very similar to slide show editing software. Like slide show editing software comes with a lot of image file format decoders video editing software comes with a lot of video codecs. Video editing software generally also allows for some limited editing of the audio clips which accompany the video, or at least the ability to sync the audio with the video.
At the cost of decreasing the image quality it can add special effects and transitions; and it sometimes includes the ability to encode the video for creation of a DVD, Web video, mobile phone video, or video podcast.
Media 100, Lightworks, Sony Vegas, Avid, Adobe Premiere, Ulead VideoStudio and Apple's Final Cut Pro are pioneers in video editing software and have a great influence on how films and TV programs are edited. The most popular of these programs are Avid, Adobe Premiere and Final Cut Pro (in no particular order). Some of these systems use custom hardware for video processing.
Several other software programs can be classified in this category, including Microsoft's Windows Movie Maker, iMovie, NERO 8 Ultra, GEAR Software's GEAR Video, Pinnacle Systems' MediaSuite, muvee Technologies' muveeNow and autoProducer. Virtual Dub is a popular Open Source video editor with some powerful features, but lacks the intuitive drag-and-drop timeline interface of high priced editors.
With the availability of commodity video processing specialist video editing cards, and computers designed specifically for non-linear video editing, many software packages are now available to work with them.
