Entered CNET Catalog: 09/15/2004
SKU: 25530001
Manufacturer: Adobe Systems
Manufacturer description
Adobe Premiere Elements software offers the perfect combination of creative control and reliability for home video editing. It automates tedious tasks so you're free to create cool effects and transitions and easily burn DVDs.CNET editors' review
- Editors' Choice: No
- Reviewed on: 06/29/2005
Juggling the various panels on our 17-inch CRT display was pretty annoying; we had to enlarge windows to see their contents, which caused them to overlap, so we constantly needed to click windows to bring them forward. In many cases, however, you can drag the tabs out of one window and combine them with another to save space.
With its standard Adobe multipanel interface, Elements will probably look familiar to Adobe veterans and jarring to everyone else.
Unlike with competing products, which tend to force you into specific modules for different tasks, you'll find only a loose organization to Premiere Elements, which lets you work in whatever order you're most comfortable. You add video, audio, and still photos to the Media panel in the top left and view your work in the Monitor panel in the top center. The timeline stretches along the bottom; it begins with two video and two audio tracks, although you can add up to 99 of each. A How To panel sits in the top right, ready to help (although as soon as you're comfortable, you'll want to ditch it in order to make room on your screen). Finally, Capture, Edit, Effects, Title, DVD, and Export buttons along the top quickly bring you to other parts of the program. If you've tried other consumer-level programs, you might wonder where Adobe Premiere Elements' quick-and-dirty video Wizard is. But it's not that kind of program. There's no instant-video option, such as the one in Ulead VideoStudio, that can automatically capture, segment, add music, and burn your DVD in a few simple steps. Instead, the program offers more subtle and powerful capabilities.
When you've finished with your editing, the program lets you add a professional-looking DVD menu (choose from seven different categories, such as Travel and Wedding) and burn a DVD or export to QuickTime, Windows Media, MPEG, or tape. If you export to a video format, you can then select the size and frame rate you prefer.
For a first version, Premiere Elements is a beautifully stable product. We tested it for days and never experienced so much as a hiccup. Importing, editing, and burning all went smoothly. Adobe Premiere Elements' features show its professional-level pedigree; for better and worse, so do its support options. The 177-page manual does a tolerable job of explaining the basics, but it's a sloppy truncation of the full version's manual; for example, there's a note to read up on keyframes on page 233. The electronic files are better and delve more deeply into the program's features. The program also comes with a training DVD so that you can work your way through various lessons. But Adobe falls down when it comes to more advanced support. The Web site offers scant help files; the user forums are the best resource. Unpardonably, you get no free phone or e-mail support and can contact Adobe for free only if you're having installation troubles or if the product is defective. Otherwise, Adobe asks you to shell out either $39 for a phone call or $159 per year for Expert Support, which allows you unlimited calls. Those are support options for people on corporate budgets, not home users.
User opinions
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User Rating: 
6/10
Good but...
Pros: Easy to use. I burned my first DVD of our recent holiday right out of the gate without looking at the manual. My wife was very impressed! Title page, different transitions, music, etc...
Cons: The pictures seem fuzzy. They are not as clear on the DVD as they are in the Olympus Master software. I will have to see if I can fix that.
Review:
I am very pleased with the results and the ease of use with my first attempt. I have to figure out why the pictures are not as clear as Olympus Master 2 software, which came with my camera.
Updated on Sep 20, 2008I would recomend this product to anyone who would like to display their pictures with a professional looking presentation.
Updated on Sep 20, 2008I would recomend this product to anyone who would like to display their pictures with a professional looking presentation.
User Rating: 
1/10
Cannot record live from camera
Pros: Have not discovered them yet
Cons: Cannot record live or use clips from computer
Review:
If you want to record live from a camera (without recording to onboard tape first), search online and you will find the advice to turn off automatic scene detection. This is possible only with the Pro version. It also would not compile video clips taken with another software package (Pinnacle). The program is totally useless to me, since these are the only things I need it for - recording live classical music without the subtle hums and rattles of a camera mechanism, or perhaps (as I had hoped) compiling them into a dvd at something more than the glacial speed of Pinnacle.
User Rating: 
2/10
Desapointing on (too) many points
Pros: Good appearance, Hability to do reverse video. Nice tittles
Cons: No 16:9 ratio
Review:
I thought that this package came with 16:9 aspect ratio. I guess not, or is it my 1.8 Ghz limitation that prevent from selecting this mode. Is Adobe still in the 20th century ? Waste of $120.
1. Cannot do pan and zoom on still photos. This is a must for a half decent video editor. Not in this package. Sorry. Why?
2. Cannot edit part of the sound track, i.e. lowering the volume for part of a track, unless you cut the track and lower the sound for that portion.
My main beef, no 16:9 aspect ratio. So much for my big screen. Sorry Adobe, this is a no go. I am deleting the program. Hope you can use my $120 to improve your product.
Louis Larocque
1. Cannot do pan and zoom on still photos. This is a must for a half decent video editor. Not in this package. Sorry. Why?
2. Cannot edit part of the sound track, i.e. lowering the volume for part of a track, unless you cut the track and lower the sound for that portion.
My main beef, no 16:9 aspect ratio. So much for my big screen. Sorry Adobe, this is a no go. I am deleting the program. Hope you can use my $120 to improve your product.
Louis Larocque
User Rating: 
3/10
Warning: Use of Premier Elements 3.0 may lead to male pattern baldness
Pros: easy to import clips
Cons: very user un-friendly, confusing controls, absolutely usless manual
Review:
Warning! Use of Adobe Premier Elements may lead to male pattern baldness... on account of you ripping out your hair.
I purchased Elements to make a slidshow of our new pet dog, a very simple task indeed. Needless to say It's been a week and I still haven't gotten any farther than when I started.
First off I am a very experinced computer user, so most programs are easy for me learn.
The layout of the program seems to be well defined, it is easy to see the project that you are working on, and navigate between editing and previewing. I put together a small slide show, importing the music and the slides was very easy. However, that's about as far as it goes. APE is one of those programs that has a mind of it's own, like the programmers are playing a cruel joke on the world. It does off the wall things for no apparent reason and refuses to do the simplest of taks. i.e. I wanted to lengthen all the slides in my slideshow to match the length of the song that I had selected. I have been through the manual many times (completely useless), and for some reason it refuses to do so. Now the music and slides are not matching. There is no way to make the slides any longer, except one at a time. Then for some unknown reason the soundtrack doubled, and started playing on top of itself, etc, etc, etc. There was no soundtrack in the "audio 2" section, so your guess is as good as mine. Thank god for the ctrl-z. This only one on a laundry list of headaches I've had so far in the 10 days I've owned this program.
So if you are looking to spend the $70+ for the program you'd be better off rolling it up and eating it. It HAS to be better for your health, than dealing with this program.
I purchased Elements to make a slidshow of our new pet dog, a very simple task indeed. Needless to say It's been a week and I still haven't gotten any farther than when I started.
First off I am a very experinced computer user, so most programs are easy for me learn.
The layout of the program seems to be well defined, it is easy to see the project that you are working on, and navigate between editing and previewing. I put together a small slide show, importing the music and the slides was very easy. However, that's about as far as it goes. APE is one of those programs that has a mind of it's own, like the programmers are playing a cruel joke on the world. It does off the wall things for no apparent reason and refuses to do the simplest of taks. i.e. I wanted to lengthen all the slides in my slideshow to match the length of the song that I had selected. I have been through the manual many times (completely useless), and for some reason it refuses to do so. Now the music and slides are not matching. There is no way to make the slides any longer, except one at a time. Then for some unknown reason the soundtrack doubled, and started playing on top of itself, etc, etc, etc. There was no soundtrack in the "audio 2" section, so your guess is as good as mine. Thank god for the ctrl-z. This only one on a laundry list of headaches I've had so far in the 10 days I've owned this program.
So if you are looking to spend the $70+ for the program you'd be better off rolling it up and eating it. It HAS to be better for your health, than dealing with this program.
User Rating: 3/10
Good luck burning a DVD
Pros: Professional style editing.
Cons: DVD burning slow, fails often.
Review:
I've been using Adobe Photoshop and Premiere for some time now. I've had to self train. Although there have been some ups and downs, I've always been able to muddle through just about every problem until now. I can't burn a movie to DVD. I have a great new system, fast dual processors, losts of virt mem and hard drive space but can't burn a 2 hour movie to DVD. I can burn photoshop slideshows, tutorials and other things but not a movie. Cant' find much on the problem I'm having with the "error, memory allocation problem. I rate this product poor because it can't deliver a complete package.
User Rating: 2/10
Better luck next time
Pros: First video clip loaded
Cons: Wouldn't load a second clip
Review:
"Premiere" as far as it goes - as in the sense of 'first.' Program refuses to import a second clip of video. This strikes me as problematic for movie making software. Maybe Second Elements will be better.
User Rating: 2/10
Very poor product
Pros: I dont know
Cons: It does not work vell
Review:
The product has two very important flows. The porduct does not allow capturing video via a USB II port. The product does not handle well MPEG format; it simple blows up
User Rating: 
5/10
Good but manual useless.
Pros: Intuitive. Puts out good quality finished production.
Cons: Owner's manual not helpful enough.
Review:
This is a good product but learning how best to utilize it has been a stuggle. The manual that came with the software seems to only touch the surface and is not user friendly. The index in the back is sparce and there's simply not enough educational material available to self learn this software. I'd love to see a much more comprehensive teaching manual made available by the manufacturer or others well versed in the product.
User Rating: 
9/10
Super awesome!
Pros: Stable! Once you learn the interface this program because super powerful! Fast and intelligent!
Cons: Not for the computer illiterate
Review:
Super powerful. Never has video editing been so easy to take from camcorder to DVD. I love this software! I highly recommend purchasing the bundle pack that includes Photoshop elements. These two programs allow you to do so much together!
The only downside is that this software is not for the newbie. You must have a fair amount of computer skills. But even if you don't, Adobe offers a ton of training online at their website (for an additional charge), but this software is definitely worth it!
The only downside is that this software is not for the newbie. You must have a fair amount of computer skills. But even if you don't, Adobe offers a ton of training online at their website (for an additional charge), but this software is definitely worth it!
User Rating: 
4/10
Wait for next version
Pros: Sophisticated editing features
Cons: Multiple - see below
Review:
After struggling to find powerful and reliable video editing software for the home, I was delighted that Adobe decided to enter this market. The product is promising, but there are a number of critical problems that make me wish I'd waited for the next version.
1. The documentation is poor. Although there is a great training video included, this only covers the basics. Good luck trying to figure out how to use the rest of the options, particularly the Advanced Effects.
2. There is limited ability to handle video originally from non-digital source since timecode is absent. The only scene detection method is based on timecode.
3. The encoding process is relatively slow. Although you can encode to a folder. There is no way to make a DVD from the folder that will play on a set top DVD player. If you want to burn directly to DVD, there is no way to set burn speed (a problem if you have 8X drive and 4X disks).
4. The number of title animation options is limited to two, scroll and crawl.
5. There are no image mattes include (solid color backgrounds).
6. There are stability problems during encoding. The program can freeze and the problem is sometimes difficult to fix. See Adobe web site FAQ.
1. The documentation is poor. Although there is a great training video included, this only covers the basics. Good luck trying to figure out how to use the rest of the options, particularly the Advanced Effects.
2. There is limited ability to handle video originally from non-digital source since timecode is absent. The only scene detection method is based on timecode.
3. The encoding process is relatively slow. Although you can encode to a folder. There is no way to make a DVD from the folder that will play on a set top DVD player. If you want to burn directly to DVD, there is no way to set burn speed (a problem if you have 8X drive and 4X disks).
4. The number of title animation options is limited to two, scroll and crawl.
5. There are no image mattes include (solid color backgrounds).
6. There are stability problems during encoding. The program can freeze and the problem is sometimes difficult to fix. See Adobe web site FAQ.
User Rating: 3/10
Softw. ok, manual completely useless, online manuals expensive rip-offs. All designed to squeeze you
Pros: powerful software
Cons: complex to manage, manual so useless that its purpose is to direct you to adobe's website where another book and oline training offer the same than the original book. A planned rip-off
Review:
complex to manage, manual so useless that its purpose is to direct you to adobe's website where another book and oline training are exactly the same as the original book. A well planned rip-off.I have never seen such predatory behaviour in a well established software company. Shame on them.
User Rating: 
8/10
Easy, quick, excellent results first time.
Pros: Simple automatic capture and clip generation
Cons: Limited audio control, fade and cross fade
Review:
The easiest video editor that I have found, good value. Better audio control would be appreciated.
User Rating: 9/10
Spectacular Editor and the price makes it even better!
Pros: 99 a/v tracks, nice arry of filters and effects for audio and video, wireframe ability, keyframe ability, a form of scene-detection when capturing, runs fast and stable and is easy to operate
Cons: Limited to DVD templents when makeing a DVD,
Review:
I have been using this program for several months and am a quick learner so I know a good deal about what is going on here.
This program rocks! When I first used it I couldn't believe that I got it for only $100! Amazing! I recently did a documentary about an organization that I belong to and it went without a hitch and had awesome crowd results (which was a big plus for me and I knew it wouldn't have been possible if I was still using my old Pinnacle software).
But now to the important stuff:
The fact that it supported 99 a/v tracks was the biggest reason for me to buy this software (and it was well worth it). You don't know how important A/V tracks are untill you see what you can do with them.
The video filters and effects that come with the program are pretty darn nice. The color correction works pretty good for the areas I used it in and the extreme custumability of effects and the ability to save effects as presets is an awesome feature that I use on a regualar basis.
The audio effects and filters that come with the program also rock. You don't see what this program gives you in many other cheap consumer editior products.
Keyframing to create motion is quite easy and striaght forward (and if you need help the manual is pretty good).
The program also supports a wide variety of formats (beyond the basic .avi and .jpg) that you can import (If you are a Pinnacle 9 switch over user like me though, don't expect your MPEG2 files to work. That really stinks for me).
There are some things that bother me alot though. One is the Pinnacle MPEG2 import problem I allready stated.
Another is that sometimes the video and audio gradually become out of snyc. Like in the beginning it is fine, but towards the end it can be way off.
Tech support. To my knowledge there is none. Well, there is, but you have to pay for a year subscription or something stupid like that if you want it. The best you will get for tech support is the user forums (which aren't half bad) but if you have a techy program glitchy type issue thing that the common man can't understand, you are pretty much out. They do have this one area on their website though that allows you to report bugs in the software. However, last time I checked, the submit button is a broken link (which I think they may have done on purpose) and it was really annoying because I spent like a half hour typing all the tech issues out and then lost them.
The last main issue I have is that the DVD creating part of the program lacks the custumability and freedom that the editing part of the program shines in. In the DVD part you are limited to premade templates that you stick text in, in fixed areas on the screen. Major let down to an otherwise insanely good program.
Video capture is pretty darn easy. I had no problems at all though my camcorders firewire port. The program says it can't capture anolog (a/v though your composite red, white, and yellow cables) but I don't know if there is a way around that or not. So until then, its only digital footage you will be working with unless you capture your anolog somewhere else.
I am so happy with this program that I am taking my projects that I had done allready in Pinnacle and redoing them again in Elements!
So here is the bottom line on Adobe Premiere Elements:
Excellent editor that gives you alot of features that I used to only be able to find in really expensive programs. This program also seems to be quite stable in running which was a major problem I had with Pinnacle.
However, a newbie user may be a little intimidated by its workspace. It is set up the way a professional program would look. This can be quite confusing to a someone who has never edited before (I was okay though because I have been using pro programs like Final Cut Pro for quite some time). It will be well worth the time learning the interface though because your results will be amazing.
A+ Product that I have yet seen beat in this price range. Buy it, you will be happy you did. This program is cheap, but not cheap.
This program rocks! When I first used it I couldn't believe that I got it for only $100! Amazing! I recently did a documentary about an organization that I belong to and it went without a hitch and had awesome crowd results (which was a big plus for me and I knew it wouldn't have been possible if I was still using my old Pinnacle software).
But now to the important stuff:
The fact that it supported 99 a/v tracks was the biggest reason for me to buy this software (and it was well worth it). You don't know how important A/V tracks are untill you see what you can do with them.
The video filters and effects that come with the program are pretty darn nice. The color correction works pretty good for the areas I used it in and the extreme custumability of effects and the ability to save effects as presets is an awesome feature that I use on a regualar basis.
The audio effects and filters that come with the program also rock. You don't see what this program gives you in many other cheap consumer editior products.
Keyframing to create motion is quite easy and striaght forward (and if you need help the manual is pretty good).
The program also supports a wide variety of formats (beyond the basic .avi and .jpg) that you can import (If you are a Pinnacle 9 switch over user like me though, don't expect your MPEG2 files to work. That really stinks for me).
There are some things that bother me alot though. One is the Pinnacle MPEG2 import problem I allready stated.
Another is that sometimes the video and audio gradually become out of snyc. Like in the beginning it is fine, but towards the end it can be way off.
Tech support. To my knowledge there is none. Well, there is, but you have to pay for a year subscription or something stupid like that if you want it. The best you will get for tech support is the user forums (which aren't half bad) but if you have a techy program glitchy type issue thing that the common man can't understand, you are pretty much out. They do have this one area on their website though that allows you to report bugs in the software. However, last time I checked, the submit button is a broken link (which I think they may have done on purpose) and it was really annoying because I spent like a half hour typing all the tech issues out and then lost them.
The last main issue I have is that the DVD creating part of the program lacks the custumability and freedom that the editing part of the program shines in. In the DVD part you are limited to premade templates that you stick text in, in fixed areas on the screen. Major let down to an otherwise insanely good program.
Video capture is pretty darn easy. I had no problems at all though my camcorders firewire port. The program says it can't capture anolog (a/v though your composite red, white, and yellow cables) but I don't know if there is a way around that or not. So until then, its only digital footage you will be working with unless you capture your anolog somewhere else.
I am so happy with this program that I am taking my projects that I had done allready in Pinnacle and redoing them again in Elements!
So here is the bottom line on Adobe Premiere Elements:
Excellent editor that gives you alot of features that I used to only be able to find in really expensive programs. This program also seems to be quite stable in running which was a major problem I had with Pinnacle.
However, a newbie user may be a little intimidated by its workspace. It is set up the way a professional program would look. This can be quite confusing to a someone who has never edited before (I was okay though because I have been using pro programs like Final Cut Pro for quite some time). It will be well worth the time learning the interface though because your results will be amazing.
A+ Product that I have yet seen beat in this price range. Buy it, you will be happy you did. This program is cheap, but not cheap.
