Edit on a Dime

Apple is famous for their easy to use consumer software such as Garage Band and iMovie. However, I've found their apps a little hard to use. Why?

How do you review an app that refuses to work for you? I was quite excited this week to review iCinegraph, an iPhone App that simplifies the creation of cinemagraphs. However, if this was a car review it'd be the kind of review where the car under consideration is never able to start (do those reviews even exist?). The reviewer has the keys to the automobile, the interior lights come on, and perhaps there's air conditioning. But, the car itself? Unfortunately, it never moves on its own power.

Cinemagraphs are those incredible video-photo-mashups that isolate movement in a moving frame. Don't know what I'm talking about? Then check out these fantastic examples on If We Don't Remember Me.

Happy Monday to all of you out there, thankfully the Consumer Electronics Show is now behind us.

This year's Consumer Electronics Show is nearing an end so of course it's an occasion for the 'best of' lists. To save you time I thought I'd compile my 'best of' the 'best of' lists.

The battle to be the videoeditor for your iPhone continues with the debut today of Cinefy at CES. An app that promises to bring 'Hollywood-style' visual and audio effects to your phone, Cinefy comes loaded with over 50 effects to add to your movies as well as a library of copyright cleared songs.

Since the launch of Edit on a Dime several weeks ago, I've been putting a variety of automatic video editing apps though their paces. One of the first tested was Magisto, a web-based app that's directly accessed through YouTube, which I enjoyed, but found some obvious problems with. Since then, I've been in contact with Oren Boiman, CEO and founder of Magisto, who was kind enough to address my concerns.

Just as they promised, SightEra Technologies, creator of automatic video editor Magisto, has released an app for the iPhone.

Continuing the march of consumer electronics companies to put video editors in every possible device, it seems Sony is about to unveil a new video editor called PlayMemories Studio for the PlayStation 3.

It's been a fun week here at Edit on a Dime, and not just because I drove around LA for an hour with an iPhone taped to the hood of my car for a review. Here's what I was up to:

Two weeks ago I reviewed browser-based video editor WeVideo and was amazed. Amazed not because WeVideo is a competent iMovie replacement for the casual editor (which it is), but amazed that a browser-based editor can work at all.

There's a race on to see who'll be the Instagram of moving pictures. This makes sense, since many of our phones are clogged with video that, so far, no one is going to see. Wouldn't it be great if there were a simple app that could take our video content, edit it for us, and then publish it to all of our networks?

We're continuing to deliver editing app tips, tricks and reviews-a-plenty here at Edit on a Dime. Let's look at what we talked about this week:

Last week I had a quick look at V.I.K.T.O.R, the anthropomorphized automated editing app that lives on your iPhone, and today it's time to put it to work.

In the age of automatic video editors and all around software-assisted creativity, how can a humble blogger help people master a program if said program does all the work for you?

Welcome, dear readers, to week two of Edit on a Dime, the community for inexpensive, and, dare I say it, free in many cases, editing software.

According to Ryan Lawler over at GigaOM, automatic editing of that ridiculous amount of video and photos you've collected on your phone is the next big frontier for apps.

Ok, so perhaps V.I.K.T.O.R. won't replace Walter Murch or Thelma Schoonmaker anytime soon, but this app that automatically assembles clips and photos from your iPhone and transforms them into mini-movies is another viable example of software-assisted creativity.

Today I'll be detailing how to use the two YouTube Video Editors to enhance the quality of your work, as well as going over a simple workaround to save time uploading the variety of clips you'll need to assemble a more complicated piece of filmmaking.

I write for a movie site called Flixist, a sister-site of Destructoid. Basically, I write movie news, reviews, features, and interviews. I wrote this for our feature series Flixist Film School. It's a primer into film editing technique.

Hey there guys. I'm starting this Forum thread to introduce Edit on a Dime. The question is—what topics, tutorials and reviews would we find useful? There is such a wide spectrum to talk about in the world of free and inexpensive apps. Are people interested in how-to's on finding and using these apps, or would it be more helpful to focus on technique? Your opinions and thoughts are appreciated.