Video Workshop can help you perform various operations involving video. It has an unattractive interface, in which tabs serve to separate different functions, such as playback, conversion, trimming, merging and mixing. In my opinion, this is a conceptual flaw. Such functions are so logically integrated that there is no real need to separate them. However, this design may contribute to making the program easier to use.
Unfortunately, just a few formats can be played by this application; however, it is fair to recognize that the most widely used formats, such as AVI, MPG, WMV, ASF, MOV, QT and WMA, are supported. While you watch the movies, you can also take snapshots of the desired frames. It also supports zooming the movie to different sizes. Unfortunately, it does not allow you to create a playlist.
For conversion, the tool allows the same formats it supports for playback. It is a pity that it does not allow converting batches; therefore, files should be processed one by one. Multiple profiles based on the supported formats are available. Moreover, they are accompanied by a description of their usage, which facilitates selecting the one best suited for our purpose. Unfortunately, the program does not allow creating new profiles.
The application also allows you to extract a segment from a video file. The operation is easy: all you need to do is to set the start and end times for the clip. It is very convenient that the program supports frame-by-frame playback. However, it cannot perform automatic scene detection, a feature that could facilitate the process of finding the exact cutting points. It is a shame that only one fragment can be extracted during a work session. The rest of the process is similar to converting: you just need to choose an output profile to convert to. However, the tool does not allow extracting without re-encoding the fragment, which could save you a lot of time.
Merging various files is as easy as choosing the source files, putting them in order and selecting an output profile for the resulting file. Precious time can be lost again as you cannot merge files with the same format without re-encoding. Finally, mixing consists of changing a video’s audio track. You just need to import the input video and audio files and choose a profile for the output file.
All in all, Video Workshop did not meet my expectations. While it is true that it can let you play and modify video, it lacks unity among its features. Let us suppose that I need to merge contents from two files, but I want to use just a fragment from each of them. First, I should open each of the source files to trim them separately and save them by other names. After that, I should merge the new files, and no matter if I had taken the precaution of converting them exactly to the same output profile, I would need to wait until they are re-encoded again. As you can see the procedure would be unnecessarily complicated. Other applications with a similar purpose can help you solve this problem more efficiently.
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