Adobe Premiere Elements 14 Review

January 12, 2016 | Vincent Oliver | Software Reviews | Rating star Rating star Rating star Rating star Half rating star

At the bottom of the screen are a further tab options, Tools, Transitions, Titles & Text, fx Effects, Music and Graphics.  The Tools panel contains some useful features such as; Freeze Frame, for grabbing a still image from the timeline, this can be used in your production or save it for use in another application. Motion tracking, follow an object or person and apply a graphic to the object, handy for masking over something that is objectionable in a shot. Movie Menu, add menus to your movie before burning to disc. Pan & Zoom, add animation to still photos or movies. Time remapping, slow or speed up your footage for some great effects. The second tab under tools is audio, an Audio mixer lets you control the sound levels for multi track audio, up to 10 tracks can be adjusted with L&R Balance and volume levels. Narration, record a voice over track for your production, for greater clarity work from scripted content.

Adobe Premiere Elements 14A rotated clip may have black frame edges, these can be hidden by adjusting the scale of the frame, here we have increased the scale to 122%

Adobe Premiere Elements 14Assets can be viewed as a series of thumbnails, just drag a thumbnail onto the timeline to add it to your production. The sound mixer is useful for mixing ambient tracks and music together, up to 10 channels can be edited

The next tab is Transitions, add some great effects to make a transition between clips, PE14 includes several predefined transitions including; Dissolves,  3D Motion, New Blue transitions, Page Peel, Zoom, Slide, Wipe, Stretch etc. Each transition can be customised to give priority to the left or right clip or centre, plus a transition duration. There are also a couple of Audio transitions for Gain control.  The next tab is for adding Titles and Text to your production, there are predefined styles to work with including many animated titles, these can all be customised to match your production.

Adobe Premiere Elements 14Premiere Elements 14 includes many transitions to give your production a professional look

The FX Effects tab enables you to add several effects to a clip; many of the effects are similar to the ones you may be already familiar with in Photoshop;  Blur, Sharpen, Colour Correct, Distort, Old Film look, Cartoon, Painting effects. There is also a Keying effect, this enables you to incorporate green/blue screen cut outs into your footage.

Adobe Premiere Elements 14Animated titles and text can be added at any stage

The next tab Music, this has a selection of canned music scores that you can use in your production, however, the music is computer generated, you would have to be desperate to use it in any quality production. There is also a collection of sound effects which include useful sounds such as crashes, explosions and ambient noise, there are also many odd sounds such as Car wash, Auto repair shops.

The final tab is Graphics, from here you can add an animated or static graphic into your production, these can be useful for opening and end screens. A wide variety of graphics include; Animated Objects, Animals, Birds, Babies, Speech Bubbles, Costumes, Food, Holidays, Home, Miscellaneous, Music, Nature, Sports and Hobbies. Just drag and drop a graphic onto the timeline and then rescale it via the handles and position it in the desired location.

Adobe Premiere Elements 14Easily Export your video to social media sites. Or share video with other devices

Adobe Premiere Elements 14Settings can be changed in the preferences, be sure to select PAL for European systems or NTSC for North America

At the top of the screen are two tabs, Create and Export & Share. The create tab offers two options; Video Story and Instant Movie. The Video story invites you to add photos, video and audio files and then follow a series of screens to build a story for you. The Instant Movie option works in a similar fashion just add clips and select a theme from the templates, then PE14 adds in effects and transitions plus a music track. Render times were long and I wasn't convinced with the end result.

Finally, using the Export and Share tab, export the completed movie to your favourite Social media web site (YouTube, Facebook, Vimeo) or create a DVD with menu for distribution. The export options are clear and simple to follow.

Conclusion

Having used the professional version of Adobe Premiere for a number of years I have learnt most of the tricks and shortcuts to making a great looking production. Now, having worked with Adobe Premiere Elements 14 for a few weeks, I am impressed with what can be accomplished with the minimum amount of effort.  Adobe Premieree Elements 14 gives you the facility to easily produce and share professional looking videos. There is plenty of help and tips for each step of the process, so there isn't any excuse for not producing the next home block buster or cat video for YouTube viewers. 

Pros

  • Simplicity of use
  • Built in templates
  • Export and Share
  • Keying and other Effects
  • 4K editing
  • Price

Cons

  • Time consuming
  • Guided tab is uninspiring
  • Needs powerful computer for 4K
  • Create Instant movie can be slow to render
  • Supplied Canned music

4.5 stars

Ratings (out of 5)
Features 4
Ease-of-use 5
Value for money 4.5

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