- If you're looking for a heap of great effects
and animations to help make your videos look awesome,
then Red Giant Universe could be a great option.
In this video, we're gonna run through my thoughts
and a full review of Red Giant Universe,
exactly what it is, and who I'd recommend it for.
(upbeat music)
Hey it's Justin Brown here from Primal Video,
we release a ton of content to help you get better results
with your videos faster.
If you're new here, then make sure you click
that big subscribe button, and all the links
to everything that we mention in this video,
you can find linked down below.
So let's jump into it.
The way that you apply effects in video editing
can make or break your videos.
If you apply poor quality effects
or you do it incorrectly, it can really destroy
the quality of your videos, but on the flip side,
is proper use of good effects can really lift
them up to a whole new level.
It's an important part of the video production process,
and we've released a heap of videos in the past
around customizing out video intros
and titles and animations all to help you guys
create some custom and professional branding in your videos.
So when Red Giant reached out, asking us if we'd like
to check out Red Giant Universe,
which offers a whole range of effects and transitions
out of the box, we couldn't really say no.
Now it's really important to know here
that this is not a paid promotion,
it's not a sponsored video, Red Giant
just gave us access to try out Universe,
and after testing it out, we wanted to share it
with you guys because we think it's definitely gonna
be of use to some of you.
So in this video, we're gonna run through what
Red Giant Universe is, how it can help,
and my review and recommendations on who it's best for
after putting it to the test.
And make sure you stick around 'til the end,
'cause I'm gonna cover my top three tips
for speeding up editing for anyone
considering using Universe.
So what is Red Giant Universe?
Well it's a set of effects and transitions
that aren't what you get built into any standard
video editing software.
These are actually useful and professional looking,
which definitely aren't the ones that come built in.
These are the ones that you've normally gotta tweak
and create yourself.
So things like picture in picture, but not just ordinary
picture in picture effect, control over the effect
to actually have it looking good
and have it looking professional.
So adding things like diagonal lines and animations,
these would normally take so much time to create
up in Adobe After Effects or Apple Motion
to have a good looking effect,
whereas all of this is built in.
So you're getting a really high level of professional
grade effects that you can just drag and drop
onto your timeline.
It also includes things like motion titles
and animation effects, and line animations,
glitches, light effects, professional transitions,
and even lens distortion correction,
which I think is absolutely awesome.
So that's where if you've got footage,
like off a GoPro, so it's a really fisheye,
or really wide angle lens, you can drag and drop on
the lens distortion corrector,
and that will make it look like it was shot
on a regular video camera, which is awesome.
Universe also includes a heap of effects
and transitions and looks that can easily
be drag and dropped onto your videos,
and the one license fee works across
Adobe After Effects, Adobe Premier, Final Cut,
Apple Motion, VEGAS, Davinci Resolve, and HitFilm,
so that's pretty awesome that the one license fee
will actually work across as many of these applications
as you've got installed.
Now I'd say that a lot of people out there
would only have one of these applications installed,
but I know that a lot of professionals jump between
different programs, depending on the projects
that they're working on.
So me for example, I've got Final Cut installed,
I've got Davinci Resolve installed,
I've got After Effects, I've got Premiere,
and on Windows, I've got Magix installed as well.
So it works across all of those programs
and depending on which one I'm using,
for different project, or testing out videos and things
for you guys, I have access to those plugins.
And the other thing there is that it works
across both Mac and PC, but the biggest feature here
is how fast it is to use.
Now we've done some reviews previously on this channel
where we've told you about plugins and things to use,
but once you drag them onto the timeline,
then all your performance goes out the window,
so we'd always suggest that you apply those plugins last,
so that you're able to edit your footage still
without slowing your computer down to a halt.
But these effect work really, really fast,
and they're all GPU rendered,
which means that they're gonna take the load off your CPU
or your processor and use your video card
to render these back, which means
that in a lot of cases, even on lower end systems,
you can actually play some of these effects back
and use them in realtime.
So the price then, that you're probably all hanging for
at this point is just $99 per year.
And again, that works on both Mac and PC,
and across a huge range of video editing software as well,
and there's also a trial version available as well.
So we've got a link down in the description below
to where you can get access to the trial version
before you get your credit card out for that $99 per year.
So honestly, when I first looked at this offering,
Red Giant Universe, I thought it would be something
that I wouldn't use and I also thought
it would be something that would just slow down
the editing process and the rendering to add all
these cool effects and titles and things on,
but I was really blown away by the performance there.
So everything for us is about editing efficiently
and creating the best process for getting videos in
and getting them out, but getting them so they look
good as well, and this is something that I think
definitely takes your production levels up a notch
without slowing down the rest of the process.
So that is key as far as I'm concerned,
so anything that can allow you to do that,
is something that I wanna recommend to you guys,
and that's why we're creating this video.
So in my opinion, who this is good for,
if you're a professional, then you should definitely
have this, that's a no brainer.
But if you're just creating videos for YouTube,
if you're creating videos for business,
then I still think this is a no brainer at that price point.
I think if you're serious about creating videos
and you wanna create videos that look good
and look professional, without slowing down
the production process, then it's definitely worth
at least grabbing the trial version
and seeing how these effects work for you
with your editing workflow.
Just the ability to have these presets
and to have them so easy to use,
but also to have them so they don't slow down
your system every time you add them on
is a massive, massive thing, and I guarantee you
that these plugins are going to help you with your editing,
and help you take your videos up a notch.
So then the flip side is, who is this not good for?
Well obviously it's not good for anyone
that doesn't have one of those applications,
so if you're not editing on a professional editing
application or a top level application
like Final Cut, like Premiere, like Davinci Resolve,
then this obviously isn't for you.
It's also not for you if you're not going to be making
money off your videos.
If you're just creating videos for YouTube,
and you're not making money off those videos,
then I would say don't bother spending the money,
unless you really, really want to.
This is for people that are really serious
about creating high quality videos
and are looking for the best and the most efficient way
to create effects and animations and titles and things
in their videos, then this is for you.
And I guess the last point to note there,
that I've been asked to include in these videos,
in these reviews is, will I actually be using
this product or service?
Will I actually be using Red Giant Universe myself?
The answer is yes, I've already been using it,
I've just used it on three corporate projects
and it saved a heap of time.
So will I be using it?
Yes.
Do I recommend it?
Yes.
So now on to the top three effects or tips for speeding up
editing with Universe.
The first one, as we've already mentioned,
is the picture in picture effect.
I really, really love that effect
that you can add, and it's not your typical
picture in picture effect that you're used to seeing
on cheap or low end video editing software.
This is the high end stuff, with the diagonal lines
and bringing in the different clips at different times
to really get some polished effects.
You can do this directly in your timeline now
with this effect, so that's a really, really
powerful one that I've already used on
a couple of projects, and it's interesting
because we did a video a while back talking about
how not to use these effects,
not to use built in effects.
I guess these aren't built in ones,
these are the ones you should use,
but it's awesome to now have these essentially built in
to your video editing software,
without having to have these external.
So the picture in picture one is definitely one
that's worth checking out and worth playing with.
The second effect that's going to save you a heap of time
in your editing, and also give you some
really, really cool results is, it's a motion graphics
effect, and it's called logo motion,
and what this does, is it's a heap of built in templates
around animation.
So you can slide in your logos,
you can animate things in, it works on text as well,
the same plugin is there for text,
but you can animate things so easily
by just dragging presets on.
So it could be that you have a logo
that comes in from the side and bounces in,
so it's that really subtle movement
that you would normally have to go to After Effects
or Apple Motion to get, but you can now drag
and drop these in your timelines.
That's a really, really powerful one
if you're gonna bring up multiple logos,
or you're gonna bring up multiple dot points and things,
you can bring them in now with a way
that looks really polished and really professional.
And the third thing is the built in transitions.
These are gonna save you a heap of time
to get really awesome transitions.
There's two of them that are stand out for me,
but there's a heap in there that are definitely
worth checking out, and these two are exposure blur
and halflight.
Now I've already used both of these in corporate work,
and again, it's going to save you a heap of time
because you won't have to export to After Effects
and play around with Apple Motion to be able to create
these effects, they're literally drag and drop,
that you just drop them on your project,
and they're there.
And you can customize them up further
to really dial in the look that you're after,
but the fact that these are all realtime,
the fact that they're drag and drop,
they save you a heap of time to get your
videos looking good.
Now on the topic of editing, if you're looking
to edit faster and get better results without
any wasted time or rework, then check out
the video onscreen now, which runs through
the ultimate video editing process,
and it includes a free checklist guide
to help get you started.
I'll see you soon.