360 Camera Basics 360 Camera Software and Platforms 360 Camera Techniques

Easy and free tutorial on how to edit 360 videos (with affordable software)

easy free tutorial for how to edit a 360 video
easy free tutorial for how to edit a 360 video

Do you want to learn how to edit 360 videos but maybe you haven’t learned yet because it looks too hard, or perhaps you were put off by the cost of popular but expensive subscription-based video editing software (cough cough)? In this easy and free 2-part tutorial, I will show you how to edit 360 videos even if you’ve never edited videos before. We’ll use Magix Movie Edit Pro Plus 2018, an affordable video editing software with 360 video editing capability. However, the concepts also apply to most other video editors.

Here is a very easy tutorial for editing a 360 video, even if you’ve never edited a video before (360 or otherwise). By the time you complete Part 1 and Part 2, you’ll be able to achieve all the effects shown in the introduction of the video.

There are many 360 video editing software, including a few that are free.  Free video editing software can handle most simple tasks such as a majority of the techniques shown in Part 1 of this tutorial.  Here are some free video editing software:

V360 – iOS, Android
Veer – iOS, Android
Collect 360 – Android
Virb Edit – Windows, Mac

But if you want to do the techniques in Part 2, you need to get full featured video editing software.  Some of them, such as Adobe Premiere Pro, can be expensive (Premiere requires a subscription of $20 per month).  One affordable software that is still quite capable is Magix Movie Edit Pro Plus 2018, which is the software I used for this tutorial (currently on sale here).  You can download a trial version for free so you can try these yourself.

Part 1 of the tutorial is here:

TABLE OF CONTENTS for Part 1:
0:32 – Why use a 360 camera? Why should you edit a 360 video?
4:59 – How to adjust brightness, color, and color temperature without losing contrast
8:08 – How to add music and blend it with the original soundtrack, or replace the soundtrack.
10:34 – How to add fade in and fade out
14:55 – How to combine two or 360 videos or 360 photos to create a montage or slideshow
17:34 – How to add transitions

Part 2 covers advanced techniques such as tiny planet videos and the overcapture effect:

TABLE OF CONTENTS for Part 2:
0:43 – How to level the horizon; why should you straighten the horizon? How to level the horizon automatically.
3:05 – How to stitch 360 videos using Magix’s built-in 360 video stitcher
7:40 – How to add titles, photos, and non-360 videos to a 360 video (picture in picture effect)
11:06 – How to create a tiny planet video or rabbit hole video
14:53 – How to transform tiny planet videos using keyframing
19:49 – How to create overcapture videos (reframed 360 videos) and why to use it

Please hit the like button on the videos and please share them with your family and friends!  Thank you very much!

If you don’t have a 360 camera yet, check out these stabilized 360 cameras:
Insta360 ONE (less than $250 with discount code). Discount code: GB11.11ConE. Also available on Amazon (without a discount).
– Xiaomi Mijia Mi Sphere (~$225): https://goo.gl/CxDdiQ Discount codes here. Also available on Amazon (without a discount).
Ricoh Theta V ($399)
If you have a tight budget, check out how to choose 360 camera for under $150.

About the author

Mic Ty

8 Comments

Click here to post a comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

  • Does video stabilization work with 360 videos on Magix? I am trying to find a simple, inexpensive way to both stabilize my 360 videos and fix the horizon.

    Cyberlink’s PowerDirector 16 can do 360 video stabilization, and it works very well. It only cost me ~$50. However, I cannot find any feature in that app to fix the horizion. Several clips of mine have tilted horizons.

    Magix Movie Editor is similarly priced, and you’ve shown it can easily fix the horizon. However, I can’t find any information on stabilization for shaky videos. I don’t want to use a horizon keyframe every second to manually stabilize.

    Can either of those inexpensive software editors do both stabilization and horizon reprojection? Or is the only solution to use both, first fixing the horizon in one then stabilizing in the other? I’m frustrated and surprised that PowerDirector can’t do a simple horizon fix.

    I have the Xiaomi Mijia Mi Sphere 360 camera, so my videos aren’t too shaky, but it often has a skewed horizon. I don’t always have the time to start the camera up on a stable, level ground to get the horizon set.

    Any suggestions? I suppose I could purchase both pieces of software and still only pay ~$100.

  • Hey, im useing a xiaomi mijia mi spherer camera and i use the Mi Spere camera app on my computer to stich the footage. Then i use Virb Edit to create videos.

    Here comes the tricky part ive started useing the Hyperframe wich has turned out great and works perfectly in the VirbEdit, the only issue is that as soon as i want to export the video it dosent give me the option to save it as a hyperframe video.
    So the videos just ends upp being saved as regular 360 videos without the hyperframe?…

    + that if i try to share thru VirbEdit in the upper right corner the software just crashes?

    If anyone has any tips on whats wrong with my VirbEdit i would be very thankfull for any help.

  • Hi,

    Thanks for all your usefull info about Insta360 One.

    I am trying to use “Magix Edit Pro 2016 Premium” to edit Insta360 processed stills and videos into a 360 video. After editing the video/stills, I am using the following export settings:

    ______________________________________
    Workflow for 360 video using Magix 2016

    edit movie/stills
    export movie:
    video as mp4
    resolution 3840 x 1920
    ___________________________________________

    When the created movie is played in “Insta360 Player”, there is a black circle at the top (apex) of the exported movie.

    Do you know of any settings/procedures I should change to avoid the black circle?

    Thanks,

    Al

  • Hi,

    Thanks for all your usefull info about Insta360 One.

    I am trying to use “Magix Edit Pro 2016 Premium” to edit Insta360 processed stills and videos into a 360 video. After getting the video setup I am using the following export settings:

    ______________________________________
    Workflow for 360 video using Magix 2016

    edit movie
    export movie:
    video as mp4
    resolution 3840 x 1920
    ___________________________________________

    When the created movie is used, there is a black circle at the top (apex) of the movie.

    Do you know of any settings/procdures I should change to avoid the black circle?

    Thanks,

    Al

    • Hi Al. It could be a player issue. Try a different player such as gopro vr player.

      best regards,
      mic

  • Hi Mic,

    I am trying trial version of the MAGIX software. I try to stitch the spherical video. It looks ok except that the transition between the 2 sides front and back, the brightness is brighter than both sides of the video, so it looks like a light bar in the transition area. Is there any way to fix that?

    I just bought the camera, I am not sure if I am doing exporting correctly, as the video quality when I get from the desktop app is not as sharp as when I get from output of MAGIX (stitching video, just that MAGIX has brightness problem). Is this normal, or should I get the same sharpness from output of Desktop Mi Sphere App 1.1.0.20