I use the Avid Liquid 7.2 software and edit in HD from my Canon HV30.
The DVD's I prepare are of course Standard Definition. If I do get a Blu Ray player and want to burn my finished product to a Blu Ray disc what options do I have sticking with Liquid for editing.
AW 4 has been mentioned but it's expensive compared with say Movie Factory 7.
I am not after anything fancy but I do use the 5.1 surround sound option on liquid.
You can use Pinnacle Studio after rendering the HD file in Liquid, my memory is going but if you do a search I posted about this around 18 months ago as a solution.
From comments I have picked up, transfering the finished Liquid edit to software for Blu Ray is possible but you loose the 5.1 surround sound. Transferring even to Avid Studio is again not possible so if I want to go Blu Ray then Avid Liquid will have to be dumped.
Avid Studio, from information gathered, is also very buggy at this stage but hopefully may improve over time but possibly knowing Pinnacle they will introduce 'New Avid Studio' or 'Avid Studio 2' and it will be back to square one with problems.
Perhaps the alternative would be to go the Sony Vegas route but the expense for an an amateur who just edits his holiday videos etc is a bit OTT however it may be the only option.
MovieFactory's quite a good way to go to BD. That's my 'better than Edius' alternative.
I don't think Movie Factory has gone Blu Ray yet, I coulod be wrong but the problem is when you complete the project in 'Liquid' with 5.1 Surround Sound then you cannot get that 'sound' onto a blu ray via another writing programme such as Movie Factory.
Edius has still not got '5.1 surround sound' such as Vegas, Liquid and even Pinnacle and Avid Studio has.
MF 7 does BD, or at least, my copy of it does.