What it is: Sophisticated video-editing software

What's cool: Adobe Premiere, which works on Windows and Mac operating systems, is one of the most advanced, feature-rich programs for editing video. With it, you can correct colors, create surround-sound audio, and tack on a wide range of effects. Finished videos can be exported to Blu-ray discs or video for mobile devices. Adobe Premiere even uses speech recognition to transcribe the spoken dialogue. Just type a word or phrase in the search box, and it will find the point in the video at which it has spoken.

Drawbacks: The price is high, and Premiere isn't easy to master without some formal training. To that end, Adobe offers live and online seminars.

Price: $799

www.adobe.com/premiere