Illuminating text
 

I have some white text on a black background - let's say five lines, each with 5 words. Font size is around 28 on widescreen nicely centralised and clear to read. This is produced (at the moment) by using the text media generator - white text on black background. This part is easy.

Now this is what I want to do. As the text is read, I want the line being read to be illuminated more strongly than the others, with a smooth transition of the enhancement moving line to line as each line in turn is read. It would be nice if it was like a light was behind the text, highlighting the text required.

Is there anyway of doing this?

Instead of 1 media generator, use FIVE. In each of them, make ONE line highlighted. Then just do a crossfade between the various events do dissolve to the next highlighted line.

Thanks Edward. Very helpful.

Now...having tried that I see that I want the text, once it has appeared, to stay but be faded down in intensity as the next line apears and is read.

I presume a key frame will be used somehow, with each media generator event stretching from the time it appears to the end when all the text is on the screen...

I was thinking have ALL lines in each media generate but only ONE line bold.

However, you could have three events per line - the first and third media generator would have that individual line normal and the middle one would have that one line bold (or however you're emphasizing it). Then crossfade from the normal to the bold at the proper time and then crossfade back to another normal one.

Once you start experimenting, I think you'll find there are MANY alternatives you might want to try! :-)

Go to the Properties tab of the text event and lower the value in the box labeled Text Color (the Alpha value).
This should give you what you want and can be keyframed if you want to.

Thanks Mike, I think that is what I want.

I may have asked this yonks ago (I haven't done any editing for quite a while and seem to have forgotten a few things! :-( ), but is there any way to have the cursor in the keyframe window moving in sync with the cursor in the main window as it moves down the timeline? This means I could listen to the audio and stop it at the point I want to put a new keyframe in, rather than do it by trial and error.

One other question I may as well ask here also:
I have my text being illuminated as discussed so far, but now my lines of text are more than can fit on one screen. So...the audio/reading (which the text is tracking for reinforcement) is down to the bottom of the screen, and now I want to rapidly scroll down the text (I want this movement to be seen) to get the rest of my text onto the screen as the voice continues.

In my text 'Generated Media' window I can write all my text no trouble, and place it in the optimum position, but when I go to the 'Pan and Crop' window I can only access that text that is on the screen, not the text below the screen which I now want to bring up onto the screen.

How can I either expand the 'Pan and Crop' screen so it includes all my text - which I can then pan to, or do something equivilent?

No. However, I get "around" this by having the selection on a playing loop and move/adjust items in REALTIME. But no, and it is something that most Users want, and many have posted requests for too.

No, you don't get to see the extra text in Pan/Crop. You have to do this within the SONY Text Generated Media. You can do away with P/C altogether and adjust the PLACEMENT options in Generated Media Text. If you have text outside of the Placement window then you need to adjust the X:Y coords by inserting a minus " - " sign to get either below the horizon in the Y coord and the same for X coord. Not many people know that!!!

Pan/Crop is a great feature for Panning and Cropping. Th one issue this has for Users is that it is rarely understood by those coming to it for the first time. It is the FRAME of a virtual camera. So IF your text is below the horizon and you use a Tilt in Pan/Crop that which is outside of the Frame will not be seen. Having ALL your text "seen" has to be done/achieved in the Text module you elect. Pan/Crop is, what I like to term, a virtual camera. What ain't there, it wont see!

HTH

Grazie

Thanks Grazie:

But how do you keyframe 'Text generated media'?

Renton, I'm assuming that, as you mentioned previously, you want to keyframe the movement of the text media so that it rapidly scrolls down the screen.
If that's the case, you would go to the Placement tab in the text event and change the Y value to a negative number.
You'll have to play with the value to get the desired effect but this is an aspect of text that can be keyframed.
Remember that you'll need additional keyframes before and after the movement occurs to "hold" the text at the desired position.

I just found the keyframe thingi at the bottom of the placement window. I knew they hid there but didn't drag up on this particular window so missed it. I think I have it cracked now.

Thanks guys.

Got it. Thanks for your help in pointing me in the right direction.

However, it sure is a pain not to have those two cursors running in sync. Why doesn't Sony do something about that!!!?

That's a feature that has has been asked for numerous times.
Needless to say, we're still waiting for it :-(

edit: before Grazie beats me to it, a workaround is to loop the section and add & adjust keyframes on the fly.
The ability to do this (looping/adjusting) is another reason why I like Vegas.

Yeah, good one Mike! I've been out all day filming a Community Mosaic project otherwise I'd have GOTCHA! back . ..

Grazie

Grazie, I knew there had to be a reason why you didn't respond in your usual immediate fashion :-)

Re: Illuminating text
 

Just to reactivate this thread...

Has Sony got around to enabling syncing between cursor in the pan/crop keyframe timeline and the cursor in the main editing window yet?