Vegas Video discussions from 2004 (Q1Q2)
 

Check out http://www.vegastrainingandtools.com for details.

file formats and alpha channels
 

Hello,

can you make a 32 bit targa image, with a hole cut into((transparent) and drag it onto the timeline (track above the video) and see the video below through the hole??
If not Targa, whcih file formats will work?? tiff,photoshop etc ??

Thanks,
mike m.

rendering for DVD Architect
 

Hi folks,

New Vegas 4.0d + DVD Architect user here. I have been through Douglas Spotted Eagle's video training, and there are obviously many, many things I can do to modify my video.

However, just starting out, I only want to render out to DVD Architect w/o really modifying my project at all. I saw nowhere in the videos where he really detailed how to render out for use with DVD authoring software.

I am trying to render using the highest quality and using a DVD Architect 24p widescreen template. The render takes about 1.5 hours. When I go into Architect, it tells me that the video will have to be recompressed, which is strange as the documentation states that if you render the Vegas project in Architect type format, you should not have to recompress.

Also, I will have to render the audio separately. Does anyone have a source I can go to that will take me through this process? My doc. that came with Vegas, the Quick Start Manual, references very high page numbers to refer to for some of my questions(page 270, page 305, etc), which are way past the 100 pages of the quick start guide.

What doc. should I be looking at to accomplish what I am trying to do?

Thanks, Jeff

If the rendered file is too large to fit on the DVD, it will still have to recompress. How long was this project? How large was the MPG file? When you rendered to AC3, how large was that file? How many/how complicated were the menus?

The absolute SIMPLEST way is to render to a DV-AVI file and let DVD Architect to the conversion for you. Then you can use the slider to adjust the bitrate in order to get everything to fit.

If you want more control, render to MPEG in Vegas BUT use the custom button and change the average bitrate to match the length of your video.

You may want to look at the newsletter I wrote that discusses this topic (don't remember the issue # off the top of my head). Find that issue here: http://www.jetdv.com/tts

Hi Jeff,
I'm not an DVD-A owner (I use Movie Factory) but I have DSE's book and have a reference for you. Check pages 377-383. The answer to your questions are there. In short, you need to produce an MPEG-2 file (use best quality) before a DVD authoring program can use it. If it's not MPEG-2, it will re-render to put it into that format. Hope this helps.
Randy

Any format that allows alpha channel should work fine. However, you may have to right-click the clip, choose properties, and then change the alpha-channel option to the proper type.

Hello,

Ok, Edward, you nailed it again.. thanks..That is just what i was looking for.. Going into properties and clicking on the alpha channel did the trick..

Thanks..
Mike m.

thanks for the info. folks. I will have to get his book since I think it covers more ground than the videos.

I did get the process to work, but the results are terrible. I rendered in Vegas using DVD Architect NTSC Widescreen MPEG-2 format. It then rendered in about 1 hour.

I then brought up the .veg project in architect, and it told me it would have to re-compress even though it was an architect usable file.

I set the bit rate to the highest rate of 9 and it said that it would use 66% of my DVD media. the original matrerial was probably about 45 minutes of DV tape. Also, I didn't even mess with attempting to render the audio as I just wanted to get some "RAW" video out to DVD as I had never burned one before.

It then took over 3 hours to re-compress in Architect, probably because it was working on already compressed MPEG-2 data from Vegas? The results look really, really bad. Lot's of noise, washed out, looks like a VHS camcorder recording from 10 years ago instead of the pristine appearance as it looks coming directly off my GL2.

I'm ordering his book off Amazon as of right now!

Yes, if it's recompressing a compressed file, it WILL look worse. What happens if you just give DVD-A an AVI instead of the MPEG file? Then it will only be compressed ONCE (by DVDA).

Yes, rendering using the DVD-A presets should create a file compatible with DVDA. And, in fact, they always have for me. However, I've never tried a widescreen DVD.

thanks very much for the thread to the training documents. Very good stuff.

I will render a Windows .avi file into DVD-A then compress there and see what happens.

BTW, should a 50 minute DV video that's been captured require 3 hr 10 min. to render an .avi file in Vegas? That's how long the counter tells me this will take.

If that's normal ok, but it seems like a really long time.

I am rendering to a non-system and non-Vegas HDD which is an SATA 10K WD Raptor. My PC uses the Canterwood P875 Intel motherboard, 3.2 HZ EE processor, 2 GB of Corsair XMS memory and an ATI Radeon 9800 Pro 256 MB graphics card.

One other expectation question. Once I do everything right, can I expect the video I burn onto DVD to look virtually as good as the DV source? I understand it's MPEG-2 and compressed from here to Sunday.

I originally thought that DVD authoring was the way I wanted to archive my personal DV footage rather than have to keep my camera close by and attached to my tv for playing back memories, but maybe DVD is more of a convenience storage mechanism than a pristine copy of what was shot???

Can't wait to get Doug's book to get the skinny on all of this.....

Jeff,
DVD is the way to go. Everyone I've burned looks really good. Much better than VHS and almost as good as the commercial DVD's (I've got a digital 8 camera or I bet it would be as good). As for the rendering...that's normal. In fact, it's faster than I would get with my pokey 866 MHz Dell. There are a lot of factors involved such as processor speed, complexity of the file (transitions, pan/crop, opacity changes, slowmo, other effects, etc.) and show length. Sounds like you are on the right track. By the way, I'd recommend you stay with the templates for rendering except for changing the quality to best under the custom setting. That way you can trouble shoot easier. Hope this helps.
Randy

after editing render a Windows .avi file UNCOMPRESSED( you must go into custom mode) IT will be HUGE but great quality, im talken GIGS here, mega big! or mp2 which is pretty good but still compressed also smaller. Take that and put it into DVD architect.

You do NOT want to render to UNCOMPRESSED - render to DV-AVI instead. This will be about 13Gig per hour.

As for the rendering time, it really depends on several factors (including your computer)

1) how many effects have been added?
2) how many dissolves?
3) how many titles?
4) how fast is your computer.

In other words, how many sections REALLY need to be rendered?

Also, remember that "time" is an estimate. It could be totally different in the final result.

Animation from still frames
 

What is the simplest way to create a video sequence from still images, such as JPEG files from a digital camera, in Vegas?

Thanks!

- GLupien

Hi Gordon,
Vegas is great for doing this. Load your images on your computer in one file (digital camera, scan, etc.). Number them in the order of you want them to show up in your show (use 3 places - 001, 002, etc., to rename each file). Now, open a new file in Vegas. Go to options>preferences>editing tab and change the new still image length to 8.00 seconds (my preference). Check the automatically overlap multiple selected media box, then in the cut to overlap conversion, make that 2.00 seconds. Click apply and close the window. Now go to your media bin and click on the add media button. Navigate to where your pictures are and highlight them all and drag them in. Now just click on one of the pictures (they should all highlight) and drag them to the timeline. Everyone one should be the same length with a two second overlap with the crossfade transition already loaded. Now you can edit at will. This saves much time. Pay attention to your aspect ratio of each picture, add some pan/crop, titles, music, etc. Hope this helps!
Randy

Jeff there was one thing you said that raised a flag. You mentioned you used the DVD Architect 24p Widescreen template. What camera are you shooting with? The only combination that I think would make this template legitament would be shooting with a DVX100 w/ an anamorphic lense. If your shooting with a GL-2 like your profile says- there should be no circumstance why you would want to use a 24p template. This could be the reason why DVDA is trying to re-render.

thanks Gene,

yes you are correct, that was a fat finger in the post. I originally tried "DVD Architect compatible NTSC widescreen", and it was compressing in MPEG-2 in Vegas, then again in DVD-A.

I rendered using "windows .avi" per several suggestions, and as soon as I get back with some Taiyo Yuden media, I hope to begin 8x DVD burning!

thanks again.

Just go to File - Open, pick the first image, and check the box that says "load image sequence". Then they will be loaded as a series of frames.

If they are a series of still from which you want to make a slide show, just drag them to the timeline and use Randy's suggestions to change the default length and overlap amounts.

Audio Sync failure due to speed difference
 

Hey guys,

I need your help. I recently did a multicam set of for a christmas musical. My attempt to capture sound directly for the board to a s-vhs deck failed. The only decent audio tracks that I have available are from 3 on-cam mics. The audio engineered burned my a copy of the program's audio that was RECORDED ON A CASSETTE TAPE onto a CD. The tracks that I got from this CD (when sync with my original audio) are a little faster. I suppose it is the difference between the tape speed and mini-dv tape speed (Am I correct?) Is there anything that can be done to correct this difference? So far I have tried to make adjustments to the time-strecth feature under properties, but I am not sure what setting (method) I should use (if any). Also I tried to use the Simple Delay track FX but I don't know if that can solve the problem. Can someone please help?

Thanks.

Al

What happened when you tried to change the lenght of the audio?
If it sounds good enough to you, then it should be fine. So did it
not work, or?

What if you simply CTRL-Drag the extra audio to the correct length? Make sure you have it set to Preserve Pitch!

You can go into the audio clips' properties and set the total clip length equal to the length of the identically equivalent video clip. You will want to make sure the preserve pitch method of timestretch is selected.

<<<-- Originally posted by Bruce A. Christenson : You can go into the audio clips' properties and set the total clip length equal to the length of the identically equivalent video clip. You will want to make sure the preserve pitch method of timestretch is selected. -->>>

Hmmm.... I think we just gave two methods to do the exact same thing! That's the great thing about Vegas - so many ways to do the same thing that each person can use the method they like!

Even with Vegas' excellent audio handling I think it is too risky to stretch your audio. At least you must listen VERY carefully on quality equipment to make sure it's OK.

I would rather cut the video into pieces short enough to to keep sync "good enough" and change between them. You said it was multicam, so some cuts you must have been planning to make anyway. Sync up the pieces as best you can and keep the audio quality.

EDIT:
Slowing down or speeding up (parts of) the video tracks is probably easier to do without noticable loss of quality.

The pitch shifting filters in Vegas don't work all the time. You might be able to get away with not pitch shifting at all. You might still have to watch out for aliasing. Listen with headphones or high quality speakers to make sure nothing weird is happening. Don't set levels on headphones though (they're too good- seriously!).

Thanks guys,

It worked very well.
I used time shift under properties and preserved the pitch. The audio clips are now in synch. Unfortunately, the audio captured by the audio engineer was not the greatness. I will probably mix the audio captured by my GL2 with the audio capture by the engineer ( it seems as if he was mixing the audio for the audience and did not make adjustments for recording purposes- because the levels are off).

Thanks again!

Al

this reminds me to ask a similar/related question.

ain't DV itself mpeg2 already? why all the decoding/re-encoding? why not just dump all the digital data from dv directly to DVD but just edited with cuts (no titles, no special fx, nuthin, just plain old footage being cut up)?

No. DV and MPEG are two different animals. To put DV onto a playable DVD, it must be converted to MPEG2 first.

MPEG2 uses a totally different compression scheme than DV. DV compresses each frame but each frame is complete. MPEG creates one complete frame and then several partial frames followed by another complete frame and several partial frames...

hey
 

I was playing around with rendering video to 24frames and i went under event properties and lowered the undersample rate... its spread the event out across the board and unsynced it to the audio. I have since converted to 24 frames the correct way, but I wounder what that undersample and playback rate modifications are good for?

Michael Estepp

Please try to use a descriptive title for threads. Not everybody
has time to see each threads and a name that actually describes
the question or subject will help them find the important threads
and you to get more change of people knowing the answer.

I renamed the thread for you.

The undersample rate box allows you to simulate a lower frame rate. For example, an undersample rate of 0.5 plays the event at half its original frame rate. Each frame plays twice as long as in the origianl media file, creating a strobe effect.

Canada can no longer get Vegas...
 

Well this is disappointing... According to a few shops I have talked to, Sony has apparently severed all ties with its Canadian Distributor for Sonic Foundry products and has gone so far as to not allow American distributors to ship Vegas product to Canada.

Anyone know what's up with that? I thought that Vegas 4.0 was going to be my NLE of choice but I guess I may have to look at alternatives now...

Cheers;
Eric
Ottawa, Canada

First of all, Canadians can definitely still purchase Vegas. However, I do understand that the distribution has been changed somewhat. I know the distribution channel prices have gone up (actually they simply get less of a discount).

There are still many mail-order places that carry the product if you don't want to purchase directly from Sony. For example, Videoguys still carries the product (at a slightly higher price than last month) and I'm sure they will ship to Canada.

Hi Edward;

Good point... I guess that's true that any stock in the channel can be shipped, so individuals willing to order through someone in the states can still get it. I should be OK then in that respect .

The point though is that Canadian resellers can no longer carry the product as distribution to Canada has been halted (regardless of the price increases, etc). Hopefully this is just temporary as I gather its excellent software...

This could also be incorrect as I am relating what was told to me from a few stores where I attempted to buy...

Cheers;
Eric

If this is true, why would Sony do such a thing?

I don't know... but the folks I talked that own video software stores were quite upset. Perhaps Sony was unsatisfied with the distributors they had in Canada and are simply in a transition to replace them. I certainly hope its not a permanent thing.

Eric

Thanks, Ed, for bringing this thread to my attention. I checked with our head of marketing, and he had this to say:

"Well, what a coincidence. The execs from Sony Canada are actually in the office this week finalizing the distribution plans for the entire country. Sony works distribution country by country, and we're about to finalize things north of the border very soon. I the meantime, there's always the web store."

I met a bunch of folks from Sony Canada in the lobby this morning myself :)

Cheers,

///d@

Excellent news... and thanks for posting this infortmation. I sincerely look forward to purchasing Vegas!

Cheers;
Eric

i use a Vegas filter pack that makes the clips look like they are animation drawings ... at 30fps it looks odd because the motion is real but the images more animation so i set under sample to .20 and it/s 6fps , .27 / 8fps ..

for other clip just i want to throw them off slight in the 18-22fps area ....

also for a nice effects ( if subject has motion or camera zooms in/out ) set to 6-8fps then add motion blur in the video bus track ..

How do you play video in reverse?
 

??? Just wondering how... I didn't see a easy was when I was looking at vegas.

-Kay