Vegas Video discussions from 2005 (Q1Q2)

[Andrew Petrie]

Is there a demo Magic Bullet I could try? I have an A64, I could see how slow it is

[Glenn Chan]

There's a demo version of Magic Bullet on their website.

http://www.redgiantsoftware.com/magic.html

And yes, it's slow.

[Philippe Gosselin]

hi Glen,


well I am gonna need a serious Divx 101 course then HIHIHI.

I've played with that thing for a couple of hours yesterday and all it could come up with was a 100 meg file for 5000 frames !!! Could you believe that.

I download the windows media encoder and will fiddle around with for sure.

Do you know by any chanve some good tutorial for both methods.

Thanks Glenn

Phil

[Glenn Chan]

Sorry, I don't know good tutorials. In either program, you want to configure the program so that the bitrate is low. The formula Emre gave should be fairly good. Otherwise you can even calculate the bitrate you want.

[Peter Jefferson]

yeah dude thats EXACTLY waht it does..

i use this to capture from a DVCPro Deck, do what i need to do as an avi (not the best way to edit dvcpro.. but im still waiting on dvcPro support in Vegas.. ) then export back to tape through the DAC2
Very easy to set up and abotu $800 aud

[Brian Mitchell Warshawsky]

Andrew and Glenn,

Are you looking for a particular look?

VASST (http://www.vasst.com) offers a valuable alternative, in their Reel Paks for both Celluloid - which I own, as well as for their high end Ultimate S. You may find a dramatic improvement in render time.

And take a look at another useful alternative - as Vegas can natively create many of these same "looks", there is an effort underway to create share "looks" created by Vegas users.

See the discussion at http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?threadid=34401 for more information.

Both the JetDV site and the VASST site have the ability to host these presets which can be shared by useing Sony's own Preset Manager for Vegas (free download).

There are currently a number of Presets available, but hopefully more Vegas users will contribute.

Brian

[Chris Moore]

My videographer for my wedding was horrible. The video will have to do but the audio has this crackling sound like a bad connection. Is there a way to get rid of this? It is all through our vows. Wife wasnt happy about it. Wifes mother who paid him lots of dough was even less happy. Would the noise gate filter or some other effect take this out and leave our vows intact?

[Imran Zaidi]

I've used the VASST product and it's definitely cool, simple, and fast. All a 'look' is, regardless of the product, is a series of filters and color/gamma/etc. adjustments run against any given piece of footage. What's great about this tool is that it rapidly applies capabilities already in Vegas to get a certain look to happen, and then, you can edit the specific applied filters and adjustments to customize the look further. It's perfect for Vegas users that are already accustomed to Vegas.

Also, it's worth noting that regardless of what tool you use, you need to be shooting from day one expecting to do the 'look' in post - otherwise the footage you have may just not look very good with the look you want applied. Your lighting, exposure, etc. need to all be tailored to your desired look.

http://www.vasst.com/celluloid.htm

You can either get Ultimate-S Vegas plug-in which has a bunch of other timesaving tools for which you can get the additional looks plugin, or you can buy Celluloid, which is a standalone plugin for Vegas with all the same looks included. Ultimate-S comes with some looks by itself though, just not as many or as cool as with the add-on looks.

[Harris Ueng]

Here's some info that may help you out:
http://www.filmsound.org/QA/nonoise.htm

I haven't had to do extensive noise reduction work, so the following is just the approach I would take to the problem. Depending on how bad the noise is, you most likely won't be able to remove it completely. I would NOT use a noise gate if the crackling occurs simultaneously over dialog, since your dialog will be gated out also resulting in a stuttering effect which becomes even more glaring since ambient noise is gated out completedly also. However, you may be able to use a compressor to reduce the level (offensiveness) of the noise if the noise level is substantially higher in level than the dialog recorded. EQ may or maynot be appropriate depending on where the voices sit in relation to the noise. My guess would lean toward not.

Many people have reported good results with Sony's Noise Reduction 2.0 software, so you may want to give that a try. It's capable of reducing both broadband and impulsive noise (such as in your case). Some plug-in bundles from Waves (excellent precision software, but expensive for a one-shot use) have click/crackle removers. I've heard good things about it, but I think it'd be overkill to spend a couple of grand on software just to correct one piece of audio.

Alternatively, if you have the money and it's important to you, you can look for audio restoration services in your nearby area. Someone familiar with audio restoration can listen to the recording in question and give you an idea of how well they will be able to recover it and how much it'd run you.

(oh, you might want to try posting this in the "Now Hear This" forum, since this is more of an audio-oriented question. if you can post a link to a clip of the recording, you may get even better answers.)

Sorry to hear about your wedding video. Best of luck to you.

[Scott Brickert]

thanks for the info Glenn. I'm considering comparing render times between my old P3/700, P4/1400 centrino, and P4/3.2Ghz, all with 512MB of their generation of ram. Maybe we can extrapolate what it will take to hit real time with Vegas.


Scott

[Scott Brickert]

I have a Gig of ram, set for 850 to Vegas, crash free so far.

But I can only Ram-Render 26sec of video (that's with a Brightness/Conrast filter applied) if I add Smart Smoother it drops to 21 Sec.

does this sound right?

Scott

[Glenn Chan]

1- Not really relevant, but did whoever paid for the video try talking to the videographer (NICELY) about a solution? Generally if you complain nicely you should be at least be able to get some money back.

2- Removing 'crackling':
On the audio forum there was someone who had a problem with crackling audio.
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...ighlight=waves

I can't be sure you have the same problem (describing audio with words in hard), but a sharp EQ filter might help. You want to be using a parametric EQ filter or waves improved version of it for better results. Cutout the high frequencies where the crackle is.

I also tried Waves' X-crackle filter and it doesn't seem to do as good a job as the waves linear EQ filter (better version of a parametric EQ).

It might just be impossible or really, really, really expensive to fix your problem though. It depends on the problem. If you post up a clip I would definitely play around with it to see if it's fixable.

[Greg Boston]

Chris,

I would be willing to take a stab at it. I've got some good audio editing stuff. Let me know if you are interested and I will arrange to get the source material from you. This is to help out a fellow DV-INFO member.

=gb=

[Edward Troxel]

<<<-- Originally posted by Scott Brickert : I have a Gig of ram, set for 850 to Vegas, crash free so far.

But I can only Ram-Render 26sec of video (that's with a Brightness/Conrast filter applied) if I add Smart Smoother it drops to 21 Sec.

does this sound right?

Scott -->>>

No.

[Philippe Gosselin]

Thanks Glenn , i'll keep Emre's advice in mind :)