I'm very new to all of this. In fact, I haven't edited one thing as yet. I am reading this forum daily in an attempt to absorb all that I can prior to taking on a project assigned to me at work.

I work at a school for the deaf. Beginning this Fall, I will be shooting digital video with a Canon xl-2 and editing in Sony Vegas 6 for the purpose of creating instructional video for teaching sign language.

Although I have several questions, my main concern at the moment is frame rate for shooting and editing. I have to put function over form and get the smoothest possible video even if that means making it look less film like and more video like.

Is 60i the best choice for camera setting and rendering output? If I use 60i throughout, will things move that much more smoothly?

Would I be creating other problems with respect to clarity? For instance, does the reduction in harshness of a more film like look overtake the smoothness of movement by being easier on the eyes for an extended period of time?

--rick

Can you get the chipmunk voice sound without changing the speed? i.e. pitch.

=
Raise pitch one semitone.

Ctrl+=
Raise pitch one cent.

Shift+=
Raise pitch one octave.

Ctrl+Shift+=
Reset pitch.

-
Lower pitch one semitone.

Ctrl+-
Lower pitch one cent.

Shift+-
Lower pitch one octave.

Ctrl+Shift+-
Reset pitch.



or Right-click the audio, choose Properties, and manually type in the desired pitch change.

Hey Rick
I’ve done some sign language videos and found the best results with 60i. Especially if the target is TV or DVD. If its web or computer, you would defiantly want to deinterlane to 30p. I believe in 60i, you can always take away but never add it later.

The other tip, I highly recommend is to shoot with a higher shutter speed. Most people use 1/60 with video but when sign people get movin it gets blurry. I try to shoot with 1/75 or 1/90. Course it depends on lighting conditions, but go as high as you can.

One other thing is the hands are the most important. Generally most deaf people (at least the ones I have shot for) like dark clothes, to make the hands stick out more (movement finger spelling ect.) Some prefer dark backgrounds, others don’t so you might ask. Lighting is best fairly flat, but don’t light it too bright, some deaf people would always complain the scene was too bright, it wasn’t over exposed, but for most deaf folks they want it to look like the person is in front of them, they don’t care about film or artsy looks. They want to see the person properly, as sign language has a lot of facial expression.

But always remember high shutter speed, If its for instructional learning they probably won’t go that fast, but its the worst when the image not is necessarily blurring but its soft, and the person can’t quite make out what the signer is saying. Also if it is more teaching purposes try to use an NLE with semi strong slow motion capabilities, as sometimes something is slowed down to give an example.

I like trying to make video look like film in general, but for sign videos I always go straight up video. So yea as little noise as possible, if the person is wearing darker clothes be careful the blacks don’t get dirty with noise, don’t crush them, but be careful of any gain. Course I’ve never done it, but heck maybe just shoot outside and you’ll have less lighting issues. (well until the sun goes down….I think I’ve gabbed enough)

Jacob,

Thanks for the information. It is great to find someone that has experience with sign language.

For this particular training, the instructor is caucasian so my initial thoughts are to use black clothing, with about a 50% gray slightly modeled background. That gives me hands face and arms that are the lightest elements on the screen well separated from the clothing and the background. And, a 50% separation between the background and the clothing.

Does that seem workable?

--rick

Edward

That worked great. And of course I can apply all of the normal FX to the generated media also to smooth out the edges!

Thanx

Ian

Hey u r back!

Yeah, he's back just in time for my critical question of a life time..........telling me how to make people sound like chipmunks without increasing the speed. Hehe.

Hey u r back!

Yes - and it feels good to be back!

In short, I can plug a 1/4 male into my input on my onboard sound on my mother board, and connect the split rca's to my 15 monitor and play sound such as my Itunes off my NLE. But when I try to play a vegas timeline audio, I get nothing. I've explored for about an hour different settings. Is there something I'm missing in Vegas. I can play an audio timeline out of my speakers, which is my main output on my onboard sound, but I can't get vegas to play out the line such as one designated as a second output that my Itunes does and such. I set my onboard audio to 4 channel to get the link to my monitor to work.

So Itunes will play using my bridge to my preview monitor, but vegas will not.

Anyone have a bone to throw me?

Thanks Everyone For Your Input...I have got a custom to the keys now after using it for a couple days

If you're getting sound at all out of any program on your PC, you should be able to get Vegas audio out to those same speakers.

Assuming you can for example play something from iTunes or Windows Media Player (please write again if you don't hear sound out of windows programs)...

The vegas controls you are looking for are in Options | Preferences | Audio Device. Most straightforward: Pull down the setting for "audio device type" to "microsoft sound mapper". That will probably do it.

If that doesn't work, explore the other devices you have available in that setting and test them.

...I set my onboard audio to 4 channel to get the link to my monitor to work...

You seem to be suggesting that you have a 4-channel audio card and you want Vegas to play out of channels 3 & 4? If so, you want to find those channels in the audio device settings, that's where you set it up.

If none of the above work, you might look at your project audio properties, and assure that you are playing back off the timeline at a standard that your audio card accomodates. For example, 16 bit 44.1 KHz ought to work, but 24 bit 96 KHz might not.

Still no joy? Write back...

Under the options pull down menu, are you sure you don't have all audio muted ??

Under the options pull down menu, are you sure you don't have all audio muted ??


Hehe, yeah, knowing me, that was the first thing I checked. I can get Vegas sound through my speakers, i.e main speaker out, but not to the monitor, I'm going look into Seths' ideas.

If you're getting sound at all out of any program on your PC, you should be able to get Vegas audio out to those same speakers.

Assuming you can for example play something from iTunes or Windows Media Player (please write again if you don't hear sound out of windows programs)...

The vegas controls you are looking for are in Options | Preferences | Audio Device. Most straightforward: Pull down the setting for "audio device type" to "microsoft sound mapper". That will probably do it.

If that doesn't work, explore the other devices you have available in that setting and test them.



You seem to be suggesting that you have a 4-channel audio card and you want Vegas to play out of channels 3 & 4? If so, you want to find those channels in the audio device settings, that's where you set it up.

If none of the above work, you might look at your project audio properties, and assure that you are playing back off the timeline at a standard that your audio card accomodates. For example, 16 bit 44.1 KHz ought to work, but 24 bit 96 KHz might not.

Still no joy? Write back...

Still no joy, thinking. I tested Acid which came with Vegas, and DVD Architect, neither one of the me will play through the monitor, but Itunes and the like still will. Hmmmm.

Sounds like it would work just fine Rick. If you have the time, even if the person your going to use isn't avaliabe do some test shots. Its kinda a pain, but if I can't blackmail someone to be my model, I just stand in front of the camera myself and go back and worth changing settings until it looks good.

Good luck on your project.

jacob

Using Windows Classic drivers? Asio drivers? routing? um....trying to think of other possiblities....those are the first that come to mind after what others have suggested.

I plugged my monitors audio up to my other computer which has a sound card, not the onboard sound, when I switched the computers sound configuration to 5.1 surround, I got sound out of Vegas. So I'm narrowing it down to that on my NLE's sound configuration.

I have one workstation with only SSE support(no SSE2, SSE3). New version of Premiere don't support such CPU anymore.

Wich versions of Vegas can work with that CPU(PIII-866)?
Can i do in Vegas simple edit. It means cut out all unnecessary footage and export all remaining clips without any recompression?

I have Vegas 6 running on a PIII 300MHz for testing purposes. I don't edit on that machine but I do test run scripts. The official base requirements are:

Microsoft® Windows® 2000, XP Home, or XP Professional (Windows XP SP2 required for HDV)
800 MHz processor (2.8 GHz recommended for HDV)
200 MB hard-disk space for program installation
600 MB hard-disk space for optional Sony Sound Series Loops & Samples reference library installation
256 MB RAM (512 MB RAM recommended for HDV)
OHCI-compatible i.LINK® connector*/IEEE-1394DV card (for DV capture and print-to-tape)
Windows-compatible sound card
CD-ROM drive (for installation from a CD only)
Supported CD-Recordable drive (for CD burning only)
Microsoft DirectX® 9 or later (included on CD-ROM)
Microsoft .NET Framework 1.1 SP1
Internet Explorer 5.1 or later (included on CD-ROM)

Hey gang,

I've picked up Vegas 6. Yay!

Will there be any problems accessing my Vegas 5 files with V6?

Just wondering.

sincerely,


ian

BTW.

This is NOT an upgrade.

It's a totally new install of the V6.

No problems should be encountered opening older veg files in Vegas 6, no.
Congrats!

Thanks DSE,

Good to know.

sincerely,


ian

Late to this thread but I have to echo what Emre posted.

A shuttle/jog will go miles/kilometers (for the rest of the world) to making your workflow smoother.

That and the keyboard shortcuts as you've no doubt deduced.

All the best.

ian

Just remember, if you open a Vegas 5 file in Vegas 6 and then save it in Vegas 6, it will no longer open in Vegas 5. So... Always make a copy first or do a Save As to a new name in Vegas 6.

thanks, Edward. Remains second question. If i have msdv footage and i do simpel cut do vegas export it without recomressing if i choose export format msdv as well.
And third question: can i do cut with proxy files and later replace in project directory proxy footage with original and then produce export footage.

Hey gang,

I'm just trying to figure out what I may have misunderstood, if anything.

Picked up Vegas 6 from Videoguys and they have Boris Graffiti 4 as an upgrade for Vegas users.

A sales rep had stated that, yes, the upgrade could upgrade from the Graffiti LTD included with Vegas 6.

However, there's no serial number with the Graffiti 4 disc and when I try to enter the Graffiti LTD serial it doesn't "take."

Any ideas?

FYI. I have an email into Boris and awaiting a reply. I was just wondering if anybody else has experienced this or if I'm missing something important.

sincerely,


ian

If you have a DV-AVI file, do simple cuts, and output to DV-AVI, the parts you are keeping will simply be copied to the new file. As soon as you add any FX or dissolves, that changes.

I suppose I should have checked first but I was trying out the XLH1 24f instead of 60i this weekend, viewed it on the HD monitor Saturday night and liked it so much I shot more on Sunday.

Now I don't think I can downconvert it in Vegas 6.0d.

Looks like I could have shot SD24f and been OK but I can't find a template in Vegas for the downconvert.

I may have to sit on the masters till I get my NLE that can handle the HD24f.

Any help is appreciated.

Ken

Im having a small problem. Im working for someone and they gave me some HD footage. Whenever i try and play the footage on my computer, there are a bunch of horizontal lines in the footage and it looks really bad. Do i need a special codec or anything to play the footage on my computer?

and another thing, i also have a HD tape, it wont play on my XL2, will it?

Of course you can downconvert. Just open an SD 23.976 timeline, import your m2t or better yet, Cineform file to the timeline, and edit away. Just use "BEST" when rendering to DVD format or m2t for tape print.

DSE comes through again!

Thanks! you guys at VAAST are a big part of the reason I'm using Vegas.

I better go buy something from you.

Ken

Its says in the Vegas help to just drag them into the timelime but it doesn't work for me :(

What could i be doing wrong?

do i need a codec?



grrrr... Sorry was supposed to be in Vegas section... can someone move it? i need sleep.....

In what format did you receive the HD footage you're having trouble with? How did you get it onto your hard drive?

As for the HD tape you mention, I'm assuming it's HDV. No, it won't play back on a mini-DV camcorder, because HDV uses MPEG-2 compression. It's an entirely different format that just happens to use the same type of tapes to store its 1's and 0's.

Hi,

I was wondering if anyone had made a video that does the 'flashbulb' effect we often see in TV programs like CSI Miami.

It is often used to link shots -the luminosity of the scene rises sharply and quickly and when its at a peak the scene jumps to another. I'm not sure if the 2nd scene then ramps the luminosity down. All this seems to happen in a split second -maybe 1/4 sec or about 3 or 4 frames...

My questions is -how do they achieve it? Can you apply a 'luminosity' envelope over the two scenes? Thanks.


Nick.

Use the "flash" transition. You can overlap your footage like a regular dissolve, then go into the transitions pool and drag the flash transition onto the dissolve. You'll then be able to make adjustments to the color, brightness, etc. of the transition.

you can also use generated media, and even shift from a dull yellow to a bright white or vice-versa. Double-click the crossfade to create a selection, right click in the empty selection area above the Xfade, and "insert generated media" to create the effect. Keyframe generated media as desired. Fade in/out as desired.

Hey all,

I was capturing some video using V6 and an external HDD with my laptop and noted that the average frame rate was listed as something like, 28.9 fps, during the capture.

I thought the standard is 29.97 or something similar.

Is that going to cause a problem with sync or speed or anything like that?

Just wondering.

sincerely,

ian

I already responded in the other thread, but the short version is that I have no real idea what's up with that, but also that I've never had any problems with the footage.

Depends on a few things. One thing is using an external HD are you capturing on FW or USB? Whats the speed of the drive, what else is going on in the MS background and does it playback OK?
Although I've myself have never had a problem with capture framerate it could be any number of things.

Don

Hey all,

Vegas 5 user here - have been playing around with the Vegas 6 demo.

I use a handful of audio plugins and virtual instruments to record with in Vegas. In Vegas 5 some of these work, some don't and a few I have to run cables out unused outputs of my A/D box and back into my mixer to be able to record with them.

In the Vegas 6 demo I find I've been able to open all my virtual instruments and audio plugins except M-Audio virtual keyboard programs. Does anyone know if it's possible to use M-Audio KeyRig or the M-Tron as a VST plugins in the audio chain of Vegas 6? According to the documentation they will both work this way with most standard DAWs but it doesn't actually mention Vegas.

thanks,

Dan B

there are many different kinds of MFX files ..from what camera ? or what capture system ?

grrrr... Sorry was supposed to be in Vegas section... can someone move it? i need sleep.....

No problem..headed for the Vegas forum.

-gb-

Still editing my first wedding video!!!!

EDITED - I've now managed to upload the clip in question - it's here (http://www.flashbang.demon.co.uk/highlights.wmv)

I'm creating the highlight piece to Van Morrison's Moondance. You'll see 6 clips appearing in rapid succession. On the computer screen it looks great but when I play back on TV the first set of rectangles play OK but as they are replaced by the second set the screen becomes unstable with the rectangles jitterimng vertically - completely spoils the effect. The clip was created using event pan/crop to adjust the picture width, event fx to add the border and track motion to place the picture.

I've tried reducing the size of the rectangles so they're further into the screen but this doesn't help. The only way I can get it to remain steady is to change the rectangle border from white to grey or to change the background from black to a dark grey.

Is this problem caused by the black and white contrast, the speed of change or is there something else I'm missing. I've tried 'reduce flicker', 'force resample' and render at best quality. I use the DVD Architect template and then use DVDA to make the DVD. This is PAL by the way.

Thanx

Ian

I'm not totally sure what kind they are, i've only downloaded 2 different ones.
Its just we supposedly gonna be shooting on XDCam and as it says in the Vegas Help that it can use the .MXF files straight from the disc i thought it would be best to grab them rather than having it transfered to miniDV.

Can anyone point me to more information on .MXF files and what kind Vegas will like?
Anyone used .MXF files in Vegas? can you email or send me link to download one to try.

Thanks

Oh , guess i should mention that no i haven;t got access to the XDCam to try the files from there, i'm not sure its even happening yet.
so thats why i downloading whatever .MXF files i can find to try it out first.. so when or if it comes i'll have things sorted..... hopefully :)

Without seeing exactly what you're talking about, I'd say that this is probably just one of those things that interlaced video can't handle very well. You may just have to try that grey border.

One more thing you might try is a small amount of gaussian blur; you might try as much as 0.003 on both settings (though go with 0.001 or 0.002 if you can). That will make for a less abrupt transition between white and black.

Phillip,
there are .mxf files from both XDCAM and from Panasonic (and Grass Valley) on the VASST site. Free downloads. Other sites have at least HVX footage to download for experimenting.
XDCAM will load straight to the Vegas timeline. Panasonic's flavor requires conversion using either CineForm or Raylight.

Jarrod

Thanx for the tip - I'll try that - note I have now editied my original post and managed to upload the clip.

Ian

Ian,

It's more likely that your black and white values are out of legal bounds. Is there a Broadcast Safe filter you can use?

Josh