Greetings

I'm working on a project and have just has a line apppear in the video as seen behind my head (see photo). The line is the full length behind my head and in this case his showing a section of my green screen. However at other places on the time line it shows the colour of the backdrop only in solid colour, not with a cloud effect.

I have been through all the video tracks switching them off and on to see if I can isolate the track. I though it was one with track motion on but am not sure about that now.

I have closed the the project and opened it again and it is still there. I have closed Vegas and reopened it and it is still there.

Any thoughts on what could be causing it?

What format are you shooting in? I had a similar problem with green screen when shooting in DV. Something about the pixel structure in DV. It really showed up in hair,

www.sublime-lighting.com

Brian. I'm just using DV...but this is the first time I have had something like this persist. I have just closed everything down and re booted and it is still there.

I've attached another screen shot to show it in a different part of the time line...this time it takes on teh colour of the background and goes infront of the glow (track motion) but behind the arrowhead, and behind the rest of the image. The arrow is higher on the track stack than the rest of the image

I'd need to see the Project File and open it on my VP13 timeline. At first glance it has all the look of a random sliver of a Mask not being removed and its Keyframe being held-over from another adjustment you've made.

Let's see that VEG. You can ZIP it and DVInfo will accept that.

Grazie

Thanks Graham. Appreciated.

You can see it at 6:09:03 and at 21:23:13

It also appears in any green screen clip when I turn the chromakey on. I don't work with CK on as the computer can't handle the processing required...slows everything up.

I posted earlier about hitting a key (or doing something) I know not what, which brought up 'expanded track layers'. Misc funny things that I didn't understand happened on that track at that time so whether that has anything to do with it I don't know. It appeared after that event...but I closed out of the program and went back to a saved copy so it shouldn't have.

Find vege file attached.

Renton

I just opened an earlier version of the file and it wasn't in that, and also the BAK file of the one I posted (which is from 8 hours earlier) and it is not in it...but there is another different artifact in it!!!

Renton

Here are three more screen shots of another bar, the other one I referred to...hmmm

In fact...the bar shown on the other two screen shots is no longer there...

When switching on chromakey in each of the three main green screen angles, this green bar is there.

When the graphic is on screen by itself the bar is not there, but when it is on screen in association with the green screen shot it is.

Renton

DV as in recording to tape?

We could be looking at tape dropouts here, what happens when dust on the tape or schmutz on the heads slightly lifts the tape away from the heads.

Thing is, DV has some built-in error correction for this kind of thing... which may result in different qualities of playback at different times.

I'd try rendering the original clips to DV or uncompressed AVI or DNxHD. Possibly the error correction will clean things up.

And if this seems like the right track, clean the heads with a cleaning tape or have your favorite video tech do it.

If you captured from the same camera, it's possible that a head cleaning will now enable a better capture of your existing clips. Or, if captured from a separate deck, maybe that needs a cleaning.

My money is on a bad memory chip on your graphics card.

All green screen filming for 13 episodes was done over a three week period about three years ago... and were downloaded to the computer not long thereafter. This footage is from the 5th episode of this project and to date no other segments have had this occur...and this has only been in the last week.

Yes DV was recorded to tape...

I have a EVGA GeForce GTX 570 video card...for what it is worth...perhaps I need to giggle it in its slot...

One bar has gone and another has appeared...

I'd have to agree with Seth in that DV is the issue from my experiences with it. Since switching to memory cards I've never had issues like that again.

BTW, I like the subject of your graphics. You're spot on!
Jesus loves you! :)


Sublime Lighting LLC (http://www.sublime-lighting.com)

Renton, are you using Boris Red for the keying? Just to eliminate that as a possibility can you create a copy of the project (or part of it) and use the standard Sony Chroma Keyer instead?

Regarding DV tape dropout being the issue I completely agree, that's just what it might look like (so glad those days are over!). However, if the spots are not occurring in the same places every time you play back the file that would seem to rule that out.

Renton, are you using Boris Red for the keying? Just to eliminate that as a possibility can you create a copy of the project (or part of it) and use the standard Sony Chroma Keyer instead?Yes I am using Boris RED as my CK.

It is interesting that for three of my camera angles, the Sony CK is extremely hard to get a good key with, but with RED it was relatively easy, thus I've used RED for them, whereas for the fourth one the reverse applies, so I've used the Sony CK.

Are you suggesting that RED may be the issue? I've wondered that. If so I should contact them regarding it.

I don't see how it can be DV drop out to do with tape, because initially there was a narrow horizontal line behind my head and the arrow head, but that has gone and there is this other fatter vertical one on the left hand side. Also, I have been working on this episode for several months and as far as I'm aware there haven't been any up till recently...certainly neither of the two lines in the screen grabs were there a week ago. So unless the dropouts are occurring on the files on the computer that seems to be out...

While the spots are not occurring in a different place every time I play back (or reboot and re start the program) I think tape dropout does not seem to fit what is occurring. At the moment the fatter line is there when I start etc, but it wasn't there when I first posted, rather the other one was.

I have contacted Boris to see if they think it is caused by RED.

However I have just checked and the artifact is visible over the entire duration of all green screen tracks, including the one track where I use the Sony Chroma Keyer...which suggests to me that it is not RED that is the cause...

I have just upgraded to Vegas Build 444 and it is still there...

BTW, I like the subject of your graphics. ... :)
I suspected you might...

Hmmm...I have just opened up an earlier episode which I have successfully rendered out without drama...

I switched off the rendered track, and switched on a green screen track and the artifact was there...

Does this point to a hardware issue?

Could well be - but first, have you tried turning off all other effects at media level, clip level and track level, then turn them on one at a time to see if it is a combination of plugins that might be causing the trouble? Just a thought! It would be a shame to splash out on new kit if it's something completely different.

This whole issue seems to have corrolated with the episode I mentioned on another thread where I thought I had hit something I knew not what, which produced the expanded track layers on one track.

http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/what-happens-vegas/527626-dont-know-what-i-did-how-do-i-go-back.html

Perhaps I didn't 'hit something accidently' at all and rather something went wrong in Vegas to produce that result with these artefacts as a result...

Could this be a possibility? Must contact Sony support...

My money is on a bad memory module on the graphic card. Swap in a different card and test it.

Hmmm...what have I got re a spare graphics card...an ATi Radeon 9600 Pro 256m.

Could that work? Don't know much about this stuff... :-(

Seems like a considerable down spec...

If you have it laying around it would be worth it to swap in an test. That isn't a very powerful card so it may not work well but if the green artifacts are gone you will have your answer.

OK...so...we swapped out graphics cards and the artefact is still there...so it is not the graphics card...

But I tried rendering out a couple of seconds of video where the artefact was, and the artefact didn't show in the render...

And I then tried the file using Vegas v12 and the artefact did not show.

In the start up of v12 a message came up that said a plugin could not load...which was a lightflare I had used...it may be a v13 media generator...and so that did not feature. Whether that has anything to do with it I don't know...It hadn't posed a problem till a week and a half ago...

In v13 I turned off the green screen track leaving only the four background colour tracks I've used, and then turned them off one by one. In each of them the shape was perceivable in their colour...

Further...I uninstalled v13 and reinstalled it...and the artefact is still there...

Since the problem isn't in the rendered file I expect the source is still in the graphic card chain.

When you swapped out the cards was the alternate one the same model? Did you use the same drivers?

If you feel you have eliminated a hardware problem with the graphic card it could be the driver. Can you try a different driver and see if the problem changes?

The card was not anywhere near the same. The Radeon one I had would not fit so my son in law brought along one that did that was a tiny thing compared to mine... not sure what it was. After fitting it, the computer went on line to find drivers for it and installed them... so the drivers must have been different.

Dealing with drivers is beyond me...

Haven't heard back from Sony yet... though it has been the weekend...

Further...

I checked the driver for the GeForce 570 card and it was around 2 years out of date...so updated it...

...and...the artefact is still there...

Very interesting.

Well, unless you have something sharing the same memory address as the video card I'm about out of things to suggest.

How would you check that out?

Well...Kim at Customer Service at Sony Creative Software has responded in a very helpful and pleasant manner and tracked down the problem so the issue is now resolved...

For those who are interested, here are Kim's directions...after I had supplied my 'System Information'...

'Thank you for writing back. I did read through the information you had provided on the forum thread through DVinfo which was very helpful and would like to try the following command to see if there may be a miscommunication occuring in Vegas Pro 13 that is not present in 12. This action will not harm any of your projects or files, but it will remove any cached settings or miscommunication that could be causing the preview display to be showing these bars in 13.

To reset all preferences, settings and window placement back to their original state, close the program. Then hold down the Ctrl & Shift keys when you start it again. When the program starts to load, you will see a window that asks: Do you want to reset all Vegas Pro 13 preferences to default values? To fully reset all defaults, make sure that 'Delete all cached application data' is checked. Then choose Yes.

After which please load your project again to see if the bar is still present and let us know if there's any change in behavior.'

I followed the instructions and the artifact has gone.

I found I had to first launch the program, then close it down, then open it again as per Kim's instructions...and I used right click > open when I opened it the second time. When attempting to open it as instructed (without first launching it), and using the double click to open it with shift/ctrl held down, the program would not start...

In the light of some comments recently on another thread about reputedly poor Vegas support, I would like to say that this experience with Sony Customer Service is anything but poor service. Rather I would rate it as excellent. Thanks again Kim...

Wow, great story Renton. I've only called Vegas support a couple of times over the years and I found them to be great. I think they are overworked doing a very difficult job. They are trying to diagnose issues over the phone with customers who often cannot articulate the issue properly, or who give bad information to begin with, and it would be very frustrating. I couldn't do it.

Glad you had a happy ending to your story.

i often wonder how much easier it would have been / be, to simply use the clean start (shift+ctl) at the start of any 'weird' vegas problems rather than being told to uninstall reinstall anything from os through to vegas itself....

of course if it didn't / doesn't work then huston we have a problem...