I have the little triangles, too - but mine are black. Not sure their purpose or meaning.

As for the batch capture: After recording on the tape, it is at the end. I put the tape into the deck, and note the END time and press PLAY REWIND and view the footage BACKWARDS in fast forward speed. I then note locate where sections change and note those times (I also write down events within those times).

Using a wedding as an example, maybe the first 40 minutes of the tape is the ceremony, this is followed by 15 minutes of stuff that happens after the ceremony and before the reception, and then 20 minutes of reception. During the rewind, I note those 3 sections and set up batch capture for these sections. I then end up with THREE files on the hard drive (even though the second two sections would have many different "clips").

It's just my means of organization.

So your worklow entails that you have larger more drawn out clips rather than multible smaller ones. For example, you'll capture all your footage from the actuall ceremony as 1 long clip? What do you do from there- splice it up with the trim tool or manually on the timeline? I'm just trying to get into my own groove as far as workflow is concerned- I'm still sorta a fish out of water beings I have premiere 6.0 practically engrained in me.

How about those blibs I was getting in the very beginning of some captured clips? What do you think they could be? I'm assuming (and I say assume because I can't remember exactly which clips I actually captured while the play head was at stop) that the clips with the visual blips are the ones I captured when the footage wasn't playing prior to hitting record. It could be caused from the IEEE trying to sync up with the data being sent....a latency issue perhaps? I'm wondering if visual blips/artifacts can be created from such a thing. I dont believe it's in my source footage on tape or they'd show up throught the clip...not just in the very first second or so of the capture.

Lastly how about the audio crackles? Do you get them when monitoring your audio while capturing? I'm running Vegas capture with the preview screen at 100%, can this cause any problems (like the audio pops I'm hearing) making it draw the preview screen at full size?

Thanks again for all your input, your knowledge is a great asset to me.

I break the larger clip up on the timeline. Now, I have started using the Extract Good Clips tool in my newest script in some cases. (Makes it REAL easy to pick out the good sections and discard the trash) Frequently I have the same scene from multiple cameras so I keep them close to the same location on the timeline.

Yes, my audio stutters during capture. I don't care what happens to the video display or audio while capturing as long as I get a good capture. (I usually look at the monitor and listen to the monitor connected to the deck instead of the computer anyway.)

Ok 2 down one to go- how about the blips I was seeing at the very beginning of some captured clips. Would hitting record from the playhead being in stop cause enough delay to disrupt the video in the first second of the clip while capturing?

PS I'm ordering Excalibur and the Training Vid this week. I'm hooked on traning "videos"- even though I read the manual it still helps to "see" someone go through the workflow.

Thanks again for all your help!

<<<-- Originally posted by Glen Elliott : Ok 2 down one to go- how about the blips I was seeing at the very beginning of some captured clips. Would hitting record from the playhead being in stop cause enough delay to disrupt the video in the first second of the clip while capturing? -->>>


YES

Thanks,I was concerned when I saw those visual anormalities in the beginnings of my clips.
Again thank you for your help and swift replies. I knew you'd be perfect for moderating this board.

I am trying out NLEs to see which one will work for me and right now I am trying out Vegas.

The first thing that I am trying to do is to edit together footage of a wedding taken from two cameras. Based on what I have read in the manual it would appear that the first thing for me to do is setup an A/B roll on the main track. The problem I have is in synchronizing the two tracks. I want to use the photographer's flash at the kiss to align the two tracks. This occurs at 00;31;15;12 on the A roll and 00;55;23;10 on the B roll. Is there any kind of function that allows you to supply a position for the different clips and then slides the clips appropriately along the timeline to synchronize them? If not, what is the easiest way to go about this?

Thanks for the help.

First of all, you DON'T need an "A/B" roll. Just use TWO tracks.

To make things simple, look at issue #9 of the Vegas Tips, Tricks, and Scripts Newsletter (http://www.jetdv.com/tts). It deals specifically with multicam edits.

To simplify the editing process, you may also want to look at Excalibur (http://www.vegastrainingandtools.com)

Thanks for the link Edward. I took a look at it and I am a bit surprised at how involved it is. I am glad I only have two cameras to merge.

Is there any kind of tool that would jut play the tracks and let you click on the one to begin using? Something like a director standing at a panel of monitors and choosing which camera's angle to switch to during a live event? Maybe that is too simple. It just seems odd to have to go in and cut the footage out of a #1 and a #2 camera if you want to see the #3.

I will look at Excalibur, maybe it offers something along those lines.

Yes - Excalibur

You just add markers to the timeline indicate which camera to switch to. When done, you run excalibur and it will create the mix for you.

Excalibur also provides a tool to simplify syncing of the cameras as well.

Read the article carefully: It gives two methods of syncing and four methods of multi-cam editing.

It might, depending on whether you can afford it, this is the best
thing you can spend the money on and you need it [ie, you can't
live with such rendering times].

Depends on what you want to do with the footage. But normally
I would agree with you that pal needs to be 25p, not 24p.

Okay, some basic theory on VOB files etc.

VOB files are MPEG2 program streams. They CONTAIN multiple
ELEMENTARY streams which contain things like, audio, video,
subtitles and other special things.

That being said I think a high end authoring application will
support loading of an MPEG2 program stream (VOB) file. But,
as you've pointed out Architect among others do not. This means
the file has to be split in its elementary streams (the video and
AC3 stream in this case). This is called de-muxing. The authoring
application will then re-mux these together for final authoring.

So can you split these files WITHOUT any re-encoding or quality
loss? Yes you can.

Go to www.doom9.org site and then into the Downloads.
Then go to the end of the page into the VOB Tools section. You
will find some tools there. Try them out and tell us if it worked.

The tools should be able to get you a .M2V (video) & .AC3 (audio)
file.

Good luck!

Vegas + DVD, and Excalibur.

Vegas was already excellent, Excalibur made it way better.

I know how to reverse clips in Premire, just just enter "-100" in the speed option. But can anyone tell me how to do it in Vegas?

http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?threadid=12137




Insert a VELOCITY ENVELOPE into the clip you are working on, pull it all the way down to -100%

Reversing a clip is VERY easy as long as you follow one simple rule: START at the END.

Just play the timeline and then STOP where you want the reversing to begin (i.e. at the END of the clip in forward motion). Now press "S" to split this clip at that point, add the velocity envelope t0 the RIGHT clip (you can delete the left side of the split) and change the velocity to a negative value.

Every wedding I do is a 2 camera ceremony. When I switched to Vegas life got easy, when I started using Excalibur life got great.
Now if I could just get my dog to understand the basics of editing life would be simply superb ;-)
Don

Ok, I've made a huge misstake and shot some video on a cruise ship and I didn't whitebalance (stupid me) The video is a bit yellow.. How do you recommend me to correct it in post?

/Andy

I want to do the following action, previously performed in premiere, in Vegas 4:

place a clip on one track, deinterlace that clip with the Field Order on "Lower".

Then place a copy of the original clip on a superimposed track (i'm guessing it's the track above) and deinterlace that clip with the Field Order on "Upper" and set the opacity to 50%.

Any ideas? I haven't found a deinterlace setting or filter that affects the individual clips.

First off, what editing software are you using?

I'm using vegas, Although I don't think the help is software specific? I have to color correct, but are there better ways?

Cool, I was hoping it was Vegas. Well, it is kind of software specific since Vegas 4.0 has more color correction tools then some other software. There's a couple ways to do this, the easiest way would be to just use the "color correction" video effect, and mess around with them, make it more blue in the mids, or whatever looks right, or you can use the "color curves" also, and just tweak them yourself, basically take out some red and give it some more blue, etc etc....


There's some more involved techniques for stuff like this that I use sometimes in Vegas, but i'd have to write up a article for that. :D

Andreas,
It is entirely software related. How else would you color correct after it has been shot?
Listen to Alex, Vegas has 2 or 3 different ways to correct the situation.
Don

I do listen to alex, he has already proven to me he knows what he talks about. I didn't mean to offend him.. What I mean by software specific was, whatever program I use I need to color correct. I know vegas is a good program for this.. I fiddled around with the colorcorrect but didn't get it as good as I liked it to be. So I thought I'd post here to get additional ideas on how to slove my problem.

I'll try once more to go about it as alex said.. Thanks!!

/Andreas

Try this. Right click on the event, scroll down to properties then check the reduce interlace flicker box.

Once you have the CC filter loaded up, You click on the eye dropper and then you click on something that is supposed to be white. That's how it works in Final Cut Pro and that's how it seems to work in Vegas Video.

I was looking through some of my settings today in Vegas and for the default NTSC DV template it has it set for non-drop frame rulers and 44.0khz sample rate audio.
Isn't standard DV drop-frame timecode and the same rate on the audio 48.0khz?!

Yes and Yes. I changed mine to drop frame and 48k. I think you are seeing Vegas' audio roots showing through.

I know having it at non-drop frame will do nothing more than give me innacurate program lengths, but what would having the sample rate set at 41 rather than 48 do? Will it adversely effect my audio? Also if it's set at 41 and you place 48hz clips in the timeline do they "play" at 41hz? ?!?!?!!

Why doesn't someone say something to Vegas about this- it should be fixed in the 4.0d patch.

Does anyone know of a simple way to add an explosion fireball to a clip? Like a bomb going off behind a building and the fire shooting from the side into camera view. Is there a veggie out there that does that? An effects program? I thought about taping a small fireball against a greenscreen and then enlarging it but it seems like that probably wouldn't turn out looking right. Any suggestions? Thanks.

I believe the render settings override the project settings so all should be fine anyway.

Hi,

I've been using 3D Studio for a while... renderin my projects using all my computers available ( 2.53ghz + 1.5ghz + 2.0ghz )... this evening it struck me - why can't I render my AVi -> MPEG2 projects using multiple computers?

I know that there are 3d party software that can handle it.... but why can't Vegas do it? Or Mainconcepts MPEG encoder?

Anyone heard something?

Anyone using multiple machines for MPEG rendering?

// Lazze \\

I'm trying to add text on my video as an overlay, but if I try to make it any other color than white, it turns transparent. Basically I just want solid blue text on my video.

Thanks for any help.

Place any text generated media with a checkered background on a track ABOVE the video track. Change the color of the text to blue and you are done.

Having 44.1 KHz audio will screw you up if you are aiming for DVD or export back to DV. Otherwise it shouldn't make a difference

I remember watching a documentary for either Lord of the Rings or Star Wars, where they said that somebody wrote a 3D algorithm to make fake fireballs for the first time. I presume, therefore, that it wasn't possible before, and that it's probably still not easy.

The best thing to do would try to find stock footage of an explosion in front of a blue or green screen so that you can put it in yourself.

Dan,

Peter has a good suggestion. Go to ArtBeats.com (http://www.artbeats.com/prod/category.php?pg=2&id=6) and check out their "Effects" section...particularly the "Reel Explosions" series (Reel Explosions 4 has some great shots).

And you don't have to buy the whole CD. You can download one only.

They have other effects, like bullets through glass, etc.

If you're up to making the explosion yourself you could check out Particle Illusion (http://www.particleillusion.com). Check out the SE version if you're just looking for quick effects.

Peter- I believe that would be Shrek you are thinking of. They wroth the algorythm to make the Dragons flame expand and multiply, making it look organic.

Maybe you're right. Either way I'm always amazed at the new stuff these guys come up with for special effects.

I know some people who are making a video game and we wanted to have this one scene where an ancient temple was exploding. They said that it was virtually impossible to do it right with 3D Studio so instead we'll build a model temple out of plastic and plaster, weaken it in certain key spots, fill it with dirt and gravel, and lighter fluid, and blow it up and film it in slow-mo! I still don't know where we'll get the camera (maybe Panasonic Varicam) to do it, but it's a neat idea, I think.

I purchased Excalibur yesterday and I was playing around with it last night and the MultiCam option is really great.

I do have one question though, all of my camera changes seem to be cuts regardless of what I do.

I tried checking the option that makes "disolve" the default transition. I tried specifying the D and I tried specifying the D with a time factor.

I setup two cameras and named the track 1 and 2. I put markers where I wanted the cuts and named them in a variety of different ways to test things.

With "Disolve" as the default transition
1
2

With "Cut" as the default and "Disolve" as default another time:
1D
2D

With "Cut" as the default and "Disolve" as default another time:
1D00:16
2D00:16

With "Cut" as the default and "Disolve" as default another time:
1D16
2D16

All of these resulted in cuts rather than disolves. Did I miss some setting in Vegas itself or am I totally of in my naming? It is cutting in the right places, it is just not dissolving.

Thanks,
Darrell

Do you have the Automatic Crossfades turned on?

Edward,

Thanks for the reply. I can't remember off hand. I will take a look at that this evening and make sure they are on.

Thanks,
Darrell

Yes, this is necessary because the "dissolves" are created by extending the clip lengths. I just tested it and the dissolves do NOT happen if auto crossfades is turned off. So, just leave that option turned on and all will be fine. (I NEVER turn it off anyway. If I want cuts, I just don't overlap clips.)

Making one myself would be more than I can handle. That artbeats site is perfect! Thanks.

I took some time the other day to explor all the tabs in the main concept encoder. Little did I realize the amount of tweaks available. Do most of you keep these at default and only tweak CBR/VBR and bitrate #'s? From the looks of it, it may be the only safe way for me to do any tweaking- the other settings seem above my scope and understanding of mpg encoding.
I know that MPG2 destination file has to be upper-fields first but I noticed the setting was at lower-fields first by default. Can I safely assume that is designating the source material and should not be changed?
Also I noticed there was a video quality slider- what does this do exactly?

I leave most things alone except for bitrate. I make sure the quality slider is at 31 (max) and, sometimes, change the DC Coefficient to 10bit.

MPEG2 for DVD should be LOWER field first, just like DV.

Thanks Edward, that did the trick.

Regarding the field issue I've heard the exact opposite. I asked around when I was having problems with my first DVD and the consensus was that DV is lower first but MPG2 DVD is upper first. However I'll follow your advice and keep it on lower.
I bet you knew this was comming....what is DC coefficient?

If you started with CCE, for some reason you have to pick UPPER first for it to be right. Most others use LOWER first (which is correct). Main Concept, TMPGenc, Ligos, ... all use lower first.