Video FX question - Vegas Pro 8
 

I'm in the middle of a project using Vegas Pro 8. I have 4 tracks going, with the 2nd through 4th each having a Brightness and Contrast plug-in. On each track I have different settings. While reviewing some of my efforts, I noticed the settings change from what I set as the video progresses - though only on the 3rd and 4th track and not the 2nd. Is there a setting that will stabilize the settings so they stay as I set them?

sounds like there might be a keyframe somewhere on th FX timeline that is causing the settings to change.
Go back to the clips, open the FX on the clips and check the TL at the bottom of the FX-look for keyframes. Thats what it sounds like.
Don

Beyond what Don said, get rid of the "Brightness & Contrast" effect. You can get MUCH better results using the other color correction tools!

Which ones in particular do you recommend?

depends on what you're looking to accomplish.
If the footage looks dark to you then use the Color Correction FX and you can use LEVELS,GAMMA,GAIN to make minute adjustments to the footage that if done properly will not do harm to the piece like B&C can do.
The Color Curves and the Levels FX can also be mighty helpful.
These are things one can play with to your hearts content and not worry about leaving anything permanent due to the non destructive nature of Vegas.
My other suggestion though is before you do any color or exposure correction look at the material on something other than a computer monitor. Computer monitors are not set up to properly judge color or exposure so my suggestion is to hook up at the very least a small TV using a camera or deck as a pass thru and then adjust the color and exposure via the color bars and waveform and vectorscope in vegas. That way at least you'll be close to what you could expect to see on a TV screen. Then do the color and exposure correction.
Unless the material was poorly shot (operator error or not) the amount of exposure correction should be minimal. Color is more likely to be off than exposure but on a typical computer monitor it could look like the material is a stop or 2 under exposed and way off in the color when it's really not.
Check it out!
Don

I love the Sony Color Curves FX. Careful application of this FX, wjile monitoring the waveform monitor, will let you recover a lot of over/under exposed information in your image. It's also possible to recover some lost highlights/shadows, with the use of 32 bit processing and the various gamma settings associated with the math processing.
The only thing to watch for is color shifts and excessive noise generation. Nevertheless, the improvement over a simple brightness/contrast slider is worth the effort.

I shot in HD, and am editing in HD. I intend to render as SD. Anything I should be mindful of with these tools?

I would use the scopes in Vegas and make sure all levels and gamma fall within legal range. Use CC to make those adjustments (if needed)
Don

I got rid of the brightness and contrast fx, and used the Color Correction fx instead. It does work much better.

I am not familiar with how you keep the colors within legal (broadcast, I assume) range. How does that work?

On the WAVEFORM scope there is a 'graph' for lack of a better term and on it the numbers run from -20 up to 120. You want to try to keep the colors within a range of about 15 (the unmarked line under 20) to about 100. Now this may not be an absolute but it's a very good starting point. By keeping colors and exposure in this range you'll know that unless someones TV is way of of whack, the colors and exposure will show "true" on their TV.
I have found that after cutting my workflow is usually CC and exposure using the CC fx with GAMMA and Levels (if needed) then on to other FX and finally audio sweetening.
Play around with a couple of clips and try it. You'll find what works best for you, and you'll see how the scopes work in real time.
Don

Thanks! This is a big help.