Why does this happen with projects ?
 

Ok, i edit some footage, save it as a project, go back at a later date, click file>open>vegas projects, then select my project, the project then appears on the timeline as it was when i saved it, ie, multiple tracks, effects etc, when i render a project this way it renders fast, about 2.5 times for dvd, that's ok,
however,
If i go to the project explorer, find the vegas project folder and drag the finished project into the timline, the project only appears as a single track (for the video), audio is still as a second track if it was also saved, this is no problem because it's much neater on the timeline, BUT if i try to render this, to dvd or whatever, it takes ages, so long that i can't even wait to see how long, at least 20 times to render.

I'm editing a wedding and what i want to do is save each part as a project as i complete it, for example, the first part is a photo montage with 14 video tracks,( renders straight off in 2 mins, but if i drag the project into the timeline it becomes on track but takes nearly 30 mins to render), next i want to edit the preperations then save that as a project, then the arrivals, then ceremony, then speeches.
When all the projects are completed i then want to put/drag all the projects onto the timeline and render the finished project but this will take (days ?) to render.
Is there an easier way ?

Paul.

I deal with the same issue. If I am working with less than 20 or so tracks I just work messy to cut the rendering time. When I try to drop the Vegas project file into the time line and render that way, it takes about 15mins to render for 3 mins of footage with no effects. I am using a PC / 3.4Ghz / P4 with 4GBs of ram.

If I am going to keep using Vegas and working on large projects I'm thinking of buying an 8 core Mac Pro and running boot camp with windows and Vegas.

my workflow for years with Vegas is this.
Cut the section save as a VEG of course-render to AVI. Bring the rendered AVIs into a new project called say, "the wedding" stitch all the avis together, then I render each piece to mpg/ac3 seperately and use end actions in DVDa to create my dvd.
Even though the nested veg ability works great I keep going back to the old way I've always done it.
Maybe try it and see. Your choice.

Don

Don
So my first project, the photo montage with 14 video tracks, render that as an AVI for windows ? Default template but "best render" ?
Then the next part/project i saved, the preperations, save that as an AVI same as above, but save the audio seperatley ? AC3 ?

Do all parts of the wedding like this then just drag them all onto the timeline at the end and render for dvd that'll be ok yes ? It won't take ages to rerender to dvd/mpeg-2 for dvd-a, or cause los of quality due to being rendered to different formats twice ?

Hope this is correct cos it'll save me a couple of days work.

Thanks, Paul.

Paul, what you're seeing is a FEATURE called "Nested VEG files". It's a way of including a complete project in a new project without having to have all of the individual tracks shown. If you want the file opened, don't drag it to the timeline. Instead, either choose "File - Open" and select it (as you've done) or in the explorer window, right-click it and choose the option to open the project instead of nesting it.

Hi Edward.
I just did what you said, ie right click>open, it does open the project with all the 14 tracks, but then if i want to add another project i've saved(the next part of the wedding,the preperations), if i right click on that project and select open, it does go onto the timeline but it removes the first project . What i want to do is add project, add project, add project so that all projects/parts of the wedding are on the timeline, then render for dvd-a.
The only way i've found to do this is by dragging the projects onto the timeline, this doesn't remove the previous project from the timeline, but this way then takes ages to render.

Thanks, Paul.

Don.
I just tried your way, rendering the photo project to avi, this 1 min project still took 18 mins to render to avi, which then still needs to be rerendered to mpeg-2 so this is no quicker than dragging the project and rendering straight to mpeg-2.
Thanks anyway.

Paul.

The idea behind Nested VEG files is that you can work on each piece individually, drag all the pieces to a "Final" project. In that case, you don't need all the details and you're still using the original media so the quality is the highest possible.

If, for some reason, you DO need to edit a section more, you can right-click that VEG file on the timeline and choose the option to edit it. It will then reopen with ALL the tracks allowing you to make changes. Once saved, the changes should be automatically reflected back in the "final" project.

Edward.
Drag all the projects onto a final project/timeline. That's what i've been doing, dragging them from the explorer onto the timeline, but then the projects/ finished project takes much longer to render, around 20 times instad of around 3 times, why is this ?
When i save the projects, should i select "save media with project".Idid this and i end up with more clips but they're not contained within the project, just in the same folder as the nested file.

I just draggd the photo project onto the timeline and then right clicked and chose "edit in vegas", and another instance of vegas opened with all the 14 tracks. So you're saying that if i edit in the 2nd instance of vegas, save that project, that the first instance of vegas will "updated", that's cool.


I still wish i could just drag all projects onto a new timeline and render that at the usual speed, ie 3 times.

Paul.

No. That just copies the files to a new folder giving you another copy of them. You don't need that.

Yes. The original instance of Vegas will be updated when you save the VEG file.

Now you're back to what Don suggested - render each piece out separately and put the separate renders on a new timeline. It will be faster but you've potentially lost some color information in the process. Another option would be to build the entire project on a single timeline but that can get complicated too.

There are several options available here - you just need to find the one that works best for you.

Ok thanks for all your help, i tried Don's way re, the avi route but this doesn't really speed up the process.
Dragging the seperate projects onto a new timeline is helpful but takes a long time to render, i'll remember that in future.
I've sort of worked out a workflow for this project, start again and keep a seperate video track as a project for the multicam stuff at the ceremony and speeches, once that is done i can then shove the whole lot along the timeline and then build the 14 track photo intro, then render,this is easier than building 14 video tracks first and then only working on 3 or 4 of them for the rest of the edit.

Thanks again guys.

Paul.

time is relavent. If you have lots of effects on the project especially MB it will take some time but it's easier for me, to work with a clip than the nested vegs files. Just something I've been doing for a long time and it's hard for me to change.

Do what works best for you. Nested vegs work well but like I say, it's hard to teach an old horse new tricks.

Don

Don, what's MB ?

Paul.

Magic Bullet. Which has always taken a long time to render. The newest version should be faster than the older one included with previous versions of Vegas.

MB = Magic Bullet, ok, thanks Edward.

Paul.

Avoid "best" in the render settings unless you are rescaling the video to another size. This alone will cause your render times to balloon by 3x or more with no benefit.

Any render in which you are scaling from HD to SD - "best" is worthwhile.

Renders of hirez stills on the timeline - maybe. It's worth testing with some short renders to see if there are visible improvements. Some recommend "best" for renders of stills, if you're rendering with "best" for an intermediate, and with best for a final render to MPEG2, that's a huge hit in rendering time, which benefits may not be visible in your final MPEG2.

Also look at the Cineform codec as a good alternative to AVI-Uncompressed. This codec is available in an AVI render, and is the codec used in the AVI HDV-Intermediate templates.

Usually, you don't select this option unless you have lots of unused capture in the project and are either moving the project to another computer or archivint it. It's just a method of collecting and trimming media that are used in the project.

Paul why don't you try dragging the "Nested VEG" files in where you want them and when your done, instead of rendering like that (the long way) try what Edward says and right click the VEG file - "edit it" and see if the nested files open the in full project. If it DOES reopen the nested VEG files in your current project (on the currently opened time line) then do that to all the nested files and then render it.

Basically you wont have to work messy just render messy.

Just an idea...

Oliver, i just tried your suggestion, i dragged 2 projects onto the timeline then right clicked>re-edit, first 1 project then the next, it just opened a seperate instance of vegas for each project, so no good, i need both opened projects to be on the same timeline.
Thanks anyway.

Paul.

Darn, I was hoping that worked.

I have read online that people "set their threads to 1 and memory to 128" or "Dynamic RAM to 0 and threads to 1" and that this helps a lot with render times, but I have no idea what they mean...

Another workflow trick that Oliver's post got me to thinking of:

Instead of nesting, for the render, "select all" the clips in a project and paste them into another project.

Pro - you can work section by section, nest to one project for previews.

Pro - no intermediate renders!

Pro - no nest-induced render hogging.

Con - track-based efx will not get copied and pasted over! This work needs to be done on the final "render version" of the project.

It's not worth it for a project that has lots of track efx, but for more straightforward cutting it's a great technique that we used to use before nesting became available.

Options > Prefs > Video.
The above options are at the top of this tab.

Thanks!

Do you use this method Mike, does it help?

I would only use this method *IF* you are having problems. I typically would not drop the ram to 0 but, instead, a very low number. Only if that did not work would I drop it to zero.

These changes have let some people successfully render projects that previously failed so it's worth a shot if your render is failing. The render will take longer, though. But if it finishes when it previously didn't, then it would be worth it for that project.

Does it effect the quality of the project in any way or is it just the render speed?

Not effect on quality. Just render speeds. Basically, you're telling Vegas to use one lawn mower to mow your yard instead of the four it normally uses so it will take longer to get your lawn mowed but it will still get mowed.