<<<-- Originally posted by Douglas Spotted Eagle : Just as a word of light caution, I once copy/pasted one of my own posts from the forum you refer to, I was threatened with copyright violation since they own copyright to what you post there.
-->>>

Man... I didn´t know that
I´ll make sure to paraphrase next time... It´s not like I´m publishing a book here...
Does DVinfo has copyrights of what we post here too??

Anyways.. thanx for answering... I´ll give it another try tonite and see how good can it get to sound..

Since this audio is for a Comediant Promo Video... and I´m using clips from 3 different clubs..
I found out that giving a little reverb to the "good recordings", evens out the difference of sounds and the bad recording doesn´t sound that bad...
I know that´s just subjective perception... but Is this OK?
I mean, fixing the more I can the bad sound to match the good sound.. and then fix the good sound to match the bad?


<<<-- Better thing to do in the end is record it correctly, if you can. If you are in a club where there is no line out, then stick a mic in front of the pa speakers and run a line back to the cam. Drop a lav on the floor in front of the stage. Do anything to get the audio right before you record, rather than "fix it in post."
Fixing in post is a lame CYA way of saying "I didn't take the time to figure it out before I did the gig." Sometimes bad stuff happens, but if you know there will be a problem in the future, fix it before it's a problem, because no matter what, you won't be able to make it perfect later.
-->>>

Well, you are completely right... and now that I know that club I know what to do next time in that club...
But I´ll probably be doing a lot of club shooting, most out of town, and this comediant guys are not very time aware... and we allways are late... and I only have one mic... and I´m only one person.. and sometimes it´s not possible to put the mic in a good spot...
So, as much as I dislike fixing in post, I´m pretty sure I´d have to do it a few times more before I can afford more equipment, and an assitant.

More than reverb, you'll find that applying compression at around 3:1 will help a LOT in getting a more even and consistent sound. You'll need to prank with the settings. Depending on your NLE, you can download a number of free compressors that are acceptable, and can buy a huge number of them from various manufacturers like Sonic Timeworks or WAVES for both Mac and PC.
Reverb will help fill in the gap. Think of it this way. When you shoot really sharply contrasted lines with nasty shadows, you'd probably use a touch of blur to smooth the image, right? Reverb is doing just that. A compressor on the other hand, won't blur, but will diminish the shadow while keeping the subject a little more tight.
Try cutting some midrange frequency in the 300-500 hz range too. That should make a whopping difference, that's where most of the smaller club rooms tend to be honky.
As far as recording it right, if you've only got one mic, run it as CLOSE to the source as you can. I often say, "Mics are like hand grenades. It's a proximity thing. The closer it is to the target, the better it does it's job." Visuals don't suffer the effects of distance as much as audio. We don't 'see' delayed images, but we surely hear delayed audio, plus all it's reflections in a room. Getting the mic closer to the source will minimize reflections, achieve a more direct sound, and clean up the overall image MUCH better. A little lav can easily be dangled from the ceiling of the club near the PA system, taped to the floor near the performer, put at the mid point on the PA speaker itself, between horn/tweeter and driver/woofer. Don't put it over either one directly or you'll really be unhappy.
Run and gun audio is tough, especially if you don't have the gear. A good shotgun would be quite valuable here too, but mount it on a stand rather than a camera. You'll have more control and less wash noise.
I dunno that DVInfo presses the copyright of your post issue. I'd sorta doubt it. Chris isn't a control freak.

I found that you can add a photo album simpley by right clicking on the menu and clicking "add photo ablum" Now the templat they have is timed... 5 second intervals before it switches to the next picture. I would Like to have it be a manual change via remote... maybe with a little arrow at the bottom. Is it possible to do that and if so, is it possible to have audio loop in the background?

Michael Estepp

Hey, thanx for the info.. now I´ll be doing some more experiments... It looks like I won´t be standing from this desk in a while.

Just for sharing... That club where I got the bad audio... I just heard it is a reformed old place where they kept wine to mature (don´t know the name for that). And I´m using the word "reformed" very loosely here.
That´s the kind of echo I have in there.

Rooms with parallel walls will have standing waves where the echos meet themselves and re-inforce or cancel each other out. This boosts or attenuates certain frequencies.

From Jay Rose's posts on dv.com's audio forum, here is a good way of fixing it:
Use a paragraphic equalizer to boost a narrow range of frequencies. You want to find the frequencies where the standing waves are. Sweep through the frequencies and once you've found them, set the EQ to attenuate and adjust so you don't get distorted sound.

That's pretty much what DSE said, except that you boost EQ first to find the frequencies you want to attenuate.

Removing echo is one thing audio programs aren't good at, so try to get good sound in the first place. Try to get closer to the sound source (the comedian or even the speakers) to reduce echoes. I'm not sure how a shotgun will do. Shotgun mics have very bad off-axis response and the echoes will sound distorted and do weird things to your sound.

I take exception to the title of this thread. :-) (My nickname is Spot for those who don't know me)

What about color sampling the area around the dot, using the color sample as either a solid color from the generator, or using a gradient that would give you some room to maneuver the blending, then keyframe this mask to move along with your subject? You can post a link to an image....that would help a lot.

Douglas,
Your the "welcome" Spot, not the "unsightly" one! :-)

I have to do this occationally with glass doors that are opened and closed when shooting with lighting setup outside. I duplicate the video event and use pan and crop to shift it so that the replacement spot is over the place to be replaced. (Use a lower opacity on the top clip to position.) Then I add a cookie cutter with feathered edges to only show the replacement portion of the top video. This is analogous to using the stamp tool in Photoshop to "paint" a portion of the picture from another section.

Even when following a moving target on the opening door, it is pretty quick to do. This will be similar to the singer walking in front of it. I would probably use a pan and crop keyframed generated gradient as an alpha mask to wipe the replacement spot on and off as the singer walks by. You also may find it easier to use a spot of video that has no singer in it and either slow down, or duplicate, so you don't have to deal with the replacement spot being wall sometimes and singer other times.

Simulating tv/film dropouts, artifacts
 

How do you simulate
- analog video dropouts
- film dropouts
- tv signal dropout / instability

in vegas video? Are there scripts available to do this?

These can be very useful when simulating tv, hidden cameras, in sci fi etc. and are an easy way to add motion and ambience in many other cases.

Thank you.
-- Andre

All those things you are asking for are there as filters already. You don't need a script. There are some presets, and there is a lot of tweak ability in each of the plugs.
The TV simulator is quite good, my tutorial on creating a "star wars-like hologram" uses it.
The Film FX tools in Vegas are all keyframable, allowing for as much or as little grain, jitter, dust, grit, hair, scratch etc that you'd like to have.

URL please
 

Hello,

There is a website, where people upload their short films, experiments etc.. done in Vegas.. I lost some of my favorites and do not remember what the URL was ?? Anyone??

Thanks,
Mike M.

There's audio sharing, video sharing, and VEG sharing at: http://vegasusers.com/

Hello,

Thank you Edward..Thats it..the site i was looking for..

Mike Moncrief

Adorage Fx Vol. 7 for Vegas 4
 

Adorage Magic PC Volume 7

Volume 7 delivers extraordinary and impressive animations as well as professional compositings for transitions, PiP effects and splitscreens. Hundreds of high quality Flag animations and transitions, Globe animations (with target stop possibility), new particle- and Light effects and many more flexible usable Tricks are included in this package.

Note: If older volumes have been installed and after that Volume 7 have been attached, all effects of the older volumes and of course the volume 7 effects are useable without limitations.

http://www.adorage.de/gb/produkte-00000049-00000015.html

I also made my Lady X episode with Vegas if you're interested...

Observations from a long-time NAMMer
 

Here's a first.
I'm in my 26th year at NAMM. That should tell you how old I am.
This is the FIRST YEAR in the history of NAMM that video has been presented for editors. And, what's serendipitous about it is that
Adobe, Pinnacle, Final Cut Pro, and Ulead are all within about 20 feet of each other, with Sony being about 200 feet away from all that, with a couple other small video-related offerings very near by. WAVES has a new IR convoluted reverb plug that is totally revolutionary that will have major impact/benefit to location recorders. Lotsa video stuff this year, and it's a first.
I feel vindicated; the audio guys have been predicting this for years. The video folks have been poo-pooing it and saying it will never happen. Now all 5 'bigger' companies in the vid biz show up at the same time, and since I have some inside knowledge, I know it happened entirely innocently. Hilarious.
Rudy Sarzo, playing live in the Sony booth, is a huge draw for ACID and live recording in Vegas, too.

New scripts
 

WOW, John Meyer just deluged the Sundance site with a host of new scripts, some of which are very creative. Check em' out.
http://www.sundancemediagroup.com/help/kb
Thanks, John

Problem with 256Kbps wmv render
 

Hi. I wondered if anyone else has had a problem trying to render using the Vegas 4 wmv 9 template at 256Kbps?

I had a recurring problem where the render of a two minute segment stopped three times at 73% and froze up Vegas.

At first I thought it might be an issue with something illegal on the timeline but when I tried rendering at 100Kbps and again at 1Mbps it went ahead smoothly.

Any thoughts?

Ian . . .

Yeah thanks John, the Audit for event levels and Audit for blank gaps are pure gold!!!

Thanks, they all look great and I look forward to tinkering. I had no idea there was such a wealth of scripts available.

One question - when you say John has "just added" these scripts, is there a reason why they are shown on the site as having been added in December 2001?!

Thanks again for the link.

Ian . . .

For a VERY subtle, non animated CRT effect, take a look at this .veg sample posted at the Sundance site.

http://www.sundancemediagroup.com/help/kb/kb_download.asp?id=219

I had a brief look at it this morning and it seems quite good (but I'll say it again, VERY subtle). Not sure what the missing .png files were supposed to be for, though, and whether they add something to the party.

You can vary the aperture by playing with the height setting on the checkerboard.

The included text works very well and I tried it over a still with reasonable results.

Ian . . .

What's NAMM?

That's weird. What you might want to try is to select the template,
then hit custom and change the rate to something like 300 kbps
or 250. See what that does.

The International Music Products Association ... I guess

Well, actually it is the National Association of Musical Merchants.

which is better? Blended or Interpolated...?
 

hmm.. ive always used blended fields, and sometimes on extreme slow mos it DOES give me combing distortions even in avi...

now i havet really used interpolation due to the fact that im working strictly with DV, and fel taht using the same routine would give me the rawest image...

now im of two minds as interpolation offers a nicer blend (for still anywyas (apart from progressive) now i have tried this an di really dont have the time to make test recordings to see which i prefer..

what do YOU prefer??

what do u think would offer the best moving blended field image with zero artifacts?

thanks in advance for any responmse

Zero artifacts is a pipe dream, simply by nature of 4;1;1 footage. Blended provides a better deinterlace, there is quite a thread on this in the film look forum.
But it's all opinion. Build a 20 second clip of fast motion, slow motion, stills, and normal DV, and run it in both. It will take all of 5 minutes. Then you'll have your own experience and thus your own informed opinion.

It's a Music Merchants show, NAB for the music industry. It's similar in size to NAB, with a lot more people. It's also a lot crazier. I've only been doing NAB for 10 years, so can't comment on it's growth or changes. NAMM, I've got photos of from every year.
Anyway, it's just great seeing music videos being edited in AE, FCP, etc. Apple and Pinnacle have 2 of the largest booths on the show floor. Of course, so did Logic and Steinberg, which is where both apple and pinnacle have taken over. Apple is also really pushing the hell out of Garage Band, which is the same as Acid Style, a 69.00 app.

This gets weirder, Rob.

I just got another segment finished (which I wanted to do before I spent too much time experimenting with the original problem project).

I thought that I would do a first render at 100Kbps as that was safe on the previous project. But NO! As I speak it has been sitting there at 99% for about five minutes. The time remaining indicator is at zero.

How very strange.

I had a quick look in Task Manager and the vegas process has 99% of the CPU. Cancelling the render seems to do nothing and the only exit is by terminating the process.

So, my problem is not limited to one template.

STOP PRESS : I just tried rendering it at 256 and it worked fine.

I'm confused! And of course now I wonder if there is something amiss with my pc.

Cookie cutter question
 

I'm using the cookie cutter on a track of video which has a talking head (mine). I want just the mouth to remain and this is then laid over stills of an Action Man doll to give the impression that it's talking. (In case anyone is vaguely interested in why on earth I would want to do this, I am making a spoof internal training video for a customer, set in an imaginary badly run business, with action dolls as employees. Work with me on this . . .)

OK, I've had some success so far and the results are pretty funny (I used Photoshop to create various facial expressions on the Action Man - eyebrows raised, eyes closed etc).

The problem is that the talking head I'm using for the mouth keeps moving around the frame. So, I've worked with cookie cutter keyframes and with track motion and the end result is (mostly) OK; ie the mouth stays where it should on the dolls face.

However, it is taking the best part of half a day just getting the keyframes right on each 90 second segment and I can't really afford to spend that much time.

So, my question is am I going about this the right and most efficient way? Is there a better way in Vegas? Or are there any other tools I could use.

I'm not entirely clear on anything beyond basic masks, but is there any way to create a dynamic mask that follows the shape of the mouth based on it's colour? I'm quite willing to wear bright lipstick if that will help (although my wife may be concerned. Again.)

Thanks in advance of any suggestions.

Ian . . .

Adding Web Links in DVD Arch?
 

Does anyone know if you can add web links to a DVD menu in DVD architecht?

Michael Estepp

I've done WM9 in Vegas 4 at various bitrates, including those you mention. I have not encountered a lockup, although my source material has always been DV25 AVI files.

for faster results ( as long as it takes to play clip) ) you would use a track motion tool. you put a mark on the mouth and hit play and it tracks the mouth . now you can either steady it ( so it doesn't move around the frame ) or you can apply the movement to another clip/layer/object so it has the same tracking ... commotion and combustion i know will track it .. maybe boris red 3?

instead of putting on lipstick ..
why don't you just keep your head STILL ..
seeing how you only need MOUTH .. have somebody hold your head with their hands so your head doesn't move ...

Compositing Question
 

I'm trying to create an effect where the footage is in b&w with only an animated strip that slides across the screen revealing the same footage in color.
I'm duplicating the clip, making the bottom one b&w, then adding a cookie cutter to the top clip to mask out all but the selection, then animating it with keyframes. It all seems to work pretty good.

I would, however, like to know if there is any way to modify the cookie cutter. I know you can choose circle or rectangle, etc etc. But is there a way I can click and drag out the shape of the rectangle. Similar to the way you can define the "show effects" area in the monitor view?
If not you can create a custom shape in Photoshop to act as the cookie cutter, or mask. How is that done exactly. Do you need to create a document at 720x480 with an alpha channel that has the mask. When you import it into Vegas all you have to do is choose the correct compositing mode to extract the alpha channel and use it as a mask?
Also what about animating the mask? I don't mean animating the "shape" of it but the location rather- just as I would the cookie cutter. Can that be done? I ask because I'd assume once the mask is over far enough to the left or right it'll effectively be off the frame thus not making all that it should beings the end of the mask is bleeding into the screen. Any/all of that make sense?

Glen, you may be better off if you create the mask some other way such as in Photoshop or using a black and white generated media with Pan/Crop to adjust the size. Then you'll have more flexibility than with the cookie cutter.

much appreciated, i just thought someone may have a definitive answer to this question..

I'll give it a shot sometime next week

I'm not sure what happened to the dates there. On my system, they show Jan 15, 2004. New scripts from others went up there today.

Aha - looks like the "date added" date is based on the local system date. I looked at the Sundance downloads again this morning from a different pc and the date was correct. I guess the system date on my other pc is a little bit out. Like three years!!

Looking forward to digging through the new stuff!

Ian . . .

I agree that it would be very useful to alter the shape of the masks created in cookie cutter. Even if it was just to change the proportions of, say, the rectangle, or the "flatness" of the oval. That would have been a great help with my "mouth" masks that I mentioned in another thread.

The cookie cutter is such an easy way of creating a quick and dirty mask that it seems a shame it's limited to those few (fixed proportion) shapes - many of which aren't particularly usable IMO.

As Edward says, I suppose the most flexible method is DIY with Photoshop. I really must learn how to do that . . .

Does the video and photo album have to be on the same disk? If you put a DVD or CD with files of jpg images the playe should have the option to show them auto or interactive.

Web links can be added in Vegas. Not sure if the carry through in DVDA.