20 min is a short not a trailer !

if 3mgs was too big and 500k you don't like quality then try 1mgs ..

does you project have allot of movement ?
try - select 512k then CUSTOM - varible bit rate 2 pass ...then under bit rate change from 512 to 700k

i prefer 24p slo mo vs interlace ..
i assume you are editing in 23.976 time line ..
sometimes slo mo is a bit smoother when you have your vegas preview window set to GOOD (auto or full) ..good/best forces V to resample while preview ( auto/good) does not force a resample .. the difference is resample has dissolves like between frames .. non resample just repeats frames .. i usually look at both and then decide which i like for that section ...note: if you decide you like the non resample then you'll have to either render using Preview quality or you right click on the video in TL - properties - then check the do not resample ...

When a software does everything, it doesn't do anything right... sort of like mobile phones taking terrible pictures (take me for example: I upgraded from a 3 year old Nokia to the fantastic MotoRazor... looks sharp, sends multimedia messages, browses the internet, etc, etc, etc... but the audio quality is terrible compared to my ancient Nokia)!

Try a stand-alone compression software like Sorenson Sqeeze. Even the free Windows Media Encoder should do a decent job at 512.

so if i'm buring to a widescreen project, I should check "stretch out to rendered media??" And what about the other box stating to save all rendered media box??
Just checking. I'll make sure I click on validate.
thanks
dean

I encode to WMV from Vegas all the time. You're not going to find better quality from Squeeze, Cleaner, etc. They do offer better workflows for various tasks, especially setting up big batchs, etc.

All these are built on the Windows Media Encoder. It's just a question of what WME controls they expose and what filters they add. Vegas exposes almost all of them, has a great set of filters, and allows encoding from the timeline, which I do frequently.

But WMV, as good as it is, is not a magic format. You still need to start with the audience - how will they see your short? Via internet? If so, 3 megabit per second is way too fat for most users to stream with acceptable waiting times.

Most of my work is between 200 to 500 kilobits per second for internet at 320x240 pixels.

But only you can decide what quality works best for your short, your audience, and the method you're using to deliver it to them.

See some WMV on the web you like, view properties and statistics on it (via right-click) and you'll get a better idea of what's working for people and whether you're making any mistakes in creating your renders.

OTOH, if this isn't for web distribution, or if you feel that your renders aren't looking as good as WMV should, give us more info about your content & settings.

Here's another thing to consider. I read long ago somewhere that some burners will write hard to read DVD's if you burn at maximum speed.

I tested this a few days ago by burning 2 copies of a DVD I made, one at 8X, and one at 2X. I looked at the burned side of the DVD's, and on the 8X burned disc I can see rings. The 2X burned perfectly with no rings visible.

I don't know if this really means anything, but to me it indicates the laser was more consistent when it was burning slower.

This may help with players that are marginal, they should have an easier time reading a disc that was burned slower.

Anyone else have an thoughts on this?

how big can I go file size with photos for video
 

I want to put a few photos on my timeline - what size should I save them to?? I had 180 resolution on them, but I thought that may be too big....would 72 resolution be better??

It's not about DPI, it's about total number of pixels.
You could have a 55 x 100 image at a resolution of 72dpi, and it would look horrid.
You could have a 4000 x 4000 image at 72 dpi and it would look great.
You want to scale/scan the image so you have a minimum of 720h x 480 v for best results, regardless of the inch size of the image. You can over do it too, so shoot for not more than double the 720 value in either direction.

resolution problems (someone smart needed)
 

I'm doing sort of a compilation project, editing from lots of avi's (of which i am frameserving vdub to vegas). The problem is, all of these videos have different resolutions.

I don't know anything about pixels/ratios/square pixels etc, but i know the output video is not going to look like/match the input videos when i do final render. I don't expect perfection in render but I'm just trying to find some middle ground.

Can anyone experienced look at the following and try to figure out a project resolution that might be sort of
an average of the bunch and that will have the final output looking as close as to these inputs as possible.

Here are the resolutions

320 x 240
512 x 384
384 x 288
368 x 272
704 x 576
576 x 432
720 x 496
720 x 576

thanks in advance

Disks that I burn at 8x or 16x with Nero will play correctly on my own PCs and one of my DVD players, but often don't work on other systems.

DVDs that I burn at 4x play fine anywhere, so far. I only use DVD-R.

No – no need to stretch the media as it is already widescreen. Just use the widescreen template (e.g. DVD Architect NTSC Widescreen Video Stream). Actually it doesn’t matter if you select that box or not, this only applies when you are changing the aspect ratio (in this case it will either stretch of letterbox depending on your selection).

For your other question: Do you mean the box which says “Save project path as reference in rendered media”? I’ve not used this, but it allows you to return to the source project if you use the rendered file in another project. You don’t need to select this, and it has nothing to do with widescreen

Removing part of image?
 

I have a clip that I am working on where there is a hair or something on my lens and it shows up pretty bad in a few shots.
The good part is that it is against a solid blue sky.
What is the easiest way to mask this out?

Thanks

Vegas + Behringer BCF200 = perfect
 

We have successfully linked the Behringer control surface BCF2000 to Vegas using the standard "Emulated Mackie Control Device" setting in vegas.

The BCF is running in Mackie Emulation mode as a USB MIDI device, with no MIDI cables.

We are able to write volume and pan envelopes during playback using Automation Latch mode - (Touch mode seems to revert to 0db if there are no changes for a second or so... ) and the envelopes play back on the motorized faders.

There is a required firmware and USB driver update on the Behringer site.

/magnus

I would use After Effects or Combustion. If you want to look it up, the technique is called rotoscoping. From your description, it should be easy if there is not much motion.

I transcode the video segment using a lossless codec, otherwise the rotoscoping application may use Microsoft's DV codec to render the file rather than Sony's, and the result will not be good.

I swopped my DVD write to a Liteon recently and discovered the DVDs burnt cant be read on a DVD player, only on a PC. I will have to try burning at lower speed.

That's good news Magnus.

I would be interested to hear how you're using it with the video features in Vegas (vs. audio).

You could add a slight blur in that area. Look at the "Blurring Faces" article in Vol 1 #12 of my newsletters.

Reverse Flickering Help
 

I have a clip of a reception that pans a small table with the place cards on it for the guests. It plays, renders, and re-plays fine.

When I put this clip in reverse it flickers horribly.

It only flickers on the monitor.

I use Vegas 6d.

What is causing this problem?
What should I do to fix it?

Please help.

I've tried reduce interlace flicker, added slight noise and blur, but nothing helped.

Is this clip impossible to reverse without the flickering?

So far not at all - the faders operate on audio tracks only.

Next challenge is to see if we can get the faders to write envelopes on automatable parameters of audio plugins.

Mute/Solo/Select audio track all work like a dream, as well as basic transport and go-to-marker. I'm sure there is IN and OUT somewhere as well.

Still need a basic shuttle/pro to cue/shuttle/jog with audio - the ffd and rew are mute when using the buttons on the control surface, it does not have a jog wheel.

The Emulation modes and button assignments are available in a PDF at http://www.behringerdownload.de/BCF2...tion_modes.pdf

Splitting Audio Volume Envelopes?
 

Scenario: Edited 18 minute biography, after review, I decide to remove a segment that is one minute long in the middle.

Problem: I can't simply move the rest of the biography to merge where I split it, because I have used Audio Volume Envelopes extensively, and they stay fixed on the time line.

Question: Can I split the envelope and remove the section I deleted, with the video/audio portion?

Or should I render one section out to .avi and then just plug it on the timeline where I want it? Will I lose resolution from rendering it twice? Once to AVI then again to MPEG2?

Thanks in advance.

I thought if you cut the clip the envelopes will come with the clip when pasted.

There is a button on the tool bar that says "lock envelopes to events". Click it and the envelopes will move with the clips.

Could be field order, trying switching from upper to lower first (should happen automatically though?). Are you rendering to interlaced? Did you use a velocity envelope or right click -> reverse?

yes, I just hit reverse.

I am rendering out dv .avi to a dsr20 dvcam tape.

it is interlaced lower field 1st.

it works well if I don't use the right click reverse but the clip looks better in reverse except for the flickering part.

Usually when I have this problem the reduce interlace flicker switch fixes it, but not in this case.

thanks for helping.

if you are rendering out interlaced you will need to make it upper field first once it's reversed, I thought Vegas did this automatically, but maybe not, try right click properties, field order upper first on the reversed clip.

Hey Pete,

I don't know about smart, but personally, I would drag each .AVI onto a separate track in the Vegas timeline (directly from Windows explorer).

When you have them all in the order that you want, use the track motion on each track in Vegas (just to the left of the Track FX) and adjust the output pan/crop size to what seems to work for you for each clip. You can easily make all of these the same size if you want by copying the properties to each track once you've found the size that works for you.

Hope that helps,

Brandon

Newbie Q.
 

Hi,

there was a nice feature in Premier called something like 'hold on first frame' -I used it a lot when footage was shaky to make a still clip of any length that I could then pan within.

I know it must exist in Vegas -I can get a similiar effect by reducing the clip velocity to 3% (0% possible? -seems to just jump to -2% upon reduction).

Anyway, where is that 'hold on first frame' check box? Thanks in advance,


Nick.

Hold the CTRL key while adjusting the envelope point.
There is no "hold on first frame" option in Vegas outside of
Make a one frame subclip
or
Use Velocity filter
or
split out the frame and make multiples of it
or
use the stutter feature in Ultimate S.

Vegas used to flip the field order but thats been changed as it caused too many problems, considering that re-rendering woudl then revers that order back...

try rendering the revered footage out as Progressive, then reimport to the project. When rendering out that clip, turn on the supersampling and add some sharpness.
To cut down on the flicker (if u still ahve the problem) , turn on ur scopes and view the live readout. U may need to run levels and drop your exposure a little bit... i found veags has teh tendency to flicker if the shot is blown out a lil.. detail u see... the more detail there is, the more chance of flicker..

If you right-click the velocity node, you can choose "Set to..." where you can type in the exact velocity you want including 0%

You are correct, it seems. I did several tests to see if it was possible to trick 24p or 24p (w/pulldown) via print-to-HDV tape. I tried using it with both a Z1 and the Sony MU10 (?) HDV recorder. I also tried using Cineform's HDLink export and the print-to-HDV function of Vegas. With Cineform, the tape sorta locked up. With Vegas, it would try to rerender the project into 60i; or, if I forced it to use the 24p file (both the full 24p or the 24p with pulldown) by referring it to the saved file, then it too would lock up the tape for a minute.

So I'm basically down to harddrive and/or DVD backups of the 24p m2t. I was just hoping that since the Sony Z1 records in 24f mode, that I could at least export back to tape in that mode. Seems to not work that way.

Thanks everyone.

I tried all the advice in different combinations without any real improvement. The clip switches to upper field when it is reversed. I've tried upper, lower, and progressive.

I am clueless as to why this clip is not flickerlessly reversible, but I have a deadline.

I rendered it without the reverse and the clip is fine.

I saved the clip so when I have more time and I can try to find a way to do it.

If there is anymore advice I'd apprectiate it. I feel pretty lame that I couldn't overcome such a simple problem.

There has to be a solution.

Earlier you said "it only flickers on the monitor." Assuming you are editing this for display on TV, if it only flickers on the monitor (and not on TV), why don't you just proceed?

I don't know if you have access to quicktime pro but this article was very helpful for trailers:
http://quicktime.wikicities.com/wiki..._low_bit_rates

it flickers on the TV and not the computer monitor

Dear Dean,

The other option moves the clip on the timeline so that the audio is in sync.

The option you used, "Slipping", leaves the clip where it is on the timeline, but then moves the content within the clip.

Generally, I find it better (in my work) to move the clip and not slip the contents. When you slip the contents, the starting and ending points of the shot will change, while in the other option they will not.

I find that when I have a clip out of sync, it is because I accidently moved the whole clip on the timeline, so I want to use the other option, not the slip.

Another way to accomplish this is to enable "All Tracks, Markers, and Regions" in auto ripple then enable auto ripple before deleting the section. I use this all of the time and it works well. Be sure to turn it off after the deletion unless you really need it.

Regards,
Jerry

Removing or deleting projects
 

I can't seem to find anywhere to delete or remove completed projects in Vegas 6.0d.

The only way I can figure out to do so is to delete all the associated files, and tell Vegas to forget it when I click on the remembered projects in the "File" menu.

Am I missing something, or is it just not there. I checked the program help, and looked through the manual index.

Jamie

I manually delete unwanted project files and any associated files manually via Windows Explorer. I also leave the "open last project" option turned off so I can open the project I want opened.

HDV Re-compression
 

If you capture HDV m2t files and bring them into Vegas, but only edit the audio (mix an additional audio track or something like that) and print that back to HDV tape, does the video get re-compressed (lose a generation)?

What is the answer if you do cuts-only video editing?

Background: What I am thinking of is using double-system sound recording with and HC3 camcorder, which has no mic input. If a separate recorder was used for the main sound, could it be synced with the camera video in Vegas and read back to tape without reducing the video quality.

Buddy