Vegas Video discussions from 2006 (Q1Q2)

[Glenn Chan]

In my opinion, Premiere 6 just wasn't very good. It had a lot of bugs in it, and the workflow is terrible / you have to push a lot of buttons to do what you want. Premiere Pro is definitely better. Although I personally like Vegas a lot more than Premiere Pro.

Vegas will run on just about anything, so it should do well on his old computer (if you want to buy it). Vegas will even work on a celeron 300ghz.

$525 will buy youa computer similar in speed to his old one, so you might as well pick up his old machine.

[Michael Wisniewski]

My PC has very similar specs. I built it 3 years ago to run Vegas and it's still performing very well. $525 is about right for Feb 2006.

Also made the move from Pinnacle Studio to Vegas. Best move ever, can't recommend it enough.

[Justin Lubin]

I'm new to Vegas and I've just started my project in Vegas 6. I'm trying to figure out what direction I'd like to go in. I've started in "a" direction: http://www.tchracing.com/tmp/Turbo32v.wmv (please right click, save target as)


I've got a few things on my mind.

1.) I'm having trouble locating the bottom left logo/tag on the screen properly. I start with a media generator "heavy shadow" locate LEFT then BOTTOM and adjust it with PAN/CROP but at a low point it cuts the text and doesn't display properly. What can I do to easily place a logo in the bottom left? I had a Photoshop transparent/gif over matte black but it didn't provide enough detail/sharpness for me.

2.) I'd like to letterbox this project. I read in Vegas I need to make a Mask in PS then add a video layer and drag the mask for the duration of the film. Is there a better way of doing this?

3.) By going letterbox I think I'll be able to cover the jitter of a free moving camera. Do you guys think this will work? Most of this film will be in car and or without a tripod.. I saw a tutorial of a plug-in for Vegas and they achieved a nice effect using a mask/title page and jitter/shake correction on a clip. I'll be using my letter box mask as they did the title page.


This project is based on a web release. I'm planning

[Dale Nicholson]

I would like to be able to duplicate the opening credits sequence from the movie "Superman" (the greatest opening credits sequence in cinema, IMHO). Thankfully, I only need to do it for one title, not for several. And I'd like to do it over another video clip, not over a black starfield. It's hard to explain if you don't recollect the credits sequence I'm referring to.

Is this best done in Vegas or Boris Grafitti/FX, or After Effects? I have all four. Is there a link you could point me to? Thanks.

[Jim Arthurs]

Originally Posted by Dale Nicholson

Is this best done in Vegas or Boris Grafitti/FX, or After Effects? I have all four. Is there a link you could point me to? Thanks.

That open inspired a lot of folks, including me. It is still grand.

Done using a process called streak photography. An animation stand camera slowly moves down toward backlit artwork with the shudder open, recording a 3D effect for each frame. In-between frames, the animation stand bed is moved north/south or east/west. Wash, rise and repeat for each frame in the sequence. Make no mistakes. :) Motion control over all camera axis made this process easier and more complex in terms of camera motion.

I used to do this to make money in college, going around selling all the local retailers streak and backlit animation logos for their commercials. Most of the time I couldn't afford the local Oxberry camera stand rental time, so I made a small track from hardware store aluminum, and literally pushed a Bolex toward the artwork by hand for each streak frame. It worked, and looked quite decent.

Now, just use After Effects, and the Trapcode plugin called "shine". Done deal in minutes.

EDIT: Oh, and the effect shows up better over black/dark background, but you can use any video clip in AE behind it.

Regards,

Jim Arthurs

[Bruce Broussard]

The problem was the bitrate. The default settings that I was using used an output bitrate of about 15m, this caused all of the issues. When I rendered with anything around 8m or less, all was well. Very clear results as I originally expected. Thanks for the suggestions.

Bruce

[Mitja Popovski]

Very basic question? Can someone help me with shortcuts for "I","O" and "," for fast marking of in point, out point, insert and overlay.In vegas 6 it is very inconvenient to use markers and drag de video and audio(if you are lucky to catch both of them) from the trimmer to timeline.

[Dale Nicholson]

Thanks. I'm relatively new to NLE/digital video work, so I'm guessing that I will initially have to create a layer of text first (and keyframe its movement)before using the "Spice" filter.


Oops! I just realized I should have posted this in the regular DV Vegas forum, not the HD forum. Maybe the Webmaster can move this thread over there.

[Douglas Spotted Eagle]

If you want to mark In/Out/Add to timeline from trimmer, place your cursor where you want to begin adding edited media.
1. Hit I to mark In point
2. Hit O to mark Out Point
3. Hit A to Add the selected area to the timeline

Repeat.

If you have a selection on the TIMELINE, you don't need to mark an Out point (or even an In point), just place your cursor in the Trimmer at the In point, and hit A. The media in the trimmer will fill the selection on the Timeline.

Does this help? I wasn't sure I understood where the question was.

[Fredrik Forsell]

Hi
Do I have to change the duration of audioclips in Vegas if I render 25i to 24p to mpeg2 in order for them to be synced?
I have hundreds of audiofiles in my project. So that would take a long time. Can't I instead choose "include audio" when I render the mpeg2 file for dvdarchitect and under "system" choose "save as separate elementary streams"?
If not, do you know an easy way to sync video with audio without having to change every síngle clip of audio?

/Fredrik

[Fredrik Forsell]

.....
i tried to include audio
but dvdarchitect doesn't seem to like the .m2v and .mpa files that are created....

[Fredrik Forsell]

...now I could import them and they seem to playback fine.
So is this a solution, a way of getting around having to change the length of the audio by 4% manually, or is it something that I'm missing?

[Fredrik Forsell]

...perhaps the 4% only was about getting the pitch of the sound right?
In that case dvdarchitect shortens the audio file to fit the videofile with the same name, right? So what is meant is that the audiofile will have the right length after I have changed 25i to 24p, but not the right pitch?

Please help. I'm trying to solve this right now; what to I have to do to sync audio and video if I have changed my video from 25i to 24p and want to burn it with dvdarchitect? The reason I ask, and not just try myself, is that it takes so much time to render my project. Better to ask you who knows!

[Jim Arthurs]

Originally Posted by Dale Nicholson

Thanks. I'm relatively new to NLE/digital video work, so I'm guessing that I will initially have to create a layer of text first (and keyframe its movement)before using the "Spice" filter.

Yes, that's correct. The filter is called "Shine", though "Spice" has a nice ring to it.

A 3D program or plugin could also be used with careful transparency settings on extruded text. In some cases this might work better, but requires more knowledge and effort...

Regards,

Jim Arthurs

[Douglas Spotted Eagle]

Originally Posted by Fredrik Forsell

Please help. I'm trying to solve this right now; what to I have to do to sync audio and video if I have changed my video from 25i to 24p and want to burn it with dvdarchitect? The reason I ask, and not just try myself, is that it takes so much time to render my project. Better to ask you who knows!

Before going much further, can I ask why you're rendering a 24p project from 50i media? If you're in a PAL country, you know your DVD player likely can't play 24p, right? It will speed it up instead.

You don't need to do anything if you render a 24p project from your 50i timeline, just render the 24p, and render the AC3 with the same settings, and DVD Architect will take care of the rest.