Rendering Filters
 

I've noticed that some filters don't render as they look in the preview, they render less extreme. For instance Vitascene's defocus filter renders much less blurred than it looks on the preview. Also when I render film effects the grain, hairs, spots etc look much less extreme.

Anybody know why this might be?

Is your preview window set to Best/Full?

This is starting to "ring-a-bell"? What version, release and build of Vegas are you using?

Grazie

No I use preview/auto. When I render to new track the render looks very different.

I'm using Pro 8b with Cineform intermediate files, renders are to Cineform too.

With that setting, I'd expect it to look different.
The resolution of the Preview window on preview/auto is half of what it is for best/full.
Look at the numbers in the bottom left corner of the preview window and you'll see what I mean.
I get the same "lower quality" effect if I'm previewing text.
At preview/auto, it looks soft and fuzzy.
At best/full, it's crisp and clear.
If you can't do a proper preview at the setting, do a RAM render of a short piece.

But if the render and the unrendered event are compared on the same timeline in the same preview window shouldn't they look exactly the same?

No, because one is an approximation of what the filter "might do" and the other is the exact result of what the filter "did" do. In the latter case the preview has the real result of the defocus so it doesn't have to approximate the FX. It's just approximating the resolution. Look at them both in Best (Full) mode. They should look the same.

~jr

Thanks John & Mike. I understand now that "preview" is exactly that, but why do some filters render out as they look in the preview while others don't? I can't get Newblue film looks to render anything like it looks in the preview.

Preview is a trade-off of quality for frame rate. Some filters are light on the CPU and the preview doesn't have to sacrifice much quality to keep the frame rate up. Other filters are heavy on the CPU and so more quality is sacrificed in order to keep the frame rate acceptable. This will cause different filters to preview differently. Film Looks usually uses very CPU intensive processing so you may see more of a difference between Preview and Good or Best.

~jr