supposed to? yes/ Does it? nope Unless someone here has made it go and can enlighten me

1-
If your target format is video DVD (for playback on TVs, not computer monitors):
A- I *highly* recommend you connect a TV to your edit system. A TV will be a lot closer to what your video looks like than what you see on a computer monitor.

Computer --> firewire cable --> camcorder/deck (set to convert DV-->analog) --> A/V cable --> TV/monitor (set it on the right input).

In Vegas, click on the TV icon.

If you've never done this before I highly highly recommend this as you can spot problems like overscan, chroma crawl, interlace flicker, etc. before they occur.

B- Play back your video and watch it on your TV. Does your footage look smooth?

C- If you'd like, you could de-interlace the footage. Watch the results on your TV. It shouldn't make that much of a difference for TV viewers. Motion will not be as smooth, and resolution may be lower depending on your de-interlace method. There may be advantages for people who are watching the DVD on a computer.

The reasons for my question were:

If the source is interlaced, and the destination is interlaced, then you may as well leave it interlaced. If you are looking at interlaced video on the computer monitor, it will NOT look the same as it does on an interlaced TV. The suggestion to preview on an external monitor is a good one and will give you a better representation of what the final result will look like.

Compression issue , question not problem
 

Hi all,


So I just rendrered my latest project with divx pro , it is 2:30 and the size comes up to 90 meg...

I've been watching some videos lately from a company that makes the same kind of stuff that I do and they manage to put a 640x480 4:30 in just a 60 meg file using Mpeg.

I've played with all kinds of codecs and so far divx is the one that is really comes out the most beautiful. Is there any trick then , like maybe rendering to a regular uncompressed file and encoding it in Tmpge or any other program. What could these guys have used to get such results.

My project will be web-based so it can't be 90 meg.

Thanks for your time :)

Phil

If it is Web-based, resize it to 320x240 if you want streaming video. You should easily be able to get away with a bit rate of 500kbps. For a 2:30 clip that means 150s x 500 kb/s = 9MB

If you want really want full-frame, aim for 1Mbps - 1.5Mbps. For a 2:30 clip that means 20-30 MB.

"Where did I go wrong?" you ask. You probably did not control the bit rate. Be sure to use two passes since size is of the essence.

Capturing only audio through Firewire
 

Since my sound card has a low-grade mic input, I want to use my camcorder to capture live audio (in other words, not from tape.)

Is it possible to use Vegas to capture only audio so I do not use excessive disk space?

Hi Emre,


Thanks for the answer

So , would it be possible to explain , in a nutshell, that pass thing , can't seem to find any "english" definition

So how low can the bitrate be before one starts to loose quality...

In the example that I use , the guys used mpg , would you suggest the same, if so would you suggest rendering it in mpg or rendreing it raw and encode it in mpg with another program.

Thanks for your time

Oh yes, I would always recommend multi-pass encoding, if time allows it.

With DivX (aka MPEG-4 SP) I shoot for roughly 0.2 bits / (pixel *second) if I want high quality. For low quality, 0.1 bits / (pixel * second). For NTSC DVD resolution you are looking at 1-2 Mbps. Obviously, If you reduce the resolution (recommended practice for Web distribution), you can reduce the bit rate. Ideally you should compress a representative clip of your video to determine the ideal bit rate (aka, "perform a compressibility test".)

There is a new standard called H.264 (aka MPEG-4 AVC) that is even more efficient than DivX, but the software is still maturing, so I would give them a bit more time before using them.

I can not give you a step-by-step guide to multi-pass encoding in the limited space, so let me refer you to divx.com support.

Without using the soundcard and staying strictly with firewire you have a couple of options:

1) Capture with Vegas with video, render the audio to a separate file, and delete the original file.

2) Get Scenalyzer Live which can capture audio-only over firewire.

So it is possible, but not with Vegas, it appears.

Is it possible to monitor the audio levels while doing a live recording?

Scenalyzer Live has a rough meter while capturing but I'm not sure how far I'd trust it. You can download it and test as a demo (I think you might get a beep every now and then because it's a demo)

You really need to make sure you're feeding it the proper signal strength to begin with by using your camera audio controls.

Hi Kim,

Have you tried the Debugmode (makers of WinMorph) forums?

http://www.debugmode.com/userforums/viewforum.php?f=2&sid=d269e86411757e08efb3ee7c52e0cba8

There's a good deal of material there that may (or may not) get you started and Satish (the developer) does seem to get back to people on tech problems.

Worth a try? Good luck.

Actually, this quote from Satish last year may just sum it up :

Winmorph does not work with Vegas 5. Sony is thinking of reviewing the plugin SDK for Vegas so i am waiting for that to happen.. Meanwhile please try with Vegas 4. Or if you got Wax plugin for Vegas 5 to work, you can use WinMorph from inside Wax as a plugin.

Magic Bullet, Vegas, and CPU brand
 

Excuse me if this is in the wrong forum, but when using Magic Bullet Looks with Vegas, does it make a difference, in terms of rendering time, as to whether or not one uses a P4 or an AMD chip? I've read that MB is optimized for P4s, but does this mean that AMD chips will render MB slower then P4s? Thanks.

Magic Bullet is slow no matter what chip you put it on.

Edward is being kind,, painfully slow is more like it.

It might actually be faster on AMD64 CPUs as they are generally faster at floating point calculations. Magic Bullet does its processing with 16-bit floating point calculations. This is just theoretical however, and the difference should maybe be around 50% which means Magic Bullet is still really slow. I also don't have an AMD64 CPU to play with so I have no way of verifying what I said was true.

For everything else video-related, it seems Pentium processors are generally faster than AMD64.

Hi Emre,


Well I finally got something out of it.

Ended up rendering it raw and converting it to mpg via tmpge.

27meg for a 2:46 file in 352x240.... not bad.

One question though , you suggested a bitrate of 500 and this is how I set tmpge to but it turns out to be 240 ??? I look back at my settings and it is indeed 500.

would it be 240 by pass (because I put 2) , doesn't add up but this is the only logical answer that comes to mind.

thanks for your help

Phil

The fruit of my labor
 

Hi all,

Well here it is , thanks to hours of effort , invaluable help from numerous people here who so generously helped me the final version of my latest project is here.

Hopefully I am not posting in the wrong spot.

just click on the following link to download :

http://s7.yousendit.com/d.aspx?id=3R...I3KNOHE850R0K1

Of course if I post that here I am expecting some reviews and/or criticism. PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD DO NOT BE COMPLAICENT !!!! ( hope I wrote that right)

Bash into my wall as much as you like , I want to improve and learn and if I get hit by a feather I will not go far.

Keep in mind though that this is probably my 5th project , by far the most complex. I learn everything on my own , shooting , editing (that's with some help from you guys ;) etc...

Thanks a million

Phil

PS: the project is in french so ...

It looks llike you have a lot of the main concepts well in hand.

The footage is a bit distracting because of the (evidently) poor low-light capabilities of the camera. It can probably be made to look better with tweaks such as using color curves and the median filter.

Overal, my main comment is.....Man, I have to get out more! :-)

divX and windows media should both be able to produce a better compressed file than MPEG1/MPEG2 from TMPGENC. Windows Media is probably the best choice as it won't put spyware on your computer like divX does (you can google for removing GAIN, which is bundled with divX I think), is free, and provides arguably better encodes (depending on input material). You can download Windows Media Encoder for free.

assuming yoru betaSP deck has component output, u can get urself a decklink box and connec tit that way. another option is to go for a DAC2 component to firewire adapter.

I use this all the time for broadcast work..

If only vegas supported DVCPro 25 and 50... :(

hello Peter, thanks for taking the time to reply.

The DAC 2 component to firewire adaptor sounds very interesting!

Can I attach my Beta sp player (or any other source) to it, and inport it into my pc via my firewire lead. And can you output the same way, through the firewire - into the DAC 2 component- to beta sp?

If you could perhaps give me some more details of your DAC2 component, model and make etc I'll see where I may be able to get one in the UK.

thank again

best wishes
Mark

One thing I agree with Gary on is that you seem to have a grasp on the main concepts pretty good.

However, I'm wondering if the 'apparent low light' capabilities seems to be more operator error; next time try exposing for the highlights. It appears you opened up the iris to a level where you could 'see'; as if forcing the exposure. Also consider looking into seeing if your monitor is calibrated properly.

Enetertaining video!

Couple projects i done in vegas
 

Here is couple projects idone in Vegas 5.
First is more-less playing in Vegas with filters, second was pure fun.
If you have any quetions, I will be happy to answer.

http://www.amkafilms.com/homework.mov
http://www.amkafilms.com/ads.mov

Is there a demo Magic Bullet I could try? I have an A64, I could see how slow it is

There's a demo version of Magic Bullet on their website.

http://www.redgiantsoftware.com/magic.html

And yes, it's slow.

hi Glen,


well I am gonna need a serious Divx 101 course then HIHIHI.

I've played with that thing for a couple of hours yesterday and all it could come up with was a 100 meg file for 5000 frames !!! Could you believe that.

I download the windows media encoder and will fiddle around with for sure.

Do you know by any chanve some good tutorial for both methods.

Thanks Glenn

Phil

Sorry, I don't know good tutorials. In either program, you want to configure the program so that the bitrate is low. The formula Emre gave should be fairly good. Otherwise you can even calculate the bitrate you want.

yeah dude thats EXACTLY waht it does..

i use this to capture from a DVCPro Deck, do what i need to do as an avi (not the best way to edit dvcpro.. but im still waiting on dvcPro support in Vegas.. ) then export back to tape through the DAC2
Very easy to set up and abotu $800 aud

Alternatives
 

Andrew and Glenn,

Are you looking for a particular look?

VASST (http://www.vasst.com) offers a valuable alternative, in their Reel Paks for both Celluloid - which I own, as well as for their high end Ultimate S. You may find a dramatic improvement in render time.

And take a look at another useful alternative - as Vegas can natively create many of these same "looks", there is an effort underway to create share "looks" created by Vegas users.

See the discussion at http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?threadid=34401 for more information.

Both the JetDV site and the VASST site have the ability to host these presets which can be shared by useing Sony's own Preset Manager for Vegas (free download).

There are currently a number of Presets available, but hopefully more Vegas users will contribute.

Brian

Help me fix my wedding videos Audio
 

My videographer for my wedding was horrible. The video will have to do but the audio has this crackling sound like a bad connection. Is there a way to get rid of this? It is all through our vows. Wife wasnt happy about it. Wifes mother who paid him lots of dough was even less happy. Would the noise gate filter or some other effect take this out and leave our vows intact?

I've used the VASST product and it's definitely cool, simple, and fast. All a 'look' is, regardless of the product, is a series of filters and color/gamma/etc. adjustments run against any given piece of footage. What's great about this tool is that it rapidly applies capabilities already in Vegas to get a certain look to happen, and then, you can edit the specific applied filters and adjustments to customize the look further. It's perfect for Vegas users that are already accustomed to Vegas.

Also, it's worth noting that regardless of what tool you use, you need to be shooting from day one expecting to do the 'look' in post - otherwise the footage you have may just not look very good with the look you want applied. Your lighting, exposure, etc. need to all be tailored to your desired look.

http://www.vasst.com/celluloid.htm

You can either get Ultimate-S Vegas plug-in which has a bunch of other timesaving tools for which you can get the additional looks plugin, or you can buy Celluloid, which is a standalone plugin for Vegas with all the same looks included. Ultimate-S comes with some looks by itself though, just not as many or as cool as with the add-on looks.

Here's some info that may help you out:
http://www.filmsound.org/QA/nonoise.htm

I haven't had to do extensive noise reduction work, so the following is just the approach I would take to the problem. Depending on how bad the noise is, you most likely won't be able to remove it completely. I would NOT use a noise gate if the crackling occurs simultaneously over dialog, since your dialog will be gated out also resulting in a stuttering effect which becomes even more glaring since ambient noise is gated out completedly also. However, you may be able to use a compressor to reduce the level (offensiveness) of the noise if the noise level is substantially higher in level than the dialog recorded. EQ may or maynot be appropriate depending on where the voices sit in relation to the noise. My guess would lean toward not.

Many people have reported good results with Sony's Noise Reduction 2.0 software, so you may want to give that a try. It's capable of reducing both broadband and impulsive noise (such as in your case). Some plug-in bundles from Waves (excellent precision software, but expensive for a one-shot use) have click/crackle removers. I've heard good things about it, but I think it'd be overkill to spend a couple of grand on software just to correct one piece of audio.

Alternatively, if you have the money and it's important to you, you can look for audio restoration services in your nearby area. Someone familiar with audio restoration can listen to the recording in question and give you an idea of how well they will be able to recover it and how much it'd run you.

(oh, you might want to try posting this in the "Now Hear This" forum, since this is more of an audio-oriented question. if you can post a link to a clip of the recording, you may get even better answers.)

Sorry to hear about your wedding video. Best of luck to you.

thanks for the info Glenn. I'm considering comparing render times between my old P3/700, P4/1400 centrino, and P4/3.2Ghz, all with 512MB of their generation of ram. Maybe we can extrapolate what it will take to hit real time with Vegas.


Scott

I have a Gig of ram, set for 850 to Vegas, crash free so far.

But I can only Ram-Render 26sec of video (that's with a Brightness/Conrast filter applied) if I add Smart Smoother it drops to 21 Sec.

does this sound right?

Scott

1- Not really relevant, but did whoever paid for the video try talking to the videographer (NICELY) about a solution? Generally if you complain nicely you should be at least be able to get some money back.

2- Removing 'crackling':
On the audio forum there was someone who had a problem with crackling audio.
http://www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthrea...ighlight=waves

I can't be sure you have the same problem (describing audio with words in hard), but a sharp EQ filter might help. You want to be using a parametric EQ filter or waves improved version of it for better results. Cutout the high frequencies where the crackle is.

I also tried Waves' X-crackle filter and it doesn't seem to do as good a job as the waves linear EQ filter (better version of a parametric EQ).

It might just be impossible or really, really, really expensive to fix your problem though. It depends on the problem. If you post up a clip I would definitely play around with it to see if it's fixable.

Chris,

I would be willing to take a stab at it. I've got some good audio editing stuff. Let me know if you are interested and I will arrange to get the source material from you. This is to help out a fellow DV-INFO member.

=gb=

<<<-- Originally posted by Scott Brickert : I have a Gig of ram, set for 850 to Vegas, crash free so far.

But I can only Ram-Render 26sec of video (that's with a Brightness/Conrast filter applied) if I add Smart Smoother it drops to 21 Sec.

does this sound right?

Scott -->>>

No.

Thanks Glenn , i'll keep Emre's advice in mind :)