Stabilizer Plugin for Vegas?
 

Is anyone aware of a video stabilizer plugin for Vegas 5 that is similar to this Premier Pro plugin?

http://www.wrigleyvideo.com/videotut...steadymove.htm

Thanks

Kelvin

Boris Red???

i use steadyhand.. but powerful as it is u have to refine it..
it also has issues with camera flashes and it loses tracking when flash cameras go off

its good, but it could be better..

considering theres a virtuldub plugin which does this, im hoping that someones gonna hack it and get a filter hapening.. (bit like the auto correct, which is AWESOME)

satish (i think) is also working on a Wax plugin which allows the use of virtual dub filters...

I realize that the Wax plugin works with virtualdub filters, but the "deshaker" filter in virtualdub is a 2-pass filter. Is there a way to use this filter through the Wax plugin in Vegas?

You might take a look at this article--http://www.digitalvideoediting.com/articles/viewarticle.jsp?id=28849


THis method works pretty well--in fact some people like it better then using a dedicated application.

hi ya'll,

just shot a lot of very shaky footages (even with the OIS on) from the XL H1 in 24p.

i'll need a method to clean this up via software. i see there's a plug as well as free plugins.

are there simple methods to do this in Vegas 6c? do i require a plugin of some sort to make my image stabilize. i think i'll have to stabilize my ENTIRE project. will i be sacrificing some quality? minimal?

how're people's experiences with image stabilizers on the software front via vegas? any quick solutions/good ones? cost effective?

You might as well shoot it all over again. Stabilization is very time-consuming and resource-intensive...and that's on SD--you have HD.

hi Emre,

didya finish that shoot we talked about last time? i'd love to see it! =). email me about it.

re: IS. have you seen some of the demos they have linked here? it's quite good! =).

PS i was just looking around early this morning and noticed that boris fx has plugins for vegas. anyone have experience w/this?

I ran some concert footage through both the Boris stabilizer and deshake.

GENERALLY I liked the deshake results better. The exception was in tight shots, when a performer took up a large portion of the screen. Deshake thought the performer was the stable part of the image, and on output the microphone (for example) was bobbing in time with the music. In tight shots, the raw hand-held footage was often nicer to watch.

In wider shots, deshake was a life-saver. It turned some jerky pans and zooms into smooth, almost professional-looking camera moves.

The Boris stabilizer IN THEORY is better for the tight shots, since you can mark certain features as "fixed" and it won't fall prey to the bobbing-microphone problem. I couldn't quite get it to produce the output I wanted, though, and I'm not sure why. The biggest issue was obvious interlacing artifacts; none of the Boris footage made it into the final cut.

I just didn't have the time to tweak the Boris output, so I can't say if it's my poor knowledge of the Boris interface (which is nasty, IMHO), or just a matter of the source not being fixable.

but deshake is so long&laborious! =(. does it work with m2t's?

can you use deshake INSIDE of vegas?

Yi Fong Yu:

"does it work with m2t's?"

I don't know, but probably not. The transport stream will like render the process impractical. I've been using the Connect HD capture utility to bring the Z1 output directly into the Connect codec during capture. VirtualDub deshake can handle that. And output same same.

Check out http://www.sundancemediagroup.com/ar...aker_guide.htm

Darryl

soo... no one has to stabilize their image via software? =). *sigh*.

You have several answers, but you're not happy with them?
Vegas will accept Red, but that's slow and very expensive.
Vegas will frame serve to DeShaker (which is faster) but that's too slow.
There isn't a fast frameserver or direct motion stabilizer that I'm familiar with, even as a stand alone. Dynapel is quite good, but it takes a long time, and yields soft results.
Nothing is perfect, hence the argument for shooting better in the first place, or using a cam that has a reasonably good optical stabilizer built in, or even electronic stabilization.
Something somewhere, has to be a tradeoff. Speed for quality, convenience for speed. And cost reigns above them all.
Deshake will work with CineForm, but you'd mentioned earlier you'd rather work with m2t's. 24f makes it even more difficult, as trying to stabilize with fewer frames is going to cost you a lot in quality. More frames is much better.
I'd recommend stabilizing what you NEED to stabilize, and practice shooting a bit more. Stay away from the long end of the lens unless you have a tripod.

Also . . .

What you may be seeing as "shake" might simply be the motion characteristics of 24 fps footage. It doesn't act like normal video where any which camera move is OK . . . ESPECIALLY at the long end of the lens.

Learning to shoot 24fps is above and beyond learning to shoot good video. More rules apply.

DSE,

it's well and good if i could travel back in time and do a better job. the fact is, what's done is done. yesh, it's a lesson well learned and the future will bring new corrections.

but someone (other than me in the future) will also need the power to save their footage via software image stabillizer. i'm just surprised that such a thing doesn't exist already in vegas as it does premiere pro. perhaps i should give it an install.

anyway, if not, i might go with b-fx.

There ARE image stabilizers that work with Vegas. Maybe I'm missing your point? Boris RED works within Vegas. If you think Steadymove is slow, wait'll you try RED. And, RED has a learning curve and is expensive. Using WAX, it's a freebie to frameserve. And the stabilizer that comes with PPro is worth exactly what you pay for it. Which is why RED is one of the preferred choices.
My bigger point is, there isn't a free lunch. Speed, cost, and quality are the three items on the menu, but this isn't a case where you get to pick two. All three are slow, so all three are expensive at some level, and all stabilizing softwares have a negative impact on the quality, some more than others. And all are slow. The dual pass types are the best ones, as they make one pass creating vectors and the second pass to stabilize based on the first pass information.

But to come back to point....there are indeed, stabilizers that work in Vegas. They might not be the ones you want, but they do indeed, exist.

Revisited three years later
 

This is an old thread but I wanted to mention that there is now a near-perfect solution to the question of video stabilization. The product is DeShaker, a freeware highly-sophisticated stabilizing program the runs on VirtualDub. In the past, you had to render out the shaky clip, import it into VirtualDub, run Deshaker Pass 1, run Pass 2, then export to Vegas and put it back on the timeline in place of the original clip. Big pain in the neck, and it took a long time.

This has all been automated by a Vegas script written by John Meyer. In my latest project I used the script and it performed brilliantly, making the steadying process completely automatic. The steadied clip shows up on the original timeline as an overlaid take, so you can switch back and forth with the original clip by hitting the "T" key.

DeShaker has, in my opinion, by far the best way of masking black frame edges, which are a necessary by-product of the steadying process. It looks ahead and back by a certain number of frames, and finds edges that best match the frame in question. Sounds bizarre, but in reality it does a remarkably good job of filling in the black edges. What little artifact is left I cover with a 3% or 4% cookie-cutter frame on the finished product.

On my last project virtually every single clip was shot hand-held. I steadied most of the project with the Meyer script, and it turned out beautifully. Looks like I hired a Steadicam operator.

so where to get DeShaker and the script?
Thanks...

Everything you need is right here.

Thanks for the ease...

Ever thought about dropping it in After Effects and knocking out the 'shake' there? It may be a little time consuming, but it gets the job done well.

that .02 will buy you exactly nothing :)

oh my gosh that's freakin' incredible because it's free! lol.

it worx with vegas8 and i presume upcoming 9?

if we install the 64-bit versions of 8 or 9, will deshaker still work? just curious =P. i won't have time to test this until i get my computer back up and running but it sounds promising! i've got hours of shaky footage that need stabilizing =P.

PS will deshaker work with HD?

I gave DeShaker a try and very impressed with it, simply works with the press of one button, fully automated. I'm not sure how it compares to Mercalli as I only had a demo version however DeShaker does an awesome job at stabilizing. Process didn't take long either, works great on HDV aswell.

I've upload a short clip to demonstrate the effectiveness of DeShaker.
Sony Vegas DeShaker on Vimeo

I haven't tried it myself yet but that's a pretty impressive result.

im running vegas 8 on xp pro and cant get it to work in vegas for the life of me. I either get
I highlighted a clip and ran deshaker. It starts rendering when it gets to the end of the clip for the first pass. Im assuming that because 50 percent of the time is still there. It goes black and I get
error the system cannot find the path specified
or I select a area and it says no video events selected
what am i doing wrong

Nice sample footage Nico! That HAS to be be near the Kalahari or Bots. . . . ???

You've got the edge in-fill pretty much beaten, 'cept for some in-fill near the car's side mirrors? I did spot some there. The results are quite amazing. I have used DeShaker, SteadyHand and latterly Mercalli. For quick and dirty (and NOT so dirty) steadying DeShaker is superb. But, top of the list is pure Camera Craft and Camera Skills. I don;t understand when some people HAVE a tripod but don;t use it. Have a piece of string and don't use it. Have a perfectly good wall and don't lean against it. Not every physical steady application needs big bucks. Using the tools in a modest way with items to hand makes a craftsman real.

Grazie

ps, I tried to read the "long" signpost at the beginning to get a location? I spent 5 years around SA. Great time and even greater people! I owe them a lot.

Yes, that clip from Nicholas is very impressive - and a good ad for DeShaker, especially as it's free.

I have Mercalli and I've used it to good effect to remove/reduce sudden jarring, dolly/track vibration and a bit of camera motion from the rare occasions when I shoot handheld (I'm with ya Grazie!). I'll certainly have to give DeShaker a whirl, based on that clip.

From the research I've done (not recent, I confess) I have a feeling that each product has it's own merits and failings and an awful lot depends on the original footage and the tweaking abilities of the user.

But there's no getting away from it, those DeShaker results look good.

Good evening,

I have used virtual dubs deshake and I never really had as good of success as I had hoped for, perhaps it was my inabilities that were the problem.

I not to long ago got Mercalli and I have had very good success with it in general.

Defintely try deshake as it is free.


As others have said, good tecnique and avoiding the problem to start is best.

I often shoot at a 3200 mm end of a lens and it is good for taking vibrations you get even off a great tripod!!

Sorry for my ignorance, but could anyone point me to a link or other step-by-step info on using Deshaker and Virtualdub for this process? I am unfamiliar with scripts in Vegas 8 Pro and I'm unsure of how exactly to get this working. TIA.

I second that.

6 Easy-Peasy steps

1] Download the Deshake file and onto Desktop.

2] Install by double clicking on it

3] Open Vegas

4] GO: Tools | Scripting | Rescan Script Menu Folder

5] Return to Timeline and click on Event you want Deshaken

6] GO: Tools | Scripting | choose "deshake" . . and stand back and watch the magic!


So to recap: Download; Install; Rescan Script Menu; Double Click an Event and then pick n' click deshake.

And that's all folks! Totally "Grazie-Proof"!

I have no idea how to use Virtual Dub or how to alter the settings. But this process has worked for me when ever I've needed it or needed to reinstall it.

Grazie

Excellent! I assume I need to have VirtualDub installed first? Will try it out later and report back. Thanks!

Well I followed the example and by golly it all worked. Afetr taking a particularly tough set of footage (1 minute's worth) and running it through DeShaker (almost an hour of processing) my final result is a black screen with some teensie lettering in the middle which if I zoom in on it I can make out something about "this image"..."processed" and Deshaker. How do I view the finished render ?

Chris, this has not been my experience.

I get the steadied results coming back into the original Event as a "Take 2" - very useful as a comparison. My experience has been that after executing the Deshaker script on an Event, a "temporary" video track is inserted at the Track 1 position; Deshaker does its thing and I can see the menus flashing by with 2 windows of activity going on; this stops and the temp track is removed and the Take 2 is added to the Event I originally selected. And that's been my experience.

I don't understand why 1 minute should take nearly an hour to process through Deshaker. What input format media are you attempting to steady-up? Can you try out something less and see what you get?

Grazie

I was inputting a cineform captured clip... I tried later with a less jittery clip and it ran through it MUCH faster, but with the same end result. It creates a new file in the deshaker folder but it is black. When I toggle between the input and output it freezes the input image when I select output image.

I am running Vista 64, and for this test am using Vegas 8.0c. My file is an HDV file...and even using a MT2 file I have the same issues. It sppears to be doing every thing except in the end there is not an output file.

Also when I ran rescan script menu folder nothing happens. to run Deshaker I click run script, and then click on deshaker as the script from the deshaker file folder and it seems to run.

I don't use Vista, nor Cineform nor MT2 files. So this is NOT my epxerience. Maybe you need to find a person who uses DS on your kind of set up and workflow?

In any event I don't look in the Deshaker folder for the file. As I said the deshaken clip comes back as a TAKE 2 in the original Event. Are you seeing a Take 2?

Grazie

No I am not seeing a take 2.

Further work on my end. I am running Vista. I have vegas 8.0c and 8.1. Same issue both places.

Firstoff, I erased all occurrences of Virtual Dub (I thought) and Deshaker. I previously had Virtual Dub 1.6.16 (seems like that was the number)

I downloaded Virtual Dub 1.8.something.

I downloaded the deshaker link provided onto my desktop and unzipped it.
I opened Vegas 8.0c. I clicked on tools and then scripts and asked it to rescan...nada showed up for deshaker. That thing (rescan and voila!) just has not workled at ALL for me.

I picked a short clip. I selected the clip, went to tools, scripts and then run script and manually selected he deshaker script. (How I have always had to do it, until I put the deshaker script manually into the script menu file).

As before, it rendered the avi, then went to Virtual dub (but seemed to find the old one rather the 18.8... I am still looking for that old version to delete) Did its thing and once again... "Virtual Dub did not render this on first pass." Black screen. Rerender attempts are fruitless.

I am about to throw in the towel. Help ?

Chris, go to where you have installed the elements of Deshaker. For me that is C:\Deshaker . In there there is a Readme.txt . Open it and see if you are complying with the program and if the progression of the deshake process is the same for you. There is a description of the "Theory of Operation" which might throw some light on your situ?

It sounds as if parts of your install are not where the program is expecting it to be - maybe?

Grazie

Clarification please
 

I'm interested in using deshaker but i am getting a bit confused. Here are my questions?

Do you have to install virtualdub and deshaker THEN install the script?