Vegas Video discussions from 2006 (Q1Q2)

[Edward Troxel]

You're taking a highly compressed lossy format and then uncompressing each frame and recompressing it. However, you might be able to get acceptable results. What MPEG2 preset are you using?

[Jason Robinson]

Originally Posted by Jeff Mack

One other thing I thought of. Nesting. I'm not sure I understand this but is nesting the ability to add individual veg files in order on a new parent veg file? The reason I am leaning to individual renders is that if I ever want to mix my compilations at a future time, I can easily mix and match. I am producing a series of these performances and just shot the material. I am looking for a consistant workflow that works easily and consistently.

Jeff

Nesting in Vegas and playlists in DVDA will help you with that work flow. You can replace items as they need to be updated, deleted, etc. For what you have described, you can shoose which way you want to go. If you nest projects in Vegas and render a single output file, then you don't need to use playlists in DVDA but you will need to create a chapter menu (very easy on a single media file with chapter markers created in Vegas). If you render projects seperately in vegas then to play them all on DVDA you will need a playlist. It just deepends on how much time you want to spend re-rendering your previous work if you add a new section. The nested project option means you will have to re-render the whole parent project timeline in order to include the new scenes / songs. The playlist option means you can selectively render only the new scene / song and add it to the playlist in DVDA.

Nesting in vegas is exactly how you describe it. Open your parent project and then select the individual scene / song project using the explorer tab (or drag the file from Windows Explorer right on top of the timeline).

Hope that helps.

jason

[Seth Bloombaum]

Edward, thanks for your reply. I'd been just barely aware of the veggie toolkit, I'll look at it more closely after the current projects settle down.

Or maybe I should try modding Sony's script... the best time to learn a new skill is when you really want the results, right?

[Edward Troxel]

If you want something taylor made for your workflow, it might be best to modify one personally for yourself. Otherwise, most other solutions will be more generic.

[Phil Hamilton]

I tried several. I used the DVD NTSC template - I also tried to set it to MPEG rather than DVD in the custom area. I am using Vegas 6.0d. I downloaded a couple of shareware programs that "split" clips and got better results but nothing as good as the original. I suspected that it was compreessing/uncompressing etc. and that was the problem. I wish I could just extract the clips - leave them as is without the compression.

Thanks for the quick response.

[Edward Troxel]

If you're doing cuts-only editing, you should be able to achieve what you are wanting by using a program such as Womble.

[Milt Lee]

I wrote a letter to John about this, but I'm going to post it here since I've tried a couple of things since I wrote the letter and thought I would see if others have had the same problem.

When I view a clip that I shot of a building - panning across the building in a medium pan, I notice that the playback appears to stutter - like it's catching up - sound is fine and when I render the same piece of tape and play it back in an external player, the tape is fine too. No stutter, no jump.

I have 2 gigs of ram and the the super fast AMD 4600. It's not a monitor thing as I have viewed it on the monitor and an external monitor.

I changed the amt. of ram avaliable for preview from 64 mg to 512 but not difference.
Am I missing a setup thing I don't know about.
This was shot in 29.97 and I'm playing it back in 29.97.
There are no efffects, and when I remove everything from the time line except this little bitty clip, it still does it.

thanks!
Milt

[Douglas Spotted Eagle]

Couple of ideas;
1. Previewing at anything other than Preview/Auto or Preview/Full?
2. DMA enabled for your hard drives?
3. HDD's not sharing channel with active DVD drive/CDRom drive?
4. Any default track FX in place?
5. Scopes not only not visible, but turned off?
6. Opacity at track level set to 100%?
7. Captured using a DV codec?

These are all possible/potential causes of stuttered playback on any machine..

[Milt Lee]

Hmmm.....excellent thoughts. I will check them out tomorrow and report back.
I captured this video with windows movie maker. Ok I'm an idiot but I didn't really know that it can make a difference.

I've used Scenelyzer Live for a long time, but haven't loaded it up yet.
Anyway, I'll go throught the list you suggested and see what's up.

Thanks, Spot!
Milt

[Milt Lee]

Ok so here's the status - still no luck

1. Previewing at anything other than Preview/Auto or Preview/Full?
preview is set to Preview(full)
2. DMA enabled for your hard drives?
don't know where to check on this
3. HDD's not sharing channel with active DVD drive/CDRom drive?
Hmmm...don't know how to check on this either - but totally willing to find out.
4. Any default track FX in place?
Nope
5. Scopes not only not visible, but turned off?
Turned off
6. Opacity at track level set to 100%?
100%
7. Captured using a DV codec?
Well, now this is a question. Windows movie maker seems to be using a DV codec. I thought, well I'll try using Vegas to capture but it doesn't seem to like - or at the very least recoginize my camera. Previously I was running it (Sony TRV520 Digital 8) directly in with a firewire. Vegas didn't see it - so I set up the ADS Pyro A/V link, and it still doesn't see it.

I went back and looked at some 24P from my DVX100A and it looked fine - it was captured with Scenalyzer Live and doesn't jump at all. So it could well be that it's the DMA setting that you talked about.

Can you give me more information on where to find that?

Thanks,
Milt

[Milt Lee]

OK folks, I got it to work! Here's what I did:

Messed with the Pyro A/V link, no luck,
looked at the setup program when you boot, could see anything to changee,
and then after trying all kinds of ways to get Vegas to see my little camera - plugging into various 1394 jacks, I went the old fashioned way -

I installed Scenalyzer Live 4.0 (my key that I bought several years ago still works - as promised) and sure enough, it captured the video beautifully and better yet - IT PLAYS BACK WITH NO SKIPS!! Another big plus - with Scenalyzer - you don't need an extra video capture card, if your computer has 1394 built in. Very cool.

So it wasn't the computer setup - that was hunky-dory. It was MICROSOFT's MOVIE MAKER! It must do something to the codec that is not standard.

Actually though, the cool part is that Vegas could play this non-standard codec, and then render it without a hitch. Even if it did skip in previews.

I'm still in love with Vegas, but I wish I could capture stuff directly. However, having said that, Scenalyzer offers so many great features that I still prefer it to any other capture program.
One more thing. With the nice computer I built - based on John Rolfano's specs, you don't need an extra video capture card. The computer has 2 1394 jacks built in and sees different digital cameras quite nicely. I did buy the Pyro A/V link, but I'm not using it, and I might be interested in selling it - if somebody needs a capture device for analog/digital.

Thanks for the advice, Spot
Milt

[Jim Hawley]

I am sure this is another easy one, but upon a quick search on "WMA" I did not see the answer...

How do I use a protected WMA file in Vegas. It is for a personal project that is not being broadcast or anything like that...just doing a montage.

Haven't tried it yet, but I am thinking that burning it to CD and then ripping back to Vegas may work. What's the trick?

2) While I'm at it...anyone know how I can convert SD2 files into something usable in Windows. I have tried a couple converters with no success.

Thanks again, Jim

[Fred Foronda]

Going from CFHD codec back to m2t to print back to HDV tape or to dvd architect what render quality to you set it too?? can I get away with "good" cause it takes a while when it is set on "best".

Thanks!

[Jamie Hellmich]

Thanks for the reply John.

Yes, I turned off/down the speakers when recording. And I've tried the other device options you mentioned.

I have moved up to Vegas+DVD since the original post, and also moved to a couple of better microphones.

I still find that unless I mute the existing audio track in Vegas, it is recorded onto the narration track. That with the mic off, or not even plugged in. The audio level of the "bleed" is relative to the volume level of the microphone level control in the sound card volume control window. I don't know if this bleed over is some fault of my system or connections, or in the Vegas software. Perhaps this is a way to "copy" your audio track for some reason?

The noise level in my narration recording has diminished significantly after switching off "mic boost" in the volume control window. I can also EQ the track to cut the noise at the appropriate freqency(ies).

After playing around with different mics, I have found that the Rode Videomic offers the best audio with my setup. It has a hotter signal than the dynamic mics which seems to allow the input level to be set lower, ergo lower "noise" level...and acceptable.


It is still not as clean as I would like, but I'll keep playing.


Jamie

[John Rofrano]

Originally Posted by Jamie Hellmich

I don't know if this bleed over is some fault of my system or connections, or in the Vegas software.

Nope, that’s inherent in the motherboard audio chip. Mine does the same thing. The audio level of the "bleed" is relative to the volume level of the microphone level control in the sound card volume control window because it is being caused by the inferior component isolation on motherboard audio chips. You’re not going to get rid of that. Just forget about using it and save yourself a lot of headaches. That’s why I bought an M-Audio FW-410 for recording.

It sounds like you’ve gotten pretty far, but if you are serious about recording clean voiceovers then take the next step and get a decent audio card. Even a little M-Audio MobilePre USB ($149) will sound a world better than the motherboard audio you are using now. The VideoMic will plug right into it. If you want to get a nice inexpensive side-addressing condenser mic, take a look at the Audio-Technica AT2020 ($99). For $250 you’d have a nice setup for recording quality voiceovers without hum or bleed-through.

~jr