Vegas Video discussions from 2003

[Rob Lohman]

Is it only a certain color? Red for example is difficult in DV. Coming
from MPEG2 and going to DV definitely can introduce such
problems, depending on bitrate and encoder/decoder quality.

Again, a screenshot or sample might help in identifying the
problem.

[Dave Largent]

Edward, where are the scripts available and how are they used?

[Edward Troxel]

http://www.sundancemediagroup.com/he..._files.asp?s=1

Search for "Snapshot to File" with a date of February 21, 2003

To run a script, go to Tools - Scripting... - Run Script and then pick the downloaded file.

(Note: Scripts require Vegas 4.x and the .NET Framework)

[Andre Andreev]

You might want to check http://www.sundancemediagroup.com/home1.htm (go to the Sony Vegas Tutorials section). They have a long list of user-rated vegas automation scripts, plugins and tutorials.

I have not searched it for a "camera shake" script, but if there's a place to find one, that's it. Or, you might suggest writing such a script to one of the gurus there.

You need to register (free) in order to access the knowledge base.

Also, I just realized -- it would be nice if the shake could be "scripted", i.e. sync-ed with events happening in the video. Mentioning war videos, this would be explosions, running, etc.

Of course, in your case (motion graphics), you'd need a simple randomizer with some adjustments to avoid recogniable patterns in the behavior.

Cheers
-- Andre

[Rob Lohman]

Do you have the camera in VCR mode? What OS are you running?
If it is XP, does a windows pop up when you connect your camera
and turn it on?

Might be that the firewire port on the TRV-8 is broken?

[Rob Lohman]

It might be that your Font cache is corrupt. Try to find a Microsoft
Utility called TweakUI. With this you can fix font caches. Not sure
if this is the case, but you might give it a try...

[Josh Bass]

Thanks.

[Peter Jefferson]

no mate, its more prominant on flat colours and its actually throughout...
theres no discrimination to where it is visible...

i dont ave a facility right now to upload, but its not restricted to any colour...

strange...

if i get some time, ill upload 2 pics...

[Brian Zamen]

Can someone point to a good URL on aspect ratio?

I am trying to get down the 3 selections and how they apply in Vegas.

It is a fairly simple production too.

Basically, I am using pretty much all still images (scanned). Then adding things in the productions like text etc...

Then outputing to mpeg2 for DVD.

Where I think the confusion comes in is that I can set aspect ratio in 3 different places.

Project properties. Then the source media in the production. Lastly when I render.

This will be viewed on widescreen and 4:3 SD TVs. Therefore, we want to create in widescreen and then the people with 4:3 will just have letterboxing.

Just as an example of what happens. If we start with project properties of NTSC DV Widescreen. Then drop scanned pictures in and change aspect ratio to 16:9, then set any generated media (i.e. a color bar with text in it) to widescreen and finally render in NTSC DVD changing display to 16:9 it will work fine. However, if we render to say an AVI file all the text will be "off" the color bar.

What is the most efficient way to do such a production? Set properties to NTSC DV .9091 then set aspect ratio on pictures and generated media to 16:9 and then render to 16:9?

I am just trying to keep from having to adjust the whole production every time we render to something other than NTSC DVD with 16:9 display (i.e. an avi for streaming).

In addition, I want to make sure I do it properly since these are mainly just still images, generated media and viewed on either 16:9 or 4:3 TVs.

Sorry for the long post and thanks for anyone who can help.

[Josh Bass]

Okay, I slowed down some regular speed footage, shot in the XL1s' frame mode, to about 65% or so for the purpose of making it fit some audio. Now, the footage doesn't look slower than it should, but there are these sort of ghost trails when movement occurs, very slight, but I can see them, and I'm sure a few other people could too. I don't think you could tell watching it on a computer monitor, but on my NTSC monitor you can. I was wondering if there was any way to lessen or eliminate these trails. As I said, the slowed down footage still looks like it's moving at the correct speed, it's the trails that are bothering me. Thanks.

[Joris Beverloo]

I am not sure if your problem is the same as what bothered me with slow motions. However, I found a solution to make my footage look better after I did a slow motion on it or some other kind of manipulations.
Click on properties of the desired piece if video that you have in slow motion...now mark the box that says: reduce interlace flicker.
Furthermore also select the box : Force resample.

I am not expert on this, but it works for me. By the way...if you used the velocity envelope correctly it really should be slower..maybe it is a shot in where you do not really notice a big difference (just a wild guess)

Hope to have helped you out.

[Boyd Ostroff]

I haven't tried this with your software or camera, but suspect you'll get better slow motion results if you shoot at normal 60i instead of frame mode. You want as much temporal data as possible for slow motion, and shooting frame mode (as I understand it) only gives you 30 samples per second vs 60 separate fields per second. At least that's what I find with my Sony cameras when comparing slo mo footage originally shot at 1/30 sec vs 1/60 sec.

[Edward Troxel]

What you are seeing is probably where Vegas is creating the "extra" frames necessary to slow down motion. Frame mode will not slow down as well as the regular mode. Slowing it down just exaggerates the effect but Vegas tries to compensate. Try right-clicking the clip and turning OFF resample and see if that makes a difference.

[Edward Troxel]

The update for Tsunami compatible with both 4.0d and 4.0e is now available. Just log into http://zenote.com/check_serial.asp and click download to get the new version.

[Tor Salomonsen]

If you can't re-shoot in regular mode (which would be best) you could try to rightclick the event, select properties and adjust undersample rate. That way you control the degree to which Vegas creates frames between frames. If you have slowed down much, the result will look jumpy, but without ghosting.