Vegas Video discussions from 2003

[Glenn Chan]

Some high school students did this effect on a budget production. I'm too lazy to dig up the link. You need to take different angles beforehand though.

[Rob Lohman]

There is a thread here on DVi and also an article on the COW
that I think Glenn was referring too.

[Bruce A. Christenson]

I want to make a very short stop-motion movie using Vegas 4 for fun. Rather than use my video camera, I figured I could use my digital still camera and make the project high definition. But, I'm not clear on the project settings and some of the workflow. Here are my initial questions:

What should I use for the project settings, one of the progressive HD presets? Do I need to use a square pixel aspect ratio, because this isn't miniDV source?

My raw images will probably be 1280 x 960 or some other 4x3 resolution. How do I make sure these get cropped for 16x9 in batch fashion correctly? I am guessing I don't want to go into the crop settings for each and every image and set it to 'match output aspect ratio' manually.

What do I render to when done? A standard MPEG-2 template for NTSC widescreen DVD, or do I have to do any mods to that template? I want to have an anamorphic widescreen DVD in the end that will be letterboxed on regular TVs and full screen on widescreen TVs, with awesome resolution. I've done this with DV footage (well, with less than awesome resolution on the widescreen TV), but I'm not sure if I have to do anything different in this case - I've never used the HD templates.

Thanks all
[bac]

PS - The movie is about pirates hunting for buried treasure on a haunted island.

[Rob Lohman]

For a DVD output you should indeed use the NTSC DVD template.
That means all footage must be in standard NTSC resolution with
a default pixel aspect or a widescreen/anamorphic aspect ratio.

So the final resolution is still 720x480 with an pixel aspect ratio
of 0.9091 or 1.2121. This would yield a resolution of 871x480
which Vegas will probably accept with a resolution of 870x480,
all with a pixel aspect ratio of 1.

I just tested it out and the resolution seems to be right at an
1.0 pixel aspect. So you will need to crop/resize your images
to that size.

So in your example, you must crop your picture to 1280x706.
When you then resample this to a vertical hight of 480 it will
give you a horizontal resolution of 870 (if you maintain aspect
ratio while cropping!).

I did notice however that Vegas showed some stairstepping
in my test image which was fine in the 870x480 resolution
outside Vegas. My preview was on best, so that's quite weird.

Some playing around might give you some more insight on things!

[Bryan Beasleigh]

There were some free tutorials on the Sonic Foundary website that have disapeared since Sony took over. Anyone know if they're available at any other URL.

Edit
I found some excellent links posted earlier by Rob Lohman as well as the link that disappeared.

Ed posted the link http://www.sonicfoundry.com/tutorials/default.asp
this is the one that went south.

I have printed all of the Tips and tricks on Ed's site and had them bound into a book. I also printed the manual on heavy paper and had it bound into two volumes. To have the manual printed in black and white would have been very inexpensive. I printed on my epson with waterproof ink for around $20 .

Vegas has a learning curve but it seems well worth the effort.

[Robert Poulton]

Is there a plug-in that creates a job for multiple computers to grab from and render out a project for Vegas?

Rob

[Edward Troxel]

No. However you can start Vegas multiple times and render multiple sections at the same time.

[Barry Rivadue]

Can one use Sonicfire 3.1 directly with Vegas 4.0, or does one need a program like Sound Forge in place?

[Glenn Chan]

PC speakers versus headphones:
Headphones typically give much better sound quality than an equally priced speaker setup. As a rule of thumb you have to pay 6 times as much for speakers than headphones to get equal quality. However speakers will give you the correct stereo-ness while headphones won't (sounds seem to come from inside your head).

Anyways, headphones have much greater dynamic range than TV/PC speakers (whatever your audience has) so you will hear things that your audience may not necessarily hear. You should check all your levels once you are done. I have seen 2 different approaches to this:
A- Use crappy speakers.
B- Turn down the volume so you can just hear things. This is what Jay Rose (award-winning audio guy) recommends.

Mistake #8: Ignoring how the show will be heard
People listen to point-of-sale, entertainment television, and theatrical video differently. Not only is the equipment different, but viewers' expectations and environmental noise change as well. Richness that makes sense in a theatrical mix can make voices unintelligible elsewhere.A good track for broadcast TV can be annoying when played loudly in an auditorium.Before you mix, think about the audience. Make sure you use monitors at least as good as theirs, set to about the same volume. Don't use tiny speakers just because that's what TVs have; you'll start compensating for problems that aren't universal and you may miss noises that would bother the home-theater crowd. Instead, mix on very good speakers; then, if the project is aimed at TV, review the mix at a low volume, sitting far from smaller monitors.

http://www.dv.com/features/features_...questid=214193

Noise reduction: I would just take one crack at things with noise reduction plug-ins. Cool Edit Pro (now Adobe Audition), Pro Tools, and Peak are programs which I know have these. Sound Forge might have one.

Specific flaws can be compensated for in post without many bad side effects. For hum you can use a hum removal plug-in.

If these plug-ins don't work then you will reach a point of extremely diminishing returns. There really isn't any good ways to rescue your audio other than ADR or a reshoot. If ADR or reshoot is not possible then you try to fix the sound with a program like Sound Forge. However, the sound won't be close to perfect.

So, make sure you get great location sound. Scout locations beforehand at the same time of day and same day of the week to check for road and air traffic. Use the right equipment and mic techniques.

I addition to what Gints said you can remove some background noise with noisegate (both Vegas and Sound Forge).

Noise gate is useful if you are planning to mix in other sounds as well. Otherwise the effect of the noise gate is really obvious. One common use for the noise gate is when you are working with lav mics. You want to mix in ambient sound anyways and get rid of the lav mic's inherent noisiness.

How do the veterans do manage their audio? Headphones or good speakers?

All pros use headphones while doing location shooting to monitor their audio (very important!). Sony MDR-7506s are highly recommended for that kind of thing. Sony has a consumer version of them called the MDR V6. You can grab those off ebay (apparently sony has auctions for those). You could probably use a pair of good headphones to do your sound editing work.

[Aaron Koolen]

Hi all. I'm trying to get to grips with the compositing features of Vegas as I want to have the old typical green rifle sight on the screen with cross hairs in it.

Now I've managed to draw the site and import into Vegas on it's own video track and get it working, but whenever I place the cursor on any of the timeline that's not where the sight will appear, I can't see anything. I guess it's something to do with the "multiply" composition mode and that when viewing any area where the sight isn't the multiply function zeroes everything and it comes out black. Do I have to place a white back ground on the entire rest of the track or something?

There must be an easier way.

Here is a link to a screenshot of my setup and the result I get.

http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/akoolen/


Cheers
Aaron

[Bruce A. Christenson]

swap tracks 1 and 2, so 2 is above 1?

[Aaron Koolen]

Hi Bruce. No that hasn't worked. I did manage to "sort of" find a way finally though but not using compositions which I'd prefer to use if I can.

If I used the cookie cutter plugin, set to circle and then just turned off the blue and red on the event, I get a green circle which is sight like. Still no target in it but I should be able to do that with a simple alpha composition with another track.

Thanks
Aaron

[Tor Salomonsen]

Your method may work, but I think you must supply the green on a separate track. Make a black cross on transparent background.
This is the sort of thing that's easily and beautifully done in the Vegas text generator. Use the symbol font and draw with the straight lines - you may have to use several layers for a complex drawing. use the leading adjustment to make several lines stay together (if you just blow it up in size the thickness will get too high).

If you search the net you might even find a truetype font conaining the kind of cross you want ready made.

[Peter Jefferson]

One thing that has been left out here is the fact that Vegas can render ac3 files...

handling audio in vegas can sometimes overpower the video aspect.

Vegas is good where it is Direct X plugin compatible, this means that ANY DX Audio effect wil work within Vegas. FX automation ONLY works with SoFo plugins thou... on top of that you can get VST adapters, which allow VST plugins to run within a DX environment. Audio wise, this application is on par with ProTools.

As for projects, i start with a stereo file with a seperate tracks for backing music as refernce to the full project. Once im happy with that segment, i then render WITHOUT the backing track.
Once all segments are complete, i then sequence all pieces together, add the music, and then open my 5.1 bus tracks with the audio being sent to EACH bus.. stereo is split to 6 channels and assigned to a bus track.
This is where the fun begins :)~


As for soundforge, i have been using it since inception and i have NEVER had any issues with it, I use it as a mastering tool for all my audio work. Having Vegas and forge work hand in hand is probably the best thing to ever happen to my business ;)

[Neil McLean]

Hello,

Is there anyone in the UK who could please send me a copy of the training disc supplied with the Douglas Spotted Eagle Vegas 4 Editing Workshop book?

I damaged my disc whilst removing it from the original packaging and it doesn't read on any of my (three) devices.

Many thanks and regards,
Neil