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zooming & positioning on a still image
Hello
I need some advice on zooming in on a still image. Basically I want to just go from framing A (wide) to framing B (close). I know how to set up scale and center keyframes in the viewer. But this makes a rather harsh start and stop – the motion starts and ends rather abruptly.
When I used to do this in After Effects, I would just use the “easy ease in/out” feature on the keyframes and it would work perfectly, especialy for doing quick and (not so) dirty still image zooms/pans. The default setting often worked just fine.
In Final Cut, I figured out that you can “smooth” the scale keyframes by control-clicking on them in the viewer. But for some reason, you can’t smooth the centering (position) keyframes. And so what happens is, the scaling is smoothed, but the position isn’t and so the picture wiggles and swoops all over the place before arriving at the destination.
Any tips on how to handle this? Or is there a better way? It seems a common thing to do, and it’d be really convenient to do it in the FCP timeline, instead of having to go back to After Effects. I do have Motion as well, but am just getting started learning that.
thanks a lot
Mike -
9 Replies
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Have you tried using the wireframe view in your canvas to adjust the positioning for your zoom? Gives the ability to smooth moves in FCP pretty much the same as AE. Not sure without trying if there is an Ease function.
Ben
Editec Broadcast Editing Ltd
EVS & FCP specialists for live OB operations.Producer/Director “The Supercar Run” now available for international distribution from http://www.electricsky.com
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there’s no easyease function if fcp, smooth is that function, thats odd how it’s “wiggling all over” it really shouldn’t be doing that, how did you set the keyframes?
Aaron Zander
student editor at brooks institute of photography
12″powermac g4 1.25gb ram, 1.5 GHZ macosx 10.4.6 1.3tb external space
finalcut 5.0.4 adobe cs2 afterefects 7pro
looking for partime work in l.a. area very eager -
If you search for Ken Burns on this forum, you’ll find a lot of info. Here’s one program that might help you out. There are other options. https://lyric.com/fcp-plugins/panzoompro/pzp.htm
John
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>>>there’s no easyease function if fcp, smooth is that function, thats odd how it’s “wiggling all over” it really shouldn’t be doing that, how did you set the keyframes?
Let’s say I want to start wide and centered on an image. I double click it from my timeline, so that it goes to the Viewer window. Then I click the Motion tab in the viewer. Then, I set a keyframe for Scale and Center at my current position. I jump ahead 3 seconds. I then zoom in using Scale, and reposition the image in the lower left. If I play my sequence, it does the zoom & reframe, but it starts and ends very suddenly, not gradually. My goal is to just go from point A to point B, but with a gentle start and end.
If I control-click on the Scale keyframes, and select “Smooth”, it changes the keyframes to have bezier handles. (Which, for the time being, I am not adjusting). If I were just doing the Scale, and not a postition change, it would look great. But because I am doing a position change as well, and you can’t apply “smooth” to the Center keyframes, when I play back the move, the picture slides around in an “S” shape, as it is zooming. It still starts and ends in the right position, but the path it takes is nowhere near a straight line.
I took Ben’s advice and tried control-clicking the start and end positions in the canvas window, in wireframe mod. There is indeed an ease in/ease out option. Just selecting that and leaving it as is make the whole motion a little more on track, but it still does some shifting around on the way. I guess I need to play with adjusting the bezier now.
When I was doing this in After Effects, I would simply select the start keyframes for scale & position, and choose “easy ease out”, and then select the end keyframes, choose “easy ease in”, and it would work perfectly, not really needing any adjusting. And if I did have to adjust, as long as I adjusted the bezier in the composition the same way (between scale & position), it would still look right. I guess I was hoping for such an easy process with FCP, but I’ll have to work a little harder at manually setting the bezier points.
thanks
Mike -
Bottom line, it just ain’t after effects. The keyframing engine hasn’t changed one single bit in 6 years. You can’t even cut and paste a keyframe, so don’t think you’re going to get the easing and smooting of AE. It’s pretty good for basic linear stuff, but that’s it.
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Thanks for the info on the Lyric plug in. I downloaded the demo, and in 5 minutes figured out how to get it do what I want to do. Seems like it would be $49 well spent.
Mike
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Uhm, guys, FCP has an EASE IN/OUT function. In VIDEO+WIREFRAME mode if you CONTROL CLICK on your first and last keyframes you will see that option.
It’s there. Been there for a while. Not the easiest thing to use, but it’s there.
Shane
Alokut Productions
http://www.lfhd.net -
Shane – I mentioned trying that in the other part of this thread. I got it to work, sort of, just not as simply or elegantly as in AfterEffects. I’m fine working with the plug in for simple moves, and using AE for when things need to get more complex.
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Got to echo other comments – yes, you can do it, but it AIN’T AE. That said, keep it simple and the moves are great quality on output – motion blur is even passable, with some adjustments. It’s just a shame that FCP REQUIRES the sort of fiddling it does. As I’ve said before in this forum, I loathe the UI in After Effects, but it does do motion SO WELL.
Use wireframe mode on a nice big canvas, zoom out so you can see past the edge of the visible frame, and make GENTLE adjustments to bezier points. As with AE, the fewer points the better. Easing the speed AND the coordinates in FCP does give some unexpected results, unfortunately, as you are adjusting TIME as well (like, wow!)
Ben
Editec Broadcast Editing Ltd
EVS & FCP specialists for live OB operations.Producer/Director “The Supercar Run” now available for international distribution from http://www.electricsky.com
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