newbie/nomenclature and basic question

[Mike Kujbida]

The answers given depend on what you’re going to use the video for.
Is this for the web, DVD, something else?

[Kim Gentes]

I am not sure how it would effect the technique used, but I want to end up with a 720p resolution video (@ 60fps), like my current 3 source tracks of video (aside from the one in 640×480). The video is part of a “extras” feature for something else, but a DVD, but requires the 720p final form.

thanks.

Kim

[Mike Kujbida]

Kim, the render settings are what would be affected, not the technique used but, because of what you want to do with it, this isn’t an issue here.

Hopefully your project Properties match your source video.
You’ll see why in a moment.

Since you want to stay with your 1280×720 resolution, you have two choices for the low res video.
One is to keep it at it’s original size and put it over some kind of 1280×720 background (you see this trick used a lot of TV these days when they have 4:3 footage in a 16:9 video).
I’ve done it myself when I have to use images that were shot in portrait mode instead of landscape mode.
I leave the image full size on the upper track.
The lower track is the same image but I open Pan/Crop, right-click in the middle and select “Match Output Aspect” (this is why your Project Properties must match your source video) and apply a medium (or heavier) Gaussian Blur to it.

The other option is to see how it looks when it’s blown up to match the same size as the other video clips.
This is done by going into Pan/Crop and doing a “Match Output Aspect” as I mentioned earlier.
Doing this will take the 640 x 480 video and turn it into a 1280×720 video.
As I said, you need to see if doing this will turn it into mush (like that fancy term??) or not.

Hopefully this answers your questions.
Please let me know if you have any more and I’ll do my best to help you out.

[Kim Gentes]

Mike,

this looks like what I am needing to do (your first option).

My two immediate questions are:

a) my multi-camera track is now a single track merged for takes. Do I need to go back to re-creating my original tracks (re-synching them etc) on the timeline, BEFORE merging them for takes to a single track? I am on Vegas 9pro.

b) You mentioned putting the 640×480 track in question can be handled well by using a different sized background. You said put the original on the upper track and a scaled-to-fit version on the lower track, and talked about doing different things to each. Sorry for my denseness here. How do I create such “upper track/lower tracks” out of one video track I am trying to change.

I think I understand the concepts you are giving me here, I just practically am still new to how to do this stuff. Where is Upper and Lower? Are those properties of any video track? Do I create two separate tracks and use the same video source, then somehow merge them?

thanks again, and for your patience with me. If there are videos I should be watching for this type of stuff, I am happy to watch those.

thanks
Kim

[Mike Kujbida]

Kim, sorry for the delay but things like work and dinner have a nasty habit or getting in the way of a quick reply 🙂

Before you merge them (and it’s not necessary to do this), I would add the blurred background video/still to the small clip as it will make it easier to line up.

When you first laid out your clips to do this, you had 4 video tracks and (I’m, guessing here) 4 audio tracks.
Track 1 is consider the top or “upper” track.
Consequently, tracks 2, 3 and 4 are “lower” tracks.
That’s what I mean by those terms.

Since you’re down to one video track (and one audio track?), you need to add a new video track.
There are three ways to do this.
Insert – Video Track is one.
Right-click in the Track header area and select Insert Video Track is another.
Ctrl+Shift+Q is the shortcut for the third way of doing this.
No matter which way you do it, a new video track will be created and it will be on top of your existing track (i.e. “upper”).
You need this to be a “lower” track so click in the Track header of the empty track and drag it down below the already created track.
Track one is now your existing video and track two is blank.

If you want to use the existing 640×480 clip as the blurred background, here’s how to do it.
Click on the first occurrence of it, hold the Ctrl key and drag it down to the lower track.
Slide it as necessary to ensure that it lines up with the clip above it.
Apply the Gaussian blur FX to the clip on the lower track.
This can be done by clicking on the Video FX tab, clicking Gaussian Blur, clicking Medium Blur and then dragging this on top of the lower track clip.
To avoid having the window pop up, hold down the Ctrl key as you’re dragging the FX down.
You can also click the Event FX icon on the clip itself and add the Gaussian Blur.
Either way does the exact same thing.

If you have a still image that you want to blur and use as a background, import it into the project and follow the steps I just outlined.

Because of the extra steps this took, you won’t be able to collapse the project to a single clip but this isn’t an issue as a typical video will consist of a lot of different clips along the timeline.

All that’s left to is to render the project at the desired setting.

Here are two screenshots showing what I was talking about.
The first one is the default Medium Blur and the second one is the default Extreme Blur.
Which one you choose is up to you.

[Mike Kujbida]

I forgot to mention that Sony has a series of training videos on their main site as well as on their YouTube page that should help you in your search for some training material.

[Kim Gentes]

Mike,

thanks a lot for your help.

on this specific item we are discussing here, what keywords /names of videos would I look for to see visual examples?

Kim

[Mike Kujbida]

Kim, if you mean examples of layering images, take a look at any of the videos I did for a banquet last year as I used this technique quite a bit in them.
I can’t give you specific ones to watch or times to go to as I don’t remember exactly where in the videos they were.
They’re not my best work but it pays the bills 🙂

[Kim Gentes]

woohoo! it worked 🙂 … I finally realized I had to do the pan/crop you mentioned or the gausian blur and such wouldn’t work.. very cool effect.

thanks for helping me over my first hurdle ! brilliant stuff.

here’s hoping I can find my way through the rest ..

thanks again

Kim

[Mike Kujbida]

Kim, that’s great news!!
I’m glad that I could help you out.
Don’t be afraid to come back again if you have more questions.
After all, we all have to start somewhere and I wouldn’t know Vegas half as well as I do if it wasn’t for the help of a lot of generous folks on forums such as this one.