Questions about exporting from Vegas Pro 9.0 to NTSC Digital Betacam

[Chris Young]

For international program delivery this is a common request. Usually what is required is a full stereo or 5.1 mix on channels 1&2. This includes everything you hear in the program. On channels 3&4 you usually need all of the program audio MINUS any English voice-overs or dialogue. You can mute these voice clips or make sure they are on separate tracks and mute those tracks. If the program has interviews in English they normally stay on 3&4 along with the rest of the M&E audio. This way the overseas client can totally re-voice the program in whatever language they like. With the English interviews they normally ‘duck’ the audio and then translate/voice over them with Japanese or whatever language is required.

To do this you would have to go back to your original project timeline and print out to a four-channel format or if printing to DV tape and to hold max quality you need to print to tape twice. Once with the full program mix and secondly with just the M&E tracks. You would then have to find a post house that can then transfer your MiniDV to Digi-Beta and then sync and drop in tracks 3&4 for you.

Good luck.

Chris Young
CYV Productions
Sydney

[Kathleen Carman]

Hi Chris,

Thanks for responding and explaining the process.
I think I understand now what I need to do with my Vegas project itself, in terms of making sure the elements are on their proper tracks and then bussed down to the 4 tracks needed for the output.

Now to figure out how to properly output it for them to make the digibeta! They seem to want uncompressed .avi or quicktime files made in a four-channel format. Any pointers on saving these types of files to make sure they have all 4 seperate tracks?

Thanks again!
Kathleen

[Chris Young]

Hi K ~

Didn’t you say originally that they required it on Digi-Beta? If this is still the case I would most likely export my rendered multi-track file as a Standard Def NTSC IMX Widescreen (720×486, 29.970 fps) MXF file from Vegas, there is a template with these specs, use that. I guess your project is widescreen if not use the standard template. This is the easiest way to export multi-track audio if you don’t have much experience doing it. I have posted a pdf file to help you set this multi-track project up at:

https://f1.creativecow.net/600/working-with-xdcam-in-vegas-90‘%3E600_workingwithxdcaminvegas9.pdf.zip

For some reason the whole download link is not hightlighted in my post preview so if this is the case just copy the whole link and drop it into a new page and download the pdf file.

Read this carefully especially the chapter titled “Setting up your project for multichannel audio”. Once you have rendered out your Std Def XDCam file find a post house that can export this file to an XDCam disc for you. It is then a simple job for them to run this disc in an XDCam player and output Std Def SDI with 4 embedded audio channels straight to the SDI input of the Digi-Beta deck.

A bit to learn and a bit to do but not too hard really if you go slow and steady. Others may suggest a simpler workflow but currently I can’t think of one to put forward. Good luck!

Chris Young
CYV Productions
Sydney

[Kathleen Carman]

Hey Chris!

Thanks again for your help.

To answer your question, yes, the distribution co. wants a digibeta of the film for duplication. A few tapehouses I called here in NYC said they could make the digibeta from a digital file, either quicktime or avi so I just need to make sure to export in the highest quality into one of those formats, with the 4 seperate tracks, to a hard drive.

They also said that if that wasn’t succesful, I could just create the 4 seperate tracks in said formats and have them reassemble in FCP or Avid and then export straight to digibeta. This isn’t as desirable though since it means more labor and higher cost, and I’d guess a loss of quality by it being 2nd generation.

I just got around to downloading the file you posted though and will read through it now…It looks like I have about a month to get this thing ready for duplication so hopefully I can straighten things out by then!

Best,
Katie

[Kathleen Carman]

Hi Chris,

Another question for you if you have a moment:

Since I can’t get a camera or deck to print the file to to give to the tape house, I’m going to be creating a multi-channel quicktime file with the 4 seperate tracks to put on a HD.

The only problem is that when I select to render to Quicktime, the box where I can select to “create a multi-channel file’ is greyed out and not selectable.

Do you know if there is a specific codec I need installed to be able to render to a multi-channel quicktime file? Or is that just not possible to do in Sony Vegas?

I’m still also struggling to figure out how to get my project which is 16:9 with a custom crop, to be 16:9 anamorphic, but I think that’s something I’ll need to quiz my DP about.

Thanks in advance, and also, do you know of anyone you’d recommend in NYC that freelances on Sony Vegas? If I can’t figure this out, I may need to hire someone to help guide me through the process.
-K