Removing empty time spaces in timeline

[John Rofrano]

1. Am I doing something wrong with Vegas or Production Assistant?

What exactly did you expect Production Assistant to do? It removes all of the gaps for the selected track. It does not ripple other tracks or anything like that. It is just meant to remove all of the gaps in the track. Here is the description from the User’s Guide:

Remove Track Gaps – will remove any gaps that are in the selected track. This moves all of the media end-to-end from the start of the timeline. This should not be used on tracks where you want to maintain gaps in the media (such as title tracks). To use it, select the track(s) that you want to remove the gaps from and click the toolbar button.

Just curious as to what you expected it to do that was different.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[John Lenihan]

I read that same item too and perhaps read into it what I need it to do.

What I want it to do is simply remove places where there is nothing in the timeline vertically from top to bottom.

This was so basic to my previous editor, I find a difficult time describing it.

Track one is a multicam video. Track 2, 3, 4,5 are the single channel audio that goes with them.

Track six is my single camera video. Track 7 and 8 are the audio.

I have completed a 3 hour wedding edit job. Now I want to create a 5 minute highlight. I delete a bunch of stuff on the multicam track, bunch of stuff on the single video track, some things on the audio track.

Then I want to snug them together so I can see where I am at. The command I have used in Ulead was search for empty time slots. It brings up a list and says that there are 15. The first is at say, 5 minutes for 27 seconds. Delete. I click yes. Next is at 10 minutes for 4 seconds, delete?

So what I end up with retains the same video to audio sync and same time order of the all the tracks. But the clips are not scattered over three hour timeline.

Instead, the way it works is I get all my multicam video snugged up to the left, all my single cam video snugged left on its own line, the audios are each snugged left, and there is no relationship left between any tracks. I never have a single track editing job, so I can’t even imagine a use for this the way it is.

I can not believe that these functions are not in there. Please lead me out of the woods.

John

John Lenihan

LeniCam Video Productions
https://www.lenicam.com

[Aleksey Tarasov]

I don’t know any script that does what you want. You can use auto ripple function while deleting “a bunch of stuff”

[John Rofrano]

What I want it to do is simply remove places where there is nothing in the timeline vertically from top to bottom. …I can not believe that these functions are not in there. Please lead me out of the woods.

That’s easy. Double-click in the empty area of the track that has a gap from top to bottom. This will make a timeline selection of the gap. Turn on ripple edit with All Tracks, Markers, and Regions enabled and press the Delete key. The gap will be deleted and everything will ripple left to fill it in.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[John Lenihan]

Thank You Alexa and John,

John, the technique you suggested just now is close, but actually it is harder than just turning on the all tracks ripple and grabbing the right events and dragging them to the left events. I still have to go find each gap manually and make a beginning and ending selection, and then press the delete.

It looks like that is the best that is possible and I appreciate your help.

If you are interested, I can make a video clip to show how it works from Ulead, and perhaps someone could crank that into product plans.

John

John Lenihan

LeniCam Video Productions
https://www.lenicam.com

[Aleksey Tarasov]

“I still have to go find each gap manually and make a beginning and ending selection”

To partially automate this tedious process, you can use https://vegasaur.com/project-auditor. It allows you to find empty spaces and make selections

[John Rofrano]

To partially automate this tedious process, you can use vegasaur.com/project-auditor. It allows you to find empty spaces and make selections

Ultimate S Pro will also audit for gaps (and a whole lot more). You can just as easily zoom out and find them quickly. I believe what John wants is a script that closes the gaps automatically with one click. This could be done with a script.

~jr

http://www.johnrofrano.com
http://www.vasst.com

[John Lenihan]

John,

Does Ultimate S Pro have a trial download? I don’t see one on their web page.

John Lenihan

LeniCam Video Productions
https://www.lenicam.com

[Sam Caino]

You can try this script. I’ve never used it, but it’s in my script pile (copy to a text document and change the file extension to .js) I think you need to select all your tracks first, then run the script. Let me know if it works…

/**
* Program:
* Description: This script will Delete Empty Space Between Events In Selected Tracks
* Author: Philip
*
* Date: August 31, 2003
**/

import Sony.Vegas;
import System.Windows.Forms;
import Microsoft.Win32;

//time intervals for split events.

try
{

// step through all selected video events:
var FirstTrack : Track = Vegas.Project.Tracks.Item(0);

// step through all selected video events:
for (var track in Vegas.Project.Tracks) {
if( !track.Selected) continue;
var tracktime = new Timecode(0);
for (var evnt in track.Events) {
evnt.AdjustStartLength(tracktime,evnt.Length,true);
tracktime = tracktime + evnt.Length;
}
}
}

catch (errorMsg)
{
MessageBox.Show(errorMsg, “Error”, MessageBoxButtons.OK, MessageBoxIcon.Exclamation);
}

[John Lenihan]

To John, Aleksy, and Sam,

Almost, but not yet.

1. Ultimate S Pro auditor, Production Assistant, and the script that Sam just sent all work the same. It removes all the gaps on each track, one track at a time.

2. The Vegaseur auditor is closest, it generates a list and if you work it backwords, selecting in the timeline, pressing delete, it finds only those spots where there is nothing in any track.

John Lenihan

LeniCam Video Productions
https://www.lenicam.com