Vegas Movie Studio 6 Newbie – transition question

[Edward Troxel]

[WrathWielder] “1) Scene detection – both by CONTENT and TIMECODE…I load up a DV AVI in VMS and for the life of me I can’t find anywhere to have it detect scenes. In S9 I just hit the spacebar and it gave me a thumbnail for each “event”. In VMS will I be forced to do this manually by watching the video?”

You can do scene detections based on starts/stops of your camera if the clock is set in the camera. It’s an option in the preferences in the capture program.

[WrathWielder] “2) I can’t get this whole transition thing down in VMS…can it really be this difficult?
All I want to do it put a transition between 2 events where the audio from the A side fades out and the audio on the B side fades in while the video transition is doing it’s thing.”

It’s even easier in VMS, just overlap the two events on the same track. If you want something other than a crossfade, drag the desired transition onto the overlap.

[WrathWielder] “If I’m forced to overlap the tracks to get the transitions to work, how can I have the audio NOT crossfade but just fade out/in at the split?”

You will need to shorten the audio of each event (use the “Ignore Event Grouping” button to leave the video alone) and then manually add the fades. For my editing, I usually WANT the audio to fade from one to the other.

Another option would be to get the full version of Vegas and use a script to perform the exact operation you want.

[WrathWielder] “In S9 I would do quick videos by capturing into a DV file, detecting scene changes (either by content or timecode), dragging each of these detected scenes to the timeline so all that was there were thumbnails for each scene.
Then I would drag a transition between each thumbnail and burn away!”

With the full version of Vegas and scripting, you can write a script to do all the above at the push of a button.

Edward Troxel

[Wrathwielder]

Thanks so much Edward! 🙂

I understand now how the video crossfade is replaced by the transition you drag there…and I was able to choose an audio fade that drops very quickly so there is very little volume in the center where they cross over…that way you don’t notice that the audio overlaps…
I will also try shortening the audio like you mentioned, and adding the fades manually…but that might be too much work 🙂

If I could, two more quick questions…
1) Do you happen to know of a keystroke that will SPLIT (like ‘S’ does) and then also overlap the 2 events by the default amount in preferences?
It’s not a big deal to have to drag each one over the other, but I thought I’d see if there’s a shortcut…

2) Is there a way to join all the frames in an event into a single thumbnail? I’m used to Studio 9 where you split/join thumbnails on the timeline any way you like. I guess you could say each thumbnail is an event all by itself. That way I can end up with 1 thumbnail between each transition.
VMS determines how many thumbnails to show based on zooming in/out, which is a little confusing (for me).

Thanks again!

-Greg

[Edward Troxel]

[WrathWielder] “1) Do you happen to know of a keystroke that will SPLIT (like ‘S’ does) and then also overlap the 2 events by the default amount in preferences?”

Technically, a Split and then overlap will DO NOTHING. This is because you are dissolving from and to the same video. However, I believe what you are looking for is: Put the cursor on the split position with the event selected and press / on the numeric keypad.

[WrathWielder] “2) Is there a way to join all the frames in an event into a single thumbnail?”

The zoom level will determine the number of frames/pictures you see at once. You can always proceed from frame to frame by using ALT-Arrow.

Edward Troxel

[Wrathwielder]

Thanks!

When I do a SPLIT (S) it’s between 2 different scenes where the cam was stopped & started…so it actually does have something to transition from/to.

I will try the ‘/’ key after I do an ‘S’ and see how it works 🙂

As far as thumbnails, I guess I will try my next capture with scene detection on so I have many smaller AVI files. Maybe when I drag these to the timeline it will show each one as a single thumbnail…

Thanks again!

-Greg

[Edward Troxel]

[WrathWielder] “When I do a SPLIT (S) it’s between 2 different scenes where the cam was stopped & started”

In this case the / key will not work because the two events will simply be extended to create the overlap which means you’ll still end up with a CUT even though they’re overlapped. You either need to overlap them manually or, in the full version of Vegas, you can make all the cuts and then use a script to overlap them all at once.

Edward Troxel