Zooming into a specific area on a map with Vegas

[D. Eric franks]

Bring your map into Vegas at as high a resolution as you can and then use the “Event Pan/Crop” tool to zoom in. It’s a “crop” button on the right side of the clip (event) on your timeline.

(Sorry, I’m in the middle of a render and can’t give you a better screenie.)

There are some tricks here:
* The crop tool will match your image dimensions/aspect and not your project. This is a good thing, because you can work with all of the extra resolution of your larger image however…
* The crop won’t match your project’s aspect, so you’ll get back bars top/bottom or sides until you match the crop to the project. I’d do this by first getting it roughly right and then using the numerical values in the dialog to get it perfect.
* You can also use the numerical values to enter the dimensions of your project first (say, 1280×720) and then click the Maintain Aspect Ratio button in the dialog to keep everything perfect as you resize. This is often how I “cheat”.

The Track level Track Motion tool will also work and is a more intuitive to use (in my opinion), but it only works at the project’s resolution, so when you zoom in, things may become pixelized, even if your map is a gigantic high-res image. This is why the Event Pan/Crop is a better tool to use.

[Dustin Lee]

Your suggestion is a decent method to get what you want, but it would require a fair bit of work.

I’m not sure if you have the means, but I have done the same thing by making one ultra-high res scan of the desired map, and zooming in with that. Just changing the pixel density of a smaller image would obviously not work though. It has to be a really large, sharp image, and your computer might get a bit boggy with an image of that size in the timeline if it’s a big project. For that reason, i’d suggest making it on its own, and rendering it into a standard-sized clip for the rest of your project.

Hope that helps.

[Dustin Lee]

This is exactly what I meant in my post. Just make sure your source image has high enough resolution so that it doesn’t make everything look like fuzzy LEGOs when you zoom in.

[Bob Peterson]

Don’t make it any larger than necessary to support the zoom. Large image files, in my experience, will quickly slow Vegas down. Also, when judging if the resolution is sufficient, be sure that the preview screen is set to “Best”. I usually use Best-Full.

[Rob Franks]

Why don’t you use Google Earth?

Don’t know if you have ever heard of it or use it, but it’s a free download. Google Earth use real satellite images put together in the shape of the world and you can zoom in on any part of the earth.

The last time I needed a map image zoom-in I used Google Earth and simply did a screen capture movie with Camtasia as I zoomed in on the part of the world I needed.