[Aivis Zons]

Glad to hear that it helped, but if you want to avoid this extra step the only two options that I see are
a) Change recording settings for dashcam – maybe there are options to change format.
b) Upgrade to a later version of Vegas Pro (20 or 19), which might support your files natively. As mentioned previously – you can test with the free trial.

[Aivis Zons]

H.265 is the video codec. Compared to the more common H.264 it’s more efficient in space, compression, quality, but requires more processing power.

H.265 does have some complications with Vegas, especially older versions where I believe it’s straight up not supported. Personally haven’t encountered any issues on latest version.
Your other dash cams likely used H.264 – the older, more traditional codec. Overall friendlier with everything, but less efficient.

So one solution I already mentioned prior – convert your footage to another codec. You can keep it simple and go from h265 to h264. I’ve always used Handbrake to convert odd formats that don’t work for me. The interface might be a bit overwhelming, but there are plenty of tutorials online.

Another would be to upgrade Vegas Pro to the latest version. You can first test and download the free trial of it to see if your footage would work. “Free trial” is almost at the very bottom of the page.

[Aivis Zons]

What’s the file format of your clips?

My guess is that’s where the problem lies. You can try going into Options -> Preferences -> File I/O and enable MVK reader if that’s the format, but this is just a guess.

If it’s not the MKV setting – you’ll likely have to convert these clips before using in Vegas. Maybe check if you can change the recording file format in your dash cam settings.

[Aivis Zons]

Oh, you’re totally right. Guess I imagined those – with the rounded dashes that would’ve made a bit more sense to me.

Cool challenge, shame that there’s not a more efficient workflow to make motion graphics in vegas pro. Typically ends up being a more tedious process for a less flexible result.

[Aivis Zons]

I suppose the main question would be is this a new install or have you had it for a while and it suddenly stopped working?

If it’s a new install – have you tried to reinstall? Does your system meet the software requirements?

If you’ve had it for a while – something must’ve changed in your system for it to stop working… drivers, OS or perhaps some conflicting apps.
I suppose reinstalling would also be an option in this case.

[Aivis Zons]

Definitely closer!

If you’re going for perfection I’d say that this is missing rounded corners, the timing’s a bit off on the right border and the left border is slightly shifting horizontally over time.

But yeah, no doubt closer. Curious how long this took in total hahah, because in something like After Effects this would be less than a minute

[Aivis Zons]

I’d say that the difference isn’t too big. I’m going with MAGIX AVC/AAC MP4 because it’s the more modern one of the two and you can get faster render times by setting the Encode mode to NV Encoder if your GPU supports it.

However, I have read that Mainconcept AVC has higher quality, but it’s also slower. Haven’t personally tested it, but I wouldn’t be surprised.

If you choose to go with the MAGIX template then go with the Variable bitrate option. Your average will be your previous general bitrate and the maximum you should set higher, add maybe 10Mbps on top of average for that.

[Aivis Zons]

This isn’t too far off, but the main thing that this lacks is continuity between the axis. As in it’s pretty clear that it’s not a continuous dashed border.

Could be improved with extra masking, but would be hard to get the timings and spacing right for all the corners to transform smoothly (where a vertical dash “transforms” into a horizontal one).

[Aivis Zons]

This isn’t necessarily because of the media player, this is because of the file format.
As you mentioned yourself – when you render in mp4 it’s the same. There likely is a simple answer to this question, but it’s probably filled with technicalities that might even be unnecessary by today’s standards. At a surface level there are file formats that do use the full range of 0-255 and others that don’t. If the output file differs from your preview – the format simply by default has different values and calculations for Levels compared to your project.

[Aivis Zons]

This isn’t the first time I hear of such an issue, but I’ve yet to encounter or replicate it myself. My assumption has always been that it’s due to partly corrupt video footage (or just odd format footage) where it might have variable frame rate when it wasn’t intended.

Possible solution in that case would be to convert that footage to basically anything else. A good tool for that would be Handbrake and there’s plenty of guides for it, just make sure to convert to constant framerate. That’s my best guess.

Another option would be that there’s some driver/gpu/rendering problem. I think it’s less likely, but possible, I suppose. So updating drivers, reinstalling software, restarting pc – all potential fixes there. Another thing to consider might be disabling GPU acceleration in Options -> Preferences -> Video -> GPU acceleration of video processing. Setting that to off – if that changes anything, then it could be an indicator that it’s a GPU problem (+make sure not to render with NV encoder in that test case).

Also – if you were to re-render the same footage, but in different context in a project – would the speed-ups be consistent or random? If they’re consistent I’m again further leaning into the idea that it’s a problem with how Vegas interprets that specific footage format.