[Norman Black]

1. Smart Proxy. Media does not need to be on the time line. Just click to create and the proxy is used for draft and preview quality modes. The proxies are HDCAM EX type files (MPEG-2) if you care to snoop the internals.

4. Best output for net would be to use DNxHD as an intermediate and use Handbrake (to use the x264 encoder) to generate your file for upload. Straight from Vegas the best H.264 encoder is the Main Concept CPU only encoder.

Can’t comment on anything else. Out of my league.

[Norman Black]

In Titles & Text I know you can add/change text along the timeline. I have done it. I would assume you can in Protype and (legacy) text also.

What you need to do is click the keyframe clock button on Titles and Text to allow animation of that item. For (legacy) text you click the animate button. I can’t see how you keyframe the text itself in Protype.

[Norman Black]

Tried a nested project?

[Norman Black]

I have a friend that uses Avid and he always transcodes to DNxHD. A similar workflow to what he does professionally.

Me I have just plopped my MP4 H.264 files on the timeline and edited. These are files from a GoPro Hero3 Black. There can be issues with these and my machine, a core i7 860 2.9Ghz.

1080p60 files are 30Mbps high profile H.264. Vegas cannot really keep up decoding and playback with these files on my machine. I used the smart proxy feature and my machine breathes a sigh of relief. 1080p30 20Mbps files work well for me as is.

The Smart Proxy files are actually much higher bitrate than my input but are MPEG-2 files which are easier to decode. It is curious what Sony does generating the proxy files, but it works.

I also tested multi-camera editing with 1080p30 20Mbps files and on my machine you really want to proxy, and the shorter GOP of the proxy files helps smooth playback. Multi-cam with 1080p60 files would really be mandatory.

I stick with the source, so long as it works. Nothing is ever better than your source file. Maybe easier to edit, but not better. I really don’t want to work with 145 or 220 Mbps intermediates.

[Norman Black]

Who is to say it is an AMD problem. Just as likely to be a Main Concept problem.

I found posts with problems with the 7950 card rendering with MC AVC OpenCL going back to VP11. Those got error messages. In VP12 is just falls to CPU only in my case.

Given that nothing else has a problem with the 7950, I am leaning towards it being a Main Concept problem. MC may have issues with anything in AMD’s graphic core next line of cards (79xx).

Sony support has been sitting on my support request for some time on this. Maybe they are waiting for Main Concept to get back to them.

[Norman Black]

Esc key should get you out of expanded edit mode.

When in doubt, the Esc key, most times can get you out of something modal. True most applications I have used.

I only know of two ways to get into expanded edit mode. Double click on a cut and the keypad 5 key.

[Norman Black]

I put my old 5850 back into my computer. Main Concept OpenCL now works again. I did not change the driver or anything. No need to.

I my machine it encodes at real time or better speed for 1080p30 files. Input files are GoPro Hero 3 Black (H.264 20Mbps) or Contour camera H.264 files.

One thing to test. Are you sure that OpenCL is being use with your 7950 card? It does not want to work with mine. Encode a 1 minute section CPU only and then OpenCL if available and compare times.

The 7950 is a GCN (graphic core next) design. Precompiled OpenCL code for AMD will not work on it. You need source or pseudo code to be compiled at runtime if you don’t have precompiled code for that architecture. The Main Concept OpenCL encoder in Vegas 12 may not, and stupidly not have included code that can be JIT compiled.

[Norman Black]

Sorry I don’t have specific numbers but I remember the Main Concept OpenCL encoder running at greater than real time with my old 5850 card on 1080p30 files. This on a core i7 860 machine and driver 13.1.

Unfortunately, after I upgraded my video card to a 7950, the MC AVC OpenCL encoder no longer thinks OpenCL is available since it runs in CPU only mode. Everything else works fine, just a problem with Main Concept. Otherwise I could give you numbers from my 7950.

[Norman Black]

So you are saying the output file is not 1080 like the input file?

Or are you saying the output visuals are different but the output file is still 1080? The borders cropped in.

If the later. That is how stabilization works. The Sony stabilizer is only capable of the cropping, zoomed in effect. Other stabilizers have features to fill in the outer borders various ways to minimize the amount of cropped/zoom effect.

[Norman Black]

You said you were using the Sony AVC encoder, yet you said you used CUDA and he OpenCL. Only the Main Concept AVC encoder has separate CUDA and OpenCL options listed. Sony AVC says nothing about GPU specifics. Anyway, from my experience, Sony AVC only uses the GPU lightly and is more dependent on CPU performance. Not much difference in encode time CPU only to GPU support encode time.

Main Concept AVC would load the GPU more and you would see a very large difference in CPU only to GPU encode times. Also, difference in visual quality as the OpenCL/CUDA encoders are completely different algorithms from the CPU only encoder. This only really showed when pusing bitrates really low.