[Scot Sheely]

Bill,

I have been quite busy with editing and rendering on my main machines and haven’t had the systems free long enough to capture a screenshot movie tutorial yet, but I promise I will do so sometime in the not too distant future. You are right, nothing exists here on the Cows as far as a track matte tutorial, so the idea is a sound one, IMHO.

However, always being the trooper that I am and never giving up too easily, I did find a static web-based tutorial (in other words, not a movie, but it does include screenshots).

Here is the URL: https://www.digitaljuice.com/support/tutorials/editors_toolkit/using_overlay_mattes_with_premiere.asp

Of course, most everyone here is quite familiar with DJ’s fine products, and this effect does not necessarily rely on their graphic elements, but they (or any other) can be used to achieve this important and often-used effect.

Hope that helps you out!

Scot Sheely
IMG Videos.com

[Scot Sheely]

I would suggest using a FREE program called MediaCoder. It will convert a huge amount of audio and video file types, including .VOB (video objects), as well as MPEG 1, 2 and 4 amongst others.

https://mediacoder.sourceforge.net/index.htm

I have found excellent practical use from this application in the last 6 months or so.

Another thing that you can try is changing the extension from .VOB to .m2v. Although allegedly identical to the .MPG extension, for some inexplicable reason it does seem to work on occasion when the .MPG change does not. I have not figured out why this occurs, but this is just an observation from real-world testing over the last 3 or 4 years. I have yet to find anything describing this phenomenon in any of the many DVD specification white papers or books I have read, but it is what it is.

Try MediaCoder, I believe it will solve your problem and the price couldn’t get any better than it already is.

Scot

[Scot Sheely]

Excellent! Yep, this is a new one for me, too. This definitely gets filed in the “it CAN be done” category concerning nVidia’s cards.

I am glad you were able to resolve this, and thanks again for sharing the solution here for all to see.

That’s what makes this community strong, IMHO. The dissemination of such disparate minutia (those are all of the “hundred dollar words” I have on my vocabulary list today, LoL!).

See you here on the forums.

Peace!

Scot

[Scot Sheely]

I would suggest, as a simpler measure of fixing this issue, to re-size your desktop in your display options.

Just choose a LARGER size than you are using now (like 1920×1440 or 1600×1200 if your VGA will allow for those screen resolutions).

Then you will be able to see the top of the Media Encoder and drag it down. When you close that window and re-open it again next time, it should remember the window position.

You can then re-set your display to your original configuration at that point.

I am sure there is another way to accomplish this feat, but I don’t recollect another method at this time.

Scot

[Scot Sheely]

When you are calculating the total file size per hour with captured audio, you need to remember that this file will be much smaller than capturing with video.

A full audio / video capture will indeed weigh in between 12 and 13 GB’s per hour, however, with the recent real-world actual practical use of this method by our studio the total per minute for audio only is about 12 MB (Megabytes, not Gigabytes), which equivelates to around 720 MB’s per hour (not even a full Gigabyte).

I agree, a hardware solution like an Edirol or even an iRiver is even more preferable for the portability and overall recording duration. I was advocating using something along the lines of a Panasonic AG-DVX100B camera, not an $18k camera.

At any rate, it sounds like you have the situation under control.

Good luck!

Scot

[Scot Sheely]

Brian,

I agree with Kanturina. Renaming a .VOB (video object) file to an .m2v is the simplest method of operation here, and works well most of the time.

Another possibility would be to use Adobe Audition (if you have that as well). You can capture audio from video directly using that program. Go to the FILE->OPEN AUDIO FROM VIDEO. If it is a very long program, it can take a while to capture into Audition.

Finally, if you have a PC available to you for this task, you could use an excellent program called Total Recorder. Anything you can hear on your computer’s speakers, it can capture.

Rather than being an analog means of capturing, it actually taps into your soundcard’s digital output and diverts (splits) the audio there to Total Recorder. So the sound is pristine and undistorted, with no additional D/A or A/D conversion necessary. Very, very cool program, and it has saved my rear on numerous occasions.

FYI, Total Recorder runs with very little resources (as compared to Camtasia Studio, which is a huge memory hog!). You also still hear the audio coming from your speakers normally, so it changes nothing during playback and capture. Best of all, it supports a wide range of audio file formats.

Scot

[Scot Sheely]

Jeffrey,

The simplest thing to do with the least amount of hassle and equipment involved is to record the audio using your miniDV camera and an XLR hard-wired or wireless lav mic, directly into the camera on miniDV tape.

Then, capture into PPRO, but instead of capturing audio and video, you can select AUDIO ONLY as an option to capture to.

We do this all the time and it works like a charm.

Simple setup, only a camera, tape and a mic are necessary, and the whole rig is much more portable than using a laptop to capture to.

Scot

[Scot Sheely]

Bill,

Yes, the opaque shape must occupy the underlying layer preceeding the title for it to act as a base, or lower-third type of object.

In other words, you video on track 1, then the rect, then your name / ID text.

Another possiblility would be to play around with the track matte effect, with the rectangle being the object specified by the track matte, and the text being the object that the effect is actually applied to.

If that is the case, then have the track that the rectangle occupies (which should be ABOVE the text layer) DE-selected (click on the eyeball on that track to make it invisible), apply the track matte effect to the text layer and specify the rectangle track as the matte.

You can make many interesting effects by playing around with this important tool, and it really comes alive when you use animated backgrounds for the matte. There are other options to play with in that effect as well (matte alpha vs. matte luma), and it is far easier to create a video tutorial on this than it is to describe it via text here.

If this is something that interests you, check to see if the Cows already has such a tutorial for PPRO; if not, let me know and I will gladly create one for you and this community.

Scot

[Scot Sheely]

Jason,

Do you mean, when rendering a previously captured .AVI in AE7, that the very last frame is being dropped (not rendered)?

I have noticed that AE seems as if it is stopping one frame short as well. My only suggesttion to you, if this is the case in your situation as well, is a work-around. I manually add 1 frame to the AE timeline in that project.

That way, when I render from AE7 (the current version I have, as well), it renders a full clip’s length and doesn’t drop that very last frame.

I am not sure why this anomoly occurs, perhaps one of our After Effects gurus here could further elaborate on this subject.

Hope that helps!

Scot

[Scot Sheely]

Bill,

You can indeed create a nearly opaque, bordeless rect (or any other shape native to the titling tool) in PPRO.

Are you trying to simulate the CSI Miami open? What are you trying to achieve? Understanding your end-goal would help towards providing the correct advice for your situation.

In the titling tool, once you have created your shaped object, on the right-hand side, you can drill-down (some call this “Twirl down”) the attributes until you find the shape and border fill. One of the items that can be modified is the opacity for each of these respective categories.

In your case, if the you truly want the border to be completely opaque, then set that opacity level to 0. For the main body fill for your rectangle or other object shape, I suggest you try an opacity of 1 to 5% and set the color to white, which is the least obtrusive when viewed on your timeline.

You cannot have a 100% opaque object, but you can have a completely opaque object with a (somewhat) visible border, or vice-versa, if that makes sense to you. Some amount of fill must be present, even if a tiny amount, for the shape to be able to be added into your timeline. 1% is the least amount possible (technically, you can do less, as in .5%, etc., but I believe you know what I mean).

If it is the CSI Miami opening title effect that you are trying to achive, then simply add in a blur to that shape on your timeline. Experimenting with the opacity, blur type and blur level will help you achieve your desired effect.

You can copy the blurred shape in your timeline, and stretch and skew this same shape by adjusting the rectangle shape in the Effects Controls panel. In this manner, you can make many different looking shapes from just the single, original rectangle without having to go back into your titling tool. Of course, animating these shapes across the screen using keyframes is how you will achieve that CSI look.

If, instead, you simply want a completely opaque object (can’t imagine why, I would love to hear your reason behind this; we humans usually don’t see invisible objects!), forget the blur, just set the rect fill opacity to 1% / white as previously suggested.

At any rate, I hope this helps you out. Please let me know what your goal is here, what effect you are ultimately trying to achieve. That will help in any further analysis and recommendations.

Scot Sheely