back on velocity envelopes

dogwalker wrote on 10/11/2009, 2:11 PM
I know this has been discussed a lot, and I've several approaches to this. For one edit, I used velocity envelopes, and that worked great when I had separate audio, but now I'm editing a vacation tape from 1989, and wanted to freeze the first frame for a bit while I put some titles on it, then bring in the colors and start the animation.

Only thing is, when I use the velocity envelope to do this, the audio winds up getting off very badly. I'm guessing the best approach is to grab a screen shot of the first frame rather than using velocity envelopes? In fact, it seems that anytime I use velocity envelopes, my synced audio gets messed up, which is a shame.

Is there a trick to this? Thanks.

Comments

Chienworks wrote on 10/11/2009, 2:23 PM
I tend to use the still frame even though it's not the easiest or best way, but simply because it's the obvious way. I want something still ... i take a still of it.

If you want an actual still to replace normal speed, no ramping up and down, try this:

- insert velocity envelope
- S to split the audio and video where you want the still to begin
- ripple edits on, drag the audio & video to the right of the split to the right to open up the desired duration of the still
- set 4 envelope points, one at 100% just as the still starts and one where it ends and two more inbetween, drag the inbetween points to 0% and align them exactly under the 100% points
- ripple edits off, ignore event grouping on, drag the end of video to the left of the still across the duration of the still
- ripple edits back on (if you prefer), ignore event grouping off.

Now that i write it all down, it seems more complicated than using a still image. However in practice it's pretty quick to do.

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If instead you'd like the sound to continue behind the still, then have the video resume where it would have been if the video hadn't stopped, make these changes to the above procedure:

- ignore event grouping off to begin with, ripple edits off
- split only the video
- drag the left edge of the video to the right of the split, trimming it rather than moving the event.
- add velocity envelope points as above
- drag the end of video to the left of the still across the duration of the still
- ripple edits back on (if you prefer), ignore event grouping off.

Note that in this second case a portion of the video equal to the duration of the still will be skipped over. In the first case none of the video will be skipped.
dogwalker wrote on 10/11/2009, 4:29 PM
Wow, Chien, thanks! I have to go try that out, and I'm so glad you wrote down all the steps, because at first glance, it seems complicated. Thank you so much for the tip!
dogwalker wrote on 10/11/2009, 6:10 PM
Ok, that helped a lot, and now I'm experimenting with slowing down parts (for example, where my niece and nephew are splashing each other, pretty cool to get that slower), but don't want to get the audio out of sync.

Here's what I've tried so far, which seems to work. One, as you suggested, I've turned on Ignore Event Grouping (I don't know whether that's key, I'll try both), and two, I found the point where I wanted the slow-mo to end and split only the video there and made the velocity 100% there, then moved back to where I wanted the slo-mo to start and added the 100% and two 40% marks. It works, and my audio's fine later in the movie.

Any C&C and suggestions more than welcome!

Thanks again, Chien.