BCC Optical Stabiliser

Jack S wrote on 4/16/2014, 12:30 PM

I've started using this brilliant plugin after upgrading to MS13 and it does a great job at stabilising my hand held clips. I wonder if anyone else is using it and if they've come across the same problem that I have. I go through my project applying the plugin to events that require stabilising. The event is analysed and I apply Translation and Rotation (the latter because some of my clips suffer due to slight rotation of the camcorder as I'm shooting) and everything is fine. The event is successfully stabilised. I save the project then come back to it some time afterwards and find that some of the stabilised events are no longer stabilised. The plugin is still applied but the event behaves similarly to the original, pre-stabilised event. I have to remove the plugin from the event then re-apply it. It's very frustrating and I've had to rearrange my workflow so that I now stabilise the necessary events immediately prior to rendering.
Anyone have any ideas? I don't think I'm doing anything wrong but the BCC Optical Stabiliser plugin is so complex I may be.
Thanks in advance
Jack

Comments

Jillian wrote on 4/16/2014, 3:12 PM

First, I need to state that I have not used Boris with Vegas or Sony Movie Studio, but I have used it in other editors.

In my experience the only safe way to make sure that Boris or NewBlue Stabilizers work reliably as plug-ins is to work in a separate project and render once you have your clip/event corrected to your satisfaction, then add the rendered/stabilized file to your final project. This adds a lot of extra steps to the work-flow, but you will always end up with what you expect.

In other words:
1 - You are working on a project and encounter an event that needs stabilization.
2 - Start another incidence of Movie Studio and copy/paste the event to the new timeline.
3 - Apply the stabilizer effect and fiddle with it until you have what you want.
4 - Render the event to a new file.
5 - Add the new version in place of your original event.

I make travel and wildlife videos, and despite my best efforts I frequently have clips that need stabilization. The only program that I have found that reliably and easily does a satisfactory job of stabilization is Mercalli. It works well as a stand-alone or as a plug-in.

Every other program I've tried either requires an immense amount of fiddling and/or gives strange results, such as continually needing to re-run analysis or disappearing or sticking a one-frame message on the front or tail of a rendered file.

I really don't understand why Sony doesn't offer a reasonably priced plug-in for Mercalli as well as Smartsound for Movie Studio..., but then, I don't understand why Sony would buy-in to touch screen video editing rather than working toward improved smart-rendering and video preview! But, what do I know?

Hope this helps,

Jack S wrote on 4/19/2014, 8:52 AM

Thanks Jillan. At the moment the issue isn't much of a problem for me. Usually, after re-analysis, the stabilised event survives subsequent project saves. Also, not all stabilised events need re-analysis after saving. I just wanted to know if anyone using the stabiliser had experienced what I was experiencing.
Your workflow is certainly worth considering if the issue becomes a problem.
Thanks for your input.

UKharrie wrote on 4/22/2014, 11:16 AM

CX410
Anyone had success with the Sony camcorders using BOSS ? - this is where the whole lens moves about - the only "snag" I find is that when panning it overshoots - YES I know to switch it Off....but experimenting with it ON has shown me that I've grown to like the effect ( as I pan rather slowly anyway) . . . and the Menu system is rather clunky . . .so I prefer to leave things.
In Movie Studio the stabaliser appears to zoom-in so the frame can be moved about, but that's none too smart IMHO . . . . I can do the same by Pan/crop although with much Keyframing it would be a pain.

Can someone explain how the footage is improved in BORIS?