Best program for editing clips?

mbroussard wrote on 2/15/2005, 8:45 AM
Ok another question..
I seem to have issues editing clips using the trimmer or the Split function in Movie Studio.

Let's say I have a clip that needs to have the last bit removed.
If I manually scroll through the video using my arrow keys I can easily see where the unnecessary frame starts.. so I back up one arrow movement (I dont know if one arrow = 1 frame or not) and I hit S for split. Then I delete the little portion that was split off.

PROBLEM - If I later stretch the remaining good portion of the clip the thing I cut out shows up again! Its like it never went away.. or I didn't cut enough of it?
Is there a better program for editing frames more precisely? Apparently I am just not getting along well with the trimmer or split. Or maybe I don't understand the definition of 'frame' - does zooming in or out change the preciseness with which you can edit clips?

Thanks for any info!
-mbroussard

Comments

ScottW wrote on 2/15/2005, 9:03 AM
Arrow movement is not frame by frame unless you are closely zoomed in on the timeline. Hold down the Alt key and then use your arrows to get frame by frame movement regardless of zoom level.

When you stretch a clip without doing a time stretch, the video must come from someplace, so you effectively undo your split until you've reached the end of the clip at which point it will start to repeat. if you hold down the CTRL key while stretching, you'll perform a time stretch which won't undo your split.

--Scott




mbroussard wrote on 2/15/2005, 11:16 AM
Great! This will help a great deal.. thanks for the quick response and for clarifying the frame issue.

-mbroussard
shmulb wrote on 2/15/2005, 12:52 PM
Wont the time stretched clip show up as Slo motion though ?
ScottW wrote on 2/15/2005, 1:03 PM
Yes it will, but if you're talking about only stretching a few frames, my bet is no one will notice..

Chienworks wrote on 2/15/2005, 1:22 PM
mbroussard, you say, "If I later stretch the remaining good portion of the clip the thing I cut out shows up again!". My question is, why are you stretching it out? You've finished your edit so i'm not sure what the problem is. By moving the end you are lengthening how long you want the clip to play, or in other words, changing where you want the edit point to occur. This is precisely what the software is supposed to do. If you didn't want to change your edit, why are you "stretching it out"?

Video editing on the computer is "non-destructive"; it never changes the original cilp. You can change what part of the clip is shown, where it starts, where it ends, etc. as much as you want and it will only affect what you see on the timeline and in the finished file. You don't actually cut off the end of the original file, so it's still there to be used again if you want to. By dragging out the end of the clip, you are telling the software that you do indeed want to use that part again.

Now, if you instead want to slow down the clip so it takes longer to play the same portion, hold the Ctrl key down while you stretch the end. This will stretch the edited clip out longer and slower rather than re-exposing the previously removed part.
mbroussard wrote on 2/15/2005, 3:01 PM
The problem is that I am trying to time something in my scene to my music background, and the video is going too fast and showing something at the end that I don't want. So originally I 'split' the piece of the end off, then deleted it from the timeline.
But then I found out my video was still going too fast and the clip was ending before the correct musical part, so I went to slow it down (because this synchronization stuff is trial & error) and whatever I did brought back the end piece that I cut out.

Now I'm confused and can't remember exactly what I did with the mouse, but I think I did drag the end out or maybe I messed with the playback rate of the clip.. but nothing I did worked the way I needed it to.

<<<"Now, if you instead want to slow down the clip so it takes longer to play the same portion, hold the Ctrl key down while you stretch the end. This will stretch the edited clip out longer and slower rather than re-exposing the previously removed part.">>>>

YES I think this is exactly what I need to do!


Thanks for your help,
-mbroussard