Thanks for your reply Mark.

You say "Look at pan/crop feature" - where do I find that?

Is that a plug-in?

Russell

From online Help [F1] or Application Help:
"From the Tools menu, choose Video, and choose Video Event Pan/Crop (or click the Pan/Crop button on the video event)."
You can access it from the Editing toolbar below the timeline as well.
This is assuming you have the Platinum version.
The "basic" Movie Studio 13 Application Help is here

One way of "tracking a person" here

First, it's possible. You can combine pan/crop tool and cookie cutter FX (I believe cookie cutter is available in MS, also it's possible with masks, but it a bit more complicated).
Second, it's possible. You can set up keyframes in both pan/crop and cookie cutter to change camera/viewport position and cookie cutter rectangle. Please consult help about effects animation with keyframes.
Third might be complicated. Multilayer PSD files support is not in Movie Studio 13 features, so it might be impossible to import them. There are workarounds through. I think you should try importing simple PSD file and if it doesn't work we'll find something.

Many thanks for your replies - I'm on my way to making my first (clipped) movie - well, I'm on test file 4! :)

I'll be back again soon - Russell

Stuck again!

I've resized the movie, so I now have a 520 x 780 clipped area within the original size of the movie (1440x1080) and the, unused, part of the movie is blacked out.

How can I remove the unused portion of the movie leaving just the 520x780 part?

Thanks, again Russell

520x780 means 520 WIDE by 780 TALL.
Are you sure that's what you want??
That is so far from any standard display aspect I can't understand your reasoning.

Frame size that is specific can be an issue for destination as well as device handling. I suggest you be very forthcoming about where you are going with this.

ONE other thing - frame size proportions and aspect ratio results are also constricted by rules of the encoder chosen to make it appear so...tell us a lot more about that issue for you please...

It's a 5 sec promo for a specified space on a website.

To get 520*780 video you should change project settings and render template settings. Set up resolution in project settings to 520*780 and pixel aspect ration to 1,000 (I suppose it's proper aspect ratio for web-related videos). Change field order to none and set up deinterlace method to either blend fields or interpolace fields.
Make similar changes in render template and save render template under new name.

why? why are we making something non-standard for Utube delivery - what are they going to do with it ???- post it in a standard size frame?

And just what player do you intend to embed on your website?

That works great - thanks.

Re player - no idea - haven't thought that far ahead! I kinda thought the browser would play it as an mpg file? Am I being naive?:)

Somewhat, yes.
You can have a link to a file for download, or you can embed a streaming player in the webpage code.
No guarantee a given player will adapt to your unconventional choice of display aspect.
Neither should be mpeg-2. Homework time.

You may find useful what I've discovered - I'm also using Home Studio 13 and dragging a .psd on the timeline gives me a single track image BUT right clicking you get 'streams' submenu and there individual layers are stacked on separate streams each.

Duplicating the track (with fx, track motion etc.) and selecting different streams on each gives a sort of multilayer support...