Crossfade & Transition

steve8650 wrote on 7/17/2010, 1:39 PM
I have worked with Vegas 6.0 Movie Studio for a couple years now. The one area that continues to cause me issues is inserting a crossfade between two events and then adding a transition such as a barn door. I have been successful with this sometimes in the past. Once I thought I had it all down with the right settings and whether I should go left to right, etc., I would go to do another and it would not work again.

What is happening is that event 1 will be playing it will begin to transition, everything looks good on the 1st half of the transition (it has the very end of event 1), however, as the 2nd half of the transition is going the video that is being shown is the "end of event 2". Once the transition ends the beginning of event 2 is now showing.

I feel like I have tried numerous things, going L to R, adjusting using the quarter circle but I just cannot get this part down. The last couple of videos I have just done the quarter circles in each direction to provide a basic fade out/in but I am dissapointed not having the nicer crossfade and transition.

Your help is appreciated.

Comments

TOG62 wrote on 7/17/2010, 2:32 PM
It sounds as though you're forgetting to overlap the two clips by about a second. This, by default, creates a cross-fade transition. You can right click on the overlap area and choose a different transition effect or modify an existing one.

Mike
Paul C wrote on 7/17/2010, 3:27 PM
It sounds more like you are extending too much of the second clip to the left. Vegas works with events by looping them - if you keep extending an event in either direction, once you reach the full length of the event, it simply repeats it.

To check this, look at event 2 on your timeline, and see if there is a triangular 'notch' in the top of the event in the timeline. This will indicate that the event is starting to loop. If this is the case, take the event back to this point, then create your overlap.
MSmart wrote on 7/17/2010, 9:19 PM
Paul C is correct. Fix the event by dragging the second event back to the right to where the notch is. Then click in the event and move it to the left to create the overlap. As said, by default a cross-fade transition is created. Hovering in the at one edge of the transition until the cursor changes to the rounded top looking think, right click and change the cross-fade transition properties.

To do a transition effect, go to the Transitions tab, choose an effect style and drag one of the Presets down to the cross-fade in the timeline to apply that effect to the transition.

So the key is to move your events to create the overlap, not extending them. (in simple terms that is)
steve8650 wrote on 7/18/2010, 6:06 AM
I have continued to try but unfortunately have been unsuccessful. I am sure that I am not creating a crossfade that is longer than the event causing a loop. I have events that are around 30 seconds on each side and as I try to get work I have kept the crossfade to less than a second and arrow through to see how it changes on each frame and I continue to see video from the end of event 2 pulled up into the actual crossfade portion.

I think it has to do with one of my settings. I believe they are set at the default with the load of the program but you never know. What I have just noticed is that when I do the crossfade the length of my entire video project does not shrink. It seems like that is related to my issue as it is adding video in the crossfade rather than overlapping?

Do you think it is a setting? What should I have on/off - auto crossfades, auto ripple, etc.

Can you let me know what items you have selected under the options?

Thanks.
TOG62 wrote on 7/18/2010, 6:31 AM
When you create the overlap between clips you need to select the clip itself and not just the starting point. When you drag to the left the whole clip (and subsequent clips if you have rippling switched on) should move. In other words the clip length should remain the same but the total length of clips on the timeline should decrease - due to overlapping.

Mike
steve8650 wrote on 7/18/2010, 6:45 AM
THANK YOU TO ALL! I was stretching it instead of overlapping. It all makes perfect sense now. I was so frustrated and was not getting the full enjoyment out of creating these home videos. I will enjoy them and can now feel more proud showing them.

Your help will save me so many hours of continuing to try and get the crossfade and transitions to work. I know I had gotten them to work in the past but that part of the process somehow got lost with me.

Thanks again.