Lots to speak about here.

1- I use SteadyHand when I really really want to save a bit of shaky footage. I've done it. It works. But it is not a plugin. I've got near to making it a plugin by dragging a File reference from within Media Manager directly to an open instance of SH and off I go. I then drag this back to Vegas and plop it in as a take or new event. Be warned that IF 16:9 you will have to reset as 16:9 within the properties. Again, it works. It works for me.

2- I've even used Pan/Crop to do some major surgery!

3- Vegas does not have a plugin for steadying shots.

4- SteadyMove is a phenomenal steadying s/w. But many of us hereabouts have asked for a plug for Vegas.

5- There is another piece of s/w that at present escapes my memory .. . somebody will pitch in.


Personally, I think it is about time our s/w -Vegas - had some visually interactive stuff going on. Stuff like Motion Blurring; beat peaks to video interaction; Fx to visual peaks interaction; Motion-aware plugs and so on.

But then I'd be running the risk of being accused as a "Bloatist". I see myself as being creative and wanting more for the s/w that I spend most of my waking day in front of. But hey, what do I know?

And something I do sympathise with, and be ready to be told it, that better you don't shoot shaky footage to start with - too! But I guess you knew that?

Yup DeShaker! That's what it was. I bought SH.

Thanks all! :-)

Vegas does have Motion Blur and you can with a little effort automate Video FX to audio although it's not that 'automatic', would probably work best if you had the music in multitrack format so you could use say the kick drum track to create the envelope.

The rest of your wish list though yes, would be nice

Steadyhand is the other (3rd) program. It's from Dynapel. It is standalone, like Deshaker, not a Vegas plugin. Sony does not actively promote the care and feeding of third-party developers they way most big software developers do, so there are far fewer plugins for Vegas than for Premiere. It does not appear that Sony has changed their mind and seen the light. Third-party plugins make or break a software program: They are NOT simply the result of success, but instead MAKE that success happen.

Have I ever mentioned this before?

BTW, the Deshaker guide I wrote is a little out of date because the author released a slightly improved version with a few additional (and pretty nice) features. Also, the settings I give in that guide are for the best possible quality. The performance, as a result, is VERY slow on the first. I you want to get faster performance, with not too much degradation in quality of deshaking, change "Use Pixels" from "All (most robust)" to "Every 4th."

Not a plug-in but Bauhaus Mirage will steady your footage and a whole lot more (I've used it on HDV with great results). The pixel tracker is awesome for steading footage or replacing billboards and signs or tons of other FX. It has a particle generator and it even does the infamous “handwriting” fx by animating a brush over a spline. It’s an awesome piece of software to have in your editor's kit and they have lots of free on-line tutorials to show you how to use it.

~jr

I used DeShaker a lot about a year ago when I had lots of walk-around video. It worked great. Not only did it seem to be a bit more fluid than SteadyHand on some test sequences, but it also had the ability to "fill in" the black edges that utilities of this sort necessarily create. Combined with a 4% cookie cutter over the whole final avi, I think it was hard most of the time to see any artifacts.

These programs will soften the video very slightly, but for me the tradeoff on some scenes was well worth it. DeShaker is also very geeky and not for the faint of heart, but then I'm geeky, so it's okay. Oh, it does well with HDV footage, too.