I know I can achieve that by rendering the two clips to one and fading that

I can't think of any other way to do what you want other than your own solution.

Put a black clip or media event on the track above and animate its track composite level?

@EricLNZ - that is an excellent method - it works perfectly. As they say, you learn something new every day.

Actually I made it more complicated than it needs to be. Instead of animating the track composite level use the events "fade flap" to bring it in over its length thereby fading out whats underneath.

That is how I do most of my fade to blacks at the end of a video. Much easier to only do one fade than have to fade a title and video or other graphics that are layered.

All these are great solutions.

@JohnAsh Are these what you want John?

Thanks so much, all. This forum has always been a great one. Yes, just the ticket. I'd finished editing for the day but will look for 'fade flap´, which is completely new to me, tomorrow.

Thanks again.

Put a fade envelope on the master video bus.

Here is the “fade flap” before and after:

You can get to it by placing the cursor in the top left point of the media (where the little blue triangle is in the before picture) and drag it to the right for fading in. Or, to fade out, you go to the similar point at the top right and drag it to the left.

Thanks RP. I think that might have defeated me without your guidance. Though I've been using VP for quite some time, even some of the basics still defeat me!

That’s what the forum is for. 😉

I would normally do this more directly by animating a composite level envelope on the track with the 2 events on itself.

I seem to have been particularly dim on this subject. My apologies.

I assumed 'fade flap' was something new to me but, of course, I do know how to fade individual clips by dragging what I now know to be the 'fade flap' as appropriate. So, as advised, I placed a black media event in the track above my scenes and faded that "in" and, voila, I have my fade across multiple scenes. Thank you. I must learn animation, again. I have used it so infrequently, I'm almost frightened of those windows which seem to change each time I open them. I have to say, over the years, I have found much of Vegas counter-intuitive. With the help of online tutorials, I "learn" and go away and use something like animation (for a title, say). Then, next time, I'm completely lost again.

I am getting on a bit now and my first editing experience was with Standard 8 film. I still have my box with cement and splicer somewhere out in the garage. Sadly my 8mm projector, bought 2nd hand when I was about 12, has finally given up the ghost. Learning new tricks for this old dog is becoming increasingly difficult, but I won't give up! Thank you all.

I have another issue with the quality of the video I am editing at the moment. Is it OK to seek help on camera exposure settings for a particular situation on this forum (there is so much experience here) or should I seek that elsewhere?

Fire away :)

I’m all ears! 👂

John, apologies for the confusion over "fade flap". It was past midnight when I mentioned it and I couldn't recall its correct term. I'm still not sure what it should be called. And yes I also still have two old (now not working) Eumig 8mm projectors.

"insert empty event."

Fade from both directions.

Thanks for the kind support. I was going to start a new thread but as you're "all ears" here I'll risk going off topic.

We have been exploring "off the beaten track" North America since 1981, visiting quite frequently, and, from the early days of video, have recorded our "adventures". (No cine, sadly. There was a big gap between the two for me). We nearly always have to have a few days in Las Vegas (hardly off the beaten track, but there we are) and drive up and down the Strip quite late at night, recording all the changes since the last visit. But I've never really successfully captured all the neon and now led etc lights. Left to their own devices, my various camcorders (and there have been a few) always try and expose so that it's 'daylight' which leads to the lights burning out, of course. Also there's been a problem getting into focus. I have only had consumer camcorders (mid range mostly) and my last one did quite well when I put it on "Sunset" (or was it "Fireworks"?), I think I was also able to try clicking the exposure down but, on that, focus did tend to drift. And I don't think that's an option on my new cam.....

.....Last time we took a lowly Sony HDR-CX405 as it was lighter than my Panasonic (we have to watch what we're carrying) and uses the same batteries as my still camera. It did well in most conditions and really quite pleased with our 5 weeks plus of filming. Except for the lights of Las Vegas. Any ideas for our next trip, please?

Manual Exposure. Manual Focus. Manual ISO. Manual White Balance, definitely not auto balance. And then, plenty of experiments.

As with Fireworks, I set my manual focus to an area of close to where the Event of the explosions will happen, lock off and then reset a couple of stops down OR ND to get the very bright colours are knocked back.

Thanks, Grazie, for the tips.

Is there any way to use a transition in the same way (if it has to go through two clips)?

Is there any way to use a transition in the same way (if it has to go through two clips)?

That's very easy to do. Put the two video events on upper and lower tracks with the event on the upper track with the event longer than the event on the lower track and with a fade on the overlap (as per the OP's description). Then on a top track plave a black media generated event with a fade placed to cover the intended fade over the two events, like this: