How to "label" of "mark" video?

Steve672 wrote on 1/20/2004, 12:32 PM

I am producing a medical video where various parts have to be labelled, either with arrows or just straight lines poining to various locations. Unfortuntely, the parts to be labelled are not in the same position on the screen and are moving.

Is there a way to have the arrows and the labels move to point to the same spot?

Failing this, it might be possible to label them - using the TITLER - when they are not moving as much but I don't know how to add pointers or arrows to connect the labels with the body parts.

Any thoughts would be appreciated.

Steve

Comments

GaryKleiner wrote on 1/20/2004, 12:38 PM

There are lots of arrows in the Wingding3 font, and you can move them around the screen by using keyframes.

Gary

Steve672 wrote on 1/20/2004, 12:53 PM

Thanks Gary, never thought of Wingdings. So I know how to move the arrows. Do I move the text around the same way - key frames?

Also, do you use key frames to reorient their angle so they can point in various directions? (Sounds like a bit of work but oh well...)

Steve

Jessariah67 wrote on 1/20/2004, 12:54 PM

You can also create arows in something like PhotoShop and bring them in.

markrad wrote on 1/20/2004, 1:46 PM

Steve,
No idea on the exact nature of your labeling but have you considered doing a freeze frame where you hold the label and pointer on screen for a few seconds?
It might save having to do a bunch of keyframing.

Mark

Chienworks wrote on 1/20/2004, 2:09 PM

I like Mark's idea. Not only will it save you a lot of time and effort, but it seems like it would be a lot easier for the audience to follow as well. Motion pauses, a title says "look here, this is ...", audience takes in the information, then a moment later the motion resumes. Sounds like a good flow.

But if you want to keep things moving, you can use keyframes in two separate ways. You can keyframe text positioning directly in the text generator for simple things. This has two disadvantages though: you can't use the function that tracks the cursor between the project timeline and the keyframe timeline, and you can't easily rotate the text. If you want more control then you can use track motion on the title track to move and rotate the arrows. If you do use track motion then you'll save yourself a lot of headaches if you always put the arrow in the middle of the text generator screen and then position it with track motion, rather than trying to position it with the text generator first.