John, I feel your pain because to me it's a huge design flaw. The way it worked until Vegas 9 was fine, I don't see why they had to go in and mess it up, starting with that Animate button and removing the behavior that made keyframing simple without using the sync cursor thing that, like you said, leads to accidental creation of keyframes when the user forgets to disengage it.

I suggest we send a complaint to Sony about this, and maybe they will listen if there are lots of us that send it.

Ok. I see what you are seeing John within Video FX that are keyframeable. Works diff in 8.0c .. but Pan/Crop seems to work the same in all versions. No animate button.

Seems to me the animate button helps solves the problem of adding unwanted keyframes to some degree. You can scrub to any part of the event (with the timeline cursor), make an adjustment and see what it looks like without creating a keyframe .. of course once you do click the animate button and start adding keyframes ANY change adds a keyframe --- I can't find a way to turn that OFF (with or without sync cursor) .. would be nice to be able to toggle the animate button on and off.

I agree with Sebaz. I find the new behavior a disappointment. Not a deal breaker for me, but the the behavior until 9 where you could drag and preview in the keyframe window was very fast and quite elegant. It's a step backward (toward the clunkyness of PPro).

That said, I can understand why they added the animate button...because more than a few times I've inadvertently added keyframes where I didn't want them because I was using the keyframe window like a preview window.

For me, most of this will be solved when I get my new monitor setup and move the preview screen to a separate monitor...opening up some desktop real estate for things like animate palettes.

I like that it isolates the effect your currently editing on the timeline when you animate. Much easier when you have a handful or more nested FX.

Thanks to everyone for answering my question.

So, the bottom line on the story is that the behavior changed in 9.x, and there is no way to get back the old behavior.

Boo, hiss.

I feel partly responsible because I sent several complaints to Sony a long time ago complaining that the "sync" button in the keyframable dialogs actually performed two distinctly separate functions:

1) It forced the timeline cursor in the dialog to mirror the timeline cursor on the main timeline (and vice versa) and

2) it enabled the automatic creation of new keyframe points.

The problem was that people would enable it, forget they had done so, and then hours later find out that hours of work were down the drain because they had unknowingly been creating hundreds of keyframes in every dialog they visited. I did this several times before I realized that you should never leave the sync button enabled for more than one second.

The correct solution, of course, would have been to create two separate buttons: one for automatic keyframes and one for sync. There was never any reason to have these two distinctly separate function joined.

Having been at a lot of engineering meetings where bugs and enhancements are discussed, I can imagine what went on. Some marketing or support person probably said that the number of people complaining about dozens of hours of work being lost was getting to be too much to handle and something had to be done. The engineers didn't want to spend time on the problem -- or perhaps there was something in the underlying code that made doing the correct fix difficult. So, the engineer says, "hey, I'll just turn off the timeline entirely, and when it is off, you can't create keyframes, either intentionally or unintentionally. The neophyte is never going to have a problem, and so your support headaches will be over.

It probably sounded good, and it probably fixed the problem with first-time users. Unfortunately, it is a painfully stupid fix, and degrades the usability of the program for those of us who actually know how to make it work.

It seems that every time Sony does something to "fix" the fX and pan/crop dialogs, they actually make things worse. Remember the now-extinct pan/crop paths? What percentage of users even know that the pre/post toggles exist or what they do? How many people really understand how to independently control the spatial and temporal aspects of a good pan/crop keyframe?

I could go on.

I guess the only good news is that they didn't let the designer of the ProType Titler try to do the fix. We would have been in REAL trouble then.

Even though this "new" (to me) behavior is a definite step backward, I can live with it.

"The problem was that people would enable it, forget they had done so, and then hours later find out that hours of work were down the drain because they had unknowingly been creating hundreds of keyframes in every dialog they visited. I did this several times before I realized that you should never leave the sync button enabled for more than one second."

I don't see how this is quite such a big problem. If the event or track is made "animated" then a keyframe is only created if an FX parameter is changed. Simply visiting the dialog doesn't create a new keyframe.

"The correct solution, of course, would have been to create two separate buttons: one for automatic keyframes and one for sync. There was never any reason to have these two distinctly separate function joined. "

I cannot think of any reason why the "sync" function needs to be disabled or what it would achieve. Surely simply having it permanantly enabled cures the problem and saves an icon and a piece of code. Less code = faster which is always good if possible. Having two cursors which can be out of sync seems confusing for no real purpose.

The old sync icon which has now become the animate button I suspect is not simply there to enable or disable keyframes. If it is enabled then the code knows to look for and interpolate keyframes, If not a slab of code doesn't have to needlessly run.

Another consideration could be the addition of the OFX interface. The way Vegas worked in the past seems at variance to other compositing apps. Possibly this change was forced on SCS to get the correct functionality with OFX plugins.

Bob.

Here's where I'm confused John and Bob ..

the "sync" button in the keyframable dialogs actually performed two distinctly separate functions:
1) It forced the timeline cursor in the dialog to mirror the timeline cursor on the main timeline (and vice versa) and
2) it enabled the automatic creation of new keyframe points.

The old sync icon which has now become the animate button I suspect is not simply there to enable or disable keyframes. I

Maybe I'm misunderstandng, but you guys make it sound like the "sync" button can turn automatic keyframes on and off. In other words, if the sync button was toggled OFF, then no keyframes are created. I think, even in 8.0c, automatic keyframing is ALWAYS ON. A keyframe is automatically created in any FX/TrackMotion/Pan/Crop dialog Period. No changes then no additional keyframes (remember, there is ALWAYS one keyframe in any dialog at the very beginning of the keyframe timeline). Unless I'm missing something John and Bob, and with all due respect, I think the state of the "sync" cursor has always had a single function, to toggle sync on and off between the two timeline cursors, and has never had anything to do with creation of keyframes. Have I got this right? Anybody?

This is really a hard subject to nail down in precise terms we can all understand as it has so many moving parts.

I'll defer judgment on the "animate" button and the new way of doing things until I get more experience using V10.

@TLF: "Shoot me. I like the new method."

TLF, I'm with you I'm all-the-time creating unwanted keyframes in the wrong places (using the old method). The "Animate" button saves me from my own bad work habits. However...

@xberk: "I can't find a way to turn that OFF (with or without sync cursor) .. would be nice to be able to toggle the animate button on and off. "

Yeah, I'd love to have an "Unanimate" button that removes all keyframes (except the beginning keyframe) from the FX in focus and returns the user to the default mode. I find myself having to remove the FX and re-add it to get back to the default mode.

...Jerry

PS: Thinking about it, maybe an "Unanimate current FX" and an "Unanimate all FX"

Edit: Oh, and one other thing I like about the new keyframing is they fixed the zoom problem identified here: http://www.sonycreativesoftware.com/forums/ShowMessage.asp?Forum=4&MessageID=716496

After the Video FX dialog opens move the Vegas Timeline cursor to the point in the event where you want to preview the effect -- this point can be any frame of the event -- first frame, last frame or any frame ... You can move the Vegas Timeline cursor or even play it while creating the effect, changing it, playing with it .. it should be previewing in the Vegas preview window all the time .... This new way avoids creating extra keyframes while you "play" with the effect as it doesn't create any keyframes at all because there is no timeline in FX Video dialog by default !!! .. You use the Vegas TImeline to preview.

If you want to create keyframes to "animate" the effect or "keyframe" the effect -- then click the "animate" button in the lower left of Video FX dialog. This gives you a timeline within the dialog to create the keyframes in much the way it was before.

Different than Vegas 9...I'm getting used to it..

One other thing I noticed is that you will see in all VIdeo FX dialogs, the "Pan/Crop" icon to the left of all others in the chain of FX at the top of the dialog. This can be dragged to the right and placed in a different order. The default is that Pan/Crop is applied first .. but it can be changed by dragging the icon to the right. Does anyone know what difference this would make? Is this new to Vegas?

Not new. Up to V9 there is a triangle button which let users to toggle pre/post pan/crop for each effet. V10 provides the same functionality with a more intuitive way imho. Same idea apply to track effects with pre/post composite level ajdust.

LoTN, there is anthor subtle difference which is marvellous. We can now far far easily position that PanCrop control anywhere amongst the FX links and easily position each FX
link horizontally which is more intuitive than what we had previously. Thanks SCS!

Grazie

Indeed, exactly what I wanted to say. Up to V9, ordering FXs in the chain and toggling pre/post did the same. My english is improving slowly... :)

" A keyframe is automatically created in any FX/TrackMotion/Pan/Crop dialog if you make a change. Period."

I just went back and checked this in V8 and you are indeed entirely correct.
What is profoundly confusing in V8 is this. With the Sync button Off then moving the T/L playhead does not move the FX playhead. In this state any changes to the FX values will only change the first keyframe which is always there. Moving the FX playhead however moves BOTH the T/L playhead and the FX playhead. This is very strange and inconsistent behavior.

With the Sync button On both playheads are in sync, this is at least consistent.

The change made in V10 makes Vegas internally consistent and consistent with how apps such as AE work.

Bob.

"Yeah, I'd love to have an "Unanimate" button that removes all keyframes (except the beginning keyframe) from the FX in focus and returns the user to the default mode. I find myself having to remove the FX and re-add it to get back to the default mode."

It's fairly simple to remove unwanted keyframes. Selection of keyframes follows the normal Windows paradigm e.g. Select first, Shift Click last to select all keyframe between. Then hit Delete to delete all of them. You can also Ctl+click to select individual keyframes to delete and you can draw a marque to select as well. Once selected keyframes can also be moved as a group.

Bob.

Hi JohnMeyer,

If you can observe in your system, that there is no sync between movement on animate FX TL and main TL (even if sync curson is ON, it's impossible to see changes in preview window), please report problem to SCS. I have the same issue in my system, can't find solution, had reported to support. Poblem is difficult to recreate, persistent but not constant and it is important, that other user can confirm it.

Best regards,

"It's fairly simple to remove unwanted keyframes. Selection of keyframes follows the normal Windows paradigm e.g. Select first, Shift Click last to select all keyframe between. Then hit Delete to delete all of them. You can also Ctl+click to select individual keyframes to delete and you can draw a marque to select as well. Once selected keyframes can also be moved as a group."Certainly true, however:

1) Once this series of steps is complete, the keyframe timeline remains visible & active, leaving one vulnerable to creating unwanted keyframes. It seems the "nice feature" of being in the default mode (i.e. keyframe timeline not visible) is that it prevents the user from accidentally creating these unwanted keyframes.
2) Maybe I'm lazy, but "Unanimate" would be one-click versus several clicks &/or selections for the various other solutions.

...Jerry, who's not really complaining - just expressing a wishlist item.