Or just drop the stills right onto the video track, on top of the video, without cutting the video. Add fades at the beginning & end of the still and drag effects onto the fades.

my video ends up in small chunks which can cause problems in moving it later.

Using seperate video tracks for stills is problematic as transitions look different to me than if the video overlaps on the same track. Putting the still "over" the video works well but has the drawback of having to deal with auto-ripple or groups to get it to stay in place when the video under is moved. I don't think any method is "correct" or without some draw back.

I think one strength in Vegas is all the tools you have for selecting and moving events around on the timeline. I always do a "save as" prior making complicated moves (especially working 9.0a where UNDO is suspect) but the smallest events can be moved accurately and with relative ease once you understand all the tools. Learning to move things and remove or insert sections of video and audio mid-timeline without messing up the balance of the project is a skill that I keep working on. I'm getting better at it. I know when I"ve reached my limits when I start dragging my feet on doing a bit of fine cutting for fear that I'll mess something else up on a complex timeline. I starting thinking "whose going to notice that?". That's the time to dig deeper into Vegas and learn some new skills.

Xberk, it's not nearly as difficult as you make it sound. And auto-ripple is our friend!

the reason cutting video & overlapping stills would fade different vs putting them on a different track is because you're doing two different fades. When you cut & overlap, one goes from 100 to 0% opacity, the other goes 0 to 100, all at the same time. When you put something on the track above & fade only one event, the other event doesn't fade at all, so one is 100 to 0 & the other is 100 to 100%. I think that's also what the additive dissolve does.

Actually that's not quite true. The total is always 100% so as the event on top fades up from 0 to 100%, Vegas uses 100 down to 0% of the event below. So as far as fading goes it makes no difference either way.

The difference comes with transitions that have more complex combinations or move the events against each other. In these cases the effect is applied only to the upper event, but after that the fade, if used, is still 0->100 and 100-0.

When I split a clip and insert the still, I get a nice cross fade if I overlap up to the pink line. But if I place the clip on a track above, I can't get the cross fade as the video just suddenly cuts as the still comes into view. So I guess it cant be done. I did wonder about opacity of the video track, but I can't keystone to fade out and back in. Any further thoughts anyone?

place your video media on the track ..right click expand track layer..this splits your track into two layers vid on top now drag your pics on to the bottom section of the same track..so now you can still have the cross fx transition or whatever transition you want but the bonus of simply sliding the pic to the appropriate spot

If you place a clip on the track above and you want it to fade in and out then you can use the event's fade level. Grab the top left corner, the cursor will change shape and you drag the fade in envelope to be as long as you want the fade in. Do the same to the top right corner of the event to create a fade out.

Bob.

Actually that's not quite true. The total is always 100% so as the event on top fades up from 0 to 100%, Vegas uses 100 down to 0% of the event below. So as far as fading goes it makes no difference either way.

you're right. I did tests, check the monitor & the preview and there was no difference. I thought there would of been. Thanks!

.......if I overlap up to the pink line

Al -- By the way, the pink line can be adjusted for longer or shorter cross fades as a default as can the length of the still image you drag to the timeline. See Tools/Preferences/Editing Tab. There is lots of useful default settings here that it pays to understand. Of course you can drag a longer or short cross fade on any particular event.

Regards getting a cross fade when placing an image on track above (as Chienworks said) just add the fades to the still at beginning and end. This will look like a cross fade as the image on track above gradually takes over or fades out. (you can apply transitions to the fades too but they can look a bit different versus an overlap transition)

XFX mentioned another choice which probably deserves its own thread as to how, when and why it should ever be used. Right click any video track header (that's the area all the way to the left with the track number and track controls) and choose expand track layers. This splits the track into two layers (we called this A & B rolls in film). As XFX points out this will allow you to place the stills on the A roll above, move them around but still use fades and transitions as if they were overlapped. Brilliant suggestion XFX !! .. It's typical that at first you think Vegas can't do what you want -- and then you find it can do it five different ways !
- Paul

I do a lot of work that involves cutting back and forth between slides and video, and I absolutely will 99% of the time put the slides on a separate track above the video track. One reason is, as you mention, that I can keep the video underneath and just have the slides "punch in" on top. In some cases, I even overlap the slide on top of a virtual "screen" in the original video.

But the big big reason for doing the slides on a separate track is that they are in the Computer RGB levels (0-255), while the video is in Studio RGB (16-235). I can apply a Computer->Studio track FX to all the slides without having to tweak each one individually.

I can do any transition between the slides with no problem, and in virtually all of the cases, I want to either cut or crossfade between the slide and the video, which is as simple as adjusting the fade-in and fade-out of the slide (so long as the video track is LEFT ALONE).

Worst case, if I *really really* wanted something fancy between a video & slide, I could move one slide down to the video track, taking care to apply the Computer->Studio FX, and then have one slide cut to the next one.

Hey all - this is great advice! Many thanks to all who responded - I love this forum:)

I know it's semantics, but I think that Expand Track Layers doesn't really change how things work, it just shows you what's really going on. Very useful, none-the-less.

Rob

You're right Rob. I noticed that myself. Just as easy (and less confusing) to keep the clips on their own track and not expand the video track.

I pretty well always do that. Stills more often than not need different treatment than video, adding the FX to the track takes care of them in one easy step. Also as almost all my projects are 16:9 I have to either fill in the bars or crop the stills. Haveing them all on the one track makes PEA'ing them very easy.

Bob.

One more thing please. If I keep the stills on their own track (as I will now after this good advice), is there a one step operation to place an automatic fade in and fade out on each still?
Perhaps a track FX to do all the stills in one go. I would want to have control over the fade in and fade out amount too.

is there a one step operation to place an automatic fade in and fade out on each still?

Here's a script written a number years ago (I never throw anything out!!) by John Rofrano that should do what you want.
You can change the fade in/out times by changing the values next to the word TImecode (a few lines into the script).
I just tried it and it works in V8 Pro and V9 Pro.
It only works on one still at a time but it is a script so doing multiple images is quick.

Mike


/**
* Program: FadeEventInOut.js
* Description: This script will add a 1 second fade both ends of the current event
* Author: Johnny (Roy) Rofrano
*
* Revision Date: June 7, 2003
**/

import Sony.Vegas;
import System.Windows.Forms;
import Microsoft.Win32;

try
{
var evnt = FindSelectedEvent();
if (evnt == null)
{
throw "Error: You must select an Event.";
}
evnt.FadeIn.Length = new Timecode(1000);
evnt.FadeOut.Length = new Timecode(1000);
}
catch (errorMsg)
{
MessageBox.Show(errorMsg, "Error", MessageBoxButtons.OK, MessageBoxIcon.Exclamation);
}

/**
* Finds the currently selected event. Searches all tracks and returns the first
* even that is selected or null if no event is selected
* (Taken from the SonicFoundry Scripting FAQ)
*/
function FindSelectedEvent() : TrackEvent
{
var trackEnum = new Enumerator(Vegas.Project.Tracks);
while (!trackEnum.atEnd())
{
var track : Track = Track(trackEnum.item());
var eventEnum = new Enumerator(track.Events);
while (!eventEnum.atEnd())
{
var evnt : TrackEvent = TrackEvent(eventEnum.item());
if (evnt.Selected)
{
return evnt;
}
eventEnum.moveNext();
}
trackEnum.moveNext();
}
return null;
}

Mike I have not tried John Rofrano's script but just thinking about it, couldn't you just copy the very first still with the fades already set to the length you wanted, then right click the next still, drag it up to the timeline and select "add as takes". The image will be replaced but the fades will stay in place. Can't say which method would be easier as I have not tried the script. John's script would seem to have the advantage of changing the fades later without much hassle .. I can't think of a method to do the entire track of stills at once except trying to write a script to do it. - Paul

Thanks for the script Mike. I pasted it into a Notepad window and changed the extemsion to .cs, then dropped it into the script folder under VP9. I called it "StillFadeInOut". However I got the following error message:

C:\Program Files\Sony\Vegas Pro 9.0\Script Menu\StillFadeInOut.cs(10) : A namespace does not directly contain members such as fields or methods
C:\Program Files\Sony\Vegas Pro 9.0\Script Menu\StillFadeInOut.cs(21) : Expected class, delegate, enum, interface, or struct
C:\Program Files\Sony\Vegas Pro 9.0\Script Menu\StillFadeInOut.cs(22) : Expected class, delegate, enum, interface, or struct
C:\Program Files\Sony\Vegas Pro 9.0\Script Menu\StillFadeInOut.cs(23) : Type or namespace definition, or end-of-file expected

What did I do wrongplease?