Comments

jetdv wrote on 6/13/2003, 12:11 PM
What do you mean "displayed in the preview window"?

There is a scrubber bar directly beneath the track headers.
rmack350 wrote on 6/13/2003, 12:28 PM
No.

At least not in V4.

I think Premiere does what you're asking but Vegas is not Premiere. Oft-times people moving from one NLE to another want the same exact features (only better) and feel a lot of pain over the missing or different bits. You get used to it and find other ways to do what you want.

I think the thing that would be most useful to you is a handle (CTI) at the top of the timeline/trimmer insertion point. A few people have asked for this and it makes some sense. It would be nice to grab an event without automatically moving the insertion point. Especially if you can turn on scrubbing so that it works as you drag the CTI.

This is a bit like Media100. That program also gives you a thumbnail map of the timeline-much like Photoshop's Navigator panel. The event's are colored and it's not too hard to use the navigator to set the timeline view are as well as the general cursor placement.

In Vegas, the cursor position and scrub tools are all in the timeline/tracks pane. And if you get a shuttle then the control is under your right hand.

Rob Mack
whitneyd wrote on 6/13/2003, 1:11 PM
Let me clairify:

Should the preview window follow movement of the horizontal scroll bar?
Grazie wrote on 6/13/2003, 1:21 PM
The images in the Preview Window depict what is happenning at virtical Slice or Line of the T/L Cursor. This cursor strikes across all the tracks in the T/L. The horizontal scroll allows us to "expand" or "squash" the whole T/L. You can move the horizontal scroll bar to have that portion of the whole T/L in view. Or you can grab hold of the right hand scroll bar markers to do this as well. Move the right scroll bar markers left, this will expand/zoom-up the whole T/L - move these same scroll bar markers to the right and you get the whole project "squeeze into the the view you have at that time. It's a bit different from what you mnay have experienced before - but you'll get there!

Regards

Grazie
whitneyd wrote on 6/13/2003, 1:32 PM
Thanks Grazie,

Do you mean that there is no way to follow the horizontal scroll bar in the preview window?

I guess it it because the cursor has to be clicked on the T/L.

It does work when active in the trimmer window. Not good enough.....need to scan thru clips.

Really do miss Studio..................
jetdv wrote on 6/13/2003, 2:40 PM
Just click on the timeline (blank area or above the timeline) and drag whichever direction you want to preview. It works like a charm.
whitneyd wrote on 6/16/2003, 12:30 AM
The monitor window does not reflect the motion of the timeline.

What am I doing wrong?
slacy wrote on 6/16/2003, 12:45 AM
I have to admit, as much as I think Vegas is the far superior product, Premiere's scrub is far more useful and intuitive. It's the ONLY thing I miss about Premiere.
jeffcrow wrote on 6/16/2003, 3:56 AM
I am a former Studio user too, getting around in Vegas takes a lot of getting used to, but once you do, you will like it much better, though I think it could use some enhancements.

Vegas has a different idea of scrubbing that I assume comes from the fact it was an audio app originally, I believe the scrubbing is typical of audio apps. But you get used to it. There are quite a few different ways to do just about everything in Vegas, and scrubbing probably has the most. The many ways are quite powerful and far more effect then anything in Studio I think.

What exactly is it you are trying to do? What is it about the trimmer that isn't good enough for you? I am familiar with Studio and might be able to "translate" to Vegas for you. Though I am still learning how to get around in it better myself!
whitneyd wrote on 6/17/2003, 3:32 AM
jeffcrow:

In Studio the monitor reflects the movement of the scrubber.

Also, In Studio, I use the scene detection which puts the first frame of a clip on the time line. VV4 peak view is ok but I like to be able to see each frame at times.
JohnnyRoy wrote on 6/17/2003, 8:26 AM
I’m trying to follow you but I’m just not groking it. I just opened Studio to check and I can’t future out what you mean. I’m scrolling the timeline in Studio and the preview window is still showing the frame at the current scrubber location. (i.e., its not moving). If I click on the timeline the frame changes. The strange thing is that the scrubber does not move to where I clicked, it moves to the first frame of the clip. What’s that all about? Who wanted to be on the first frame? I clicked in the middle of the clip!

I don’t see what you’re missing in Vegas? Just place your cursor on the top of the timeline in Vegas and scrub away. Vegas will also scrub with audio! Studio can’t do this. So you can find an exact audio hit and edit at that point. Try holding the Ctrl key in Vegas while you position the mouse pointer over the scrubber on a blank track and you’ll see the mouse pointer turn to the scrubber icon.

> In Studio the monitor reflects the movement of the scrubber.

So does Vegas. Move the scrub point and the preview is updated.

> I use the scene detection which puts the first frame of a clip on the time line.

And so does Vegas, in fact it puts ALL the frames of the clip on the timeline so you can see how they change over time (not just the first frame). How is this not better?

I just don’t see what you’re missing about Studio.

~jr
BillyBoy wrote on 6/17/2003, 8:43 AM
Part of the process of learning how to use ANY application is to let go of any preconceived ideas you have of how things are done in a similar application.

Scrubing in Vegas is simple and can be varied. Check the articles under 'scrub control" under Vegas 4 online help which in part says:

Scrubing the timeline

Hover over the cursor in an area of the timeline that does not contain an event and press Ctrl. The mouse pointer is displayed as a (shows symbol).

When the Allow Ctrl+drag cursor style scrub over events check box on the General tab of the Preferences dialog is selected, you can scrub with the mouse even when the cursor is over an event.

Drag left or right to scrub playback.

BillyBoy wrote on 6/17/2003, 9:02 AM
Also note the scrubber control under the track heads at extreme left (begins with rate, has yellow marker). Slowly dragging in either direction gives very fine control in real time over speed, either faster or slower. Of course as you would expect it impacts audio as well.

No need to set a vaule manually, just drag and watch. If you set the preference as suggested in my previous post you can have your cake and eat it too.

Using the scrubber control you can preview large areas of your project in any combination of very slow to very fast. (x20 in reverse up to 4x forward)

In fact doing this you can see real time preview in reverse, then watch it stop, and go forward again.

You need to HOLD DOWN the funny looking oversized scrubber control above the yellow pointer. If you do the timeline is locked and only the cursor moves at the speed you drag it. Very neat I think.

It pays to read the online help, manual and to visit the forum. <wink>
BillyBoy wrote on 6/17/2003, 9:12 AM
Oops... one more thing, (haven't had my morning coffee yet, haven't waked up fully)

If the view in the preview window is frozen, not moving, one common reason is you have the preview set to external monitor or not. If you want to view on an external monitor the little TV icon above the preview window is blue. If you want to view preview off your computer, click so that icon is dimmed and it plays off your monitor screen.
JohnnyRoy wrote on 6/17/2003, 12:11 PM
...and don't for get the J,K,L keys. Double and tripple click them to change the speed backward (J), forward (L). and stop (K).

~jr
24Peter wrote on 6/17/2003, 3:15 PM
Some of us have been asking for better scrubbing in Vegas for a while. The fact is, it's not as easy to scrub as in other NLEs. One of the biggest problems for me is not being able to freely (at my own rate) scrub through events in the explorer window/media bin window without using the trimmer.
BillyBoy wrote on 6/17/2003, 4:40 PM
How much more control could you use? If you hold down the scrubber it varies in speed from minus 20X up to 4x in increments of 100th shown on screen in real time for the timeline. The preview in media pool is meant for just that; PREVIEWING. To see it better drag to the timeline.
jeffcrow wrote on 6/18/2003, 3:19 AM
Sorry whitneyd but I am not exactly sure what you are saying. And I don't know what you mean by VV4 peak view, it does not have anything called that, perhaps you are refering to the timeline with the audio peaks showing in the audio track below the video?

Oh well, let me take a stab at it anyway. The info in the other responses is all quite good, let me see if I can add anything. First, to see if we are on the same wave length when it comes to Studio (I do not have it installed anymore to check this, so I am going on my overloaded memory)... Studio had a timeline the width of the screen at the bottom. The cursor was a vertical line that cuts through the timeline and at the top was a button looking thingy they called the scrubber. You click and drag it left or right to view the video in the preview window. When you reached the edge of the screen, the timeline would begin to scroll. The speed of the scrub depended on the level of "zoom" you were viewing the timeline at (1 sec, 10 sec, etc). There was a scroll bar at the bottom of the timeline, but it did not behave like a standard Windows scroll bar. The best way to quickly preview a video (that I am aware of anyway, it's what I did, and I get from your original post that is what you are after in Vegas) was to grab that scrubber and start scrolling. There was also a slider in the preview window that you could preview with, but it was set to the position of the mouse so it was way too touchy, just a quick way to jump to somewhere in the video without reposition the cursor.

Now in Vegas there are a dozen different ways to get around in your timeline and preview it. Some differences to note, the Vegas timeline, which in the upper part of the screen, has a slider along its bottom that although it has some non-Windows bells and whistles, does behave like any other window in that the slider simply moves the view of the timeline within the window. I found myself constantly trying to scrub with this bar, a bad habit from Studio, but once I got it through my head that it is just a view slider, like when you try to display a web page or something that is too wide for the screen, you get a slider bar to move the view back and forth, that is all it is in Vegas.

Since your interest seemed to primarily be to quickly scan through clips, I will concentrate on actual scrubbing and not on the many ways to scroll the view of the timeline or preview portions of what is within the time line view (there are many). Here is what I find myself doing most. First, in Preferences on the General tab I have "Make spacebar and F12 play/pause"... unchecked and "use linear scrub range" checked, under the Editing tab set JKL/Shuttle speed to fast.

For mouse scrubbing: On the left side of the screen under the track headers (where each track has a colored box with the track number in it) there is a horizontal line with a little yellow triangle under it. On the line is a drag button that looks like a double left and double right arrow. The triangle notes what speed you get when you press the play botton at the bottom of the timeline. You can change that speed by dragging the triangle to a new location. You click and drag the 4 arrow buttons right for faster, to the left of zero speed causes you to scrub backward. You can scrub up to 20X (if you set the speed to "fast" on the editing metioned above) You can vary the speed by moving the mouse more left or right. When you let go of the button, the cursor will now jump to were you stopped the scrub, which can sometimes not be what you want to happen. The keyboard gives you an alternative to that. While still holding the mouse button down, just press the spacebar or F12 to stop the scrub and return the preview cursor back to where the scrub started. (This is dependant on that Preference setting mentioned above)

For keyboard scrubbing: The J, K and L keys operate the scrubber in two different modes, one of which is supposed to emulate the dial on some VCRs that you can rotate to vary the speed of playback forward or reverse, called a shuttle dial. To operate it in this shuttle mode, press and hold the K button. Pressing the L button "rotates" the imaginary dial to the right, one step per press, or press and hold to crank it rapidly all the way to max. Likewise the J key "rotates the dial" back the other way. The effect is locking, meaning once you achieve a desired speed, lift your fingers off the keys and the scrub will continue on its own. To stop the playback, lift the K button if you are holding it down, then press it again. Like mouse scrubbing, this causes the cursor to jump to where you were at in the scrub when you stopped. But if you would like to end the scrub without moving the cursor, press the spacebar or F12 instead.

The second mode of JKL is where you don't hold the K button. The L will bump up the forward speed, but there is now way to back off the speed. Pressing J immediately causes the scrub to go in reverse. This could be usefull for scan ning clips at a high rate of speed and quickly reversing when you find a point you want to stop at. As usual, pressing K stops the scrub and moves the cursor, spacebar stops without moving the cursor.

I hope this is what you were after, or at least helps a little.

Another thing you mentioned was not being able to see the frames on the timeline. You can, but there are a number of things that could affect what you are, or are not seeing. First, make sure you have selected in the Preferences General tab, "Draw waveforms and frames in events". If you raise the height of the tracks in the timeline to make the frame image bigger, you also make it wider, so the timeline shows fewer frames at lower zoom levels. Keeping the track height shorter, just tall enough that it continues to show the little icons at the end of events, will show more frames. If you zoom way in, it will show you every single frame. In fact, a feature which is more for audio editing, you can actually zoom in so far that you can see 100th of a frame tick marks on the time line. The frame image is at the beginning followed by a long blank area that still represents the same frame over time. The easiest ways to zoom are to rotate your mouse wheel if you have one, or use the up and down arrow on the keyboard.

I hope all that helps. Keeps exploring in Vegas, and other than Studio's ability to edit the DVD layout right on the timeline, you will find yourself not looking back at Studio (and a lot of people like the scene detection by content, but I never used it). Now if we could just get SoFo to look at that DVD on the Vegas timeline thing, that would be sooooo nice!!!)