Putting Project Together PANIC

Sprague wrote on 9/29/2008, 8:29 AM

Hi,
I just finished a three act documentary (45 minutes) and am trying to assemble all the acts on a time line but my computers stalls out. Here's what I've done. I'd build Act 1 and then save it as such. On a whole new time line I'd build Act 2 and then save it separately. I did this for all three acts. I'm trying to import each act onto a "Final" time line and after importing Act 1 they other acts simply won't import, my computer stalls out (It may not stall out but after 5 minutes of waiting I figured it has). Each "act" is about 15 minutes. Any suggestions would go a VERY long way at this point as the project is do in two days.
Many thanks in advance,
Sprague
Vegas 8Pro
Windows XP

Comments

xberk wrote on 9/29/2008, 8:46 AM

Questions:

What are you importing? Veg files?
Is the purpose of combining all the acts together to do further fine cutting
or overall color correction or just to assemble the project?

Can you render each "act" to AVI or MPG?

Is your final output to DVD?

Sprague wrote on 9/29/2008, 8:51 AM

Yup, they're all Veg files. I did use one stock avi file (10 seconds) in one act.

Just to assemble the project with perhaps a small bit of audio trimming (between the acts)

I can render each act to either

My final output is to DVD.

Thanks!

ST

fldave wrote on 9/29/2008, 9:18 AM

Nested VEG files take a lot of RAM, so it may be a RAM problem?. Go ahead and render each one as AVI then work with those instead. 15 minutes each shouldn't take too long

Sprague wrote on 9/29/2008, 9:21 AM

Thanks, will do! No quality loss with AVI?
ST

rs170a wrote on 9/29/2008, 10:34 AM

No quality loss with AVI?

The codec in Vegas is very good.
It's so slight that you probably won't even notice it.

Mike

Widetrack wrote on 9/29/2008, 10:43 AM

FWIW, an assembled project like this is great for getting a music track just right, especially if you want your music (or any other audio) to extend across acts. It also helps, as was suggested to put overall processing on both audio and video.

I'm also a big fan of the ease with which you can open individual vegs, tweak them and have the tweaked version come right up in the assembled project.

and yes, you can gt by going first to AVI and then to MPEG.

Sprague wrote on 9/29/2008, 10:44 AM

Many thanks Mike, you're a life saver!
S

JackW wrote on 9/29/2008, 10:46 AM

Why not just open three instances of Vegas, one for each act. Copy time line in instance 2 and paste it into instance 1; ditto with instance 3. No avi files, no nested veg, no rendering, no hassle.

Jack

SCS PBC wrote on 9/29/2008, 11:21 AM

Rather than rendering as AVI, I would suggest rendering as MPEG-2.

Vegas is capable of smart rendering, meaning that when you drop your MPEG-2 files back onto the timeline, and render again as MPEG-2, there will be no recompression.

This will save you a considerable amount of time.

Sprague wrote on 9/29/2008, 7:01 PM

Hi jack,
I tried doing that but when I right clicked on the timeline, the "copy" function was grayed out, not available. What I did was set an in point at the start, then set the out point at the end, made sure all tracks were active and right clicked. Is there another way?
ST

Sprague wrote on 9/29/2008, 7:11 PM

Hi,
I tried that as well but, not knowing Vegas that well yet, thought that if I rendered just as MPEG-2 it would be only the video. So I didn't do this. When I've burned smaller projects I've rendered an MPEG-2 and then (per instructions) had to render the audio separately, then in Architect, drag both to the project timelline for burning. If I rendered as an MPEG-2 and then imported that to a working timeline wouldn't that simply give me the video? Or have I got this completely wrong? By the way, I've worked with other programs but Vegas is far superior!
ST

rs170a wrote on 9/29/2008, 7:37 PM

What I did was set an in point at the start, then set the out point at the end, made sure all tracks were active and right clicked. Is there another way?

There's no need to set in and out points.
After making all tracks in the 2nd instance active, double-click in a blank area below the timeline to select everything.
Click the "Copy" icon on the tool bar or go to the Edit menu and select "Copy".
Switch to the first instance of Vegas, go to the end of the timeline and click the"Paste" icon or go "Edit - Paste".
I just tried this and everything copied over as expected.
Be advised that, as I recall, certain things (Track Motion keyframes?) will not copy over but I'm not 100% positive as to what they are.

Mike

Sprague wrote on 9/30/2008, 4:14 AM

Thanks Mike. I'll try this when I get to the office today. Perhaps yesterday I was bit too... flustered?
ST

farss wrote on 9/30/2008, 5:09 AM

If you're using V8.0 I too have noticed having more than one instance of Vegas open feels very unstable and although it's eventually gotten me there I sure had the feeling it wasn't happy about it like it used to be a few versions back on a much lesser speced PC.

Not that that helps you.
If you're just working with DV sources then there's next to zero quality hit rendering each act to an AVI file and joining all 3 AVIs in the one master project. I'd tend to nest the three but again I've had funky things happen with nesting as well and rendering to AVIs is a goof proof as it gets. As your total project isn't that long the 3 AVIs will not use up that much disk space, under 10GB for 45 minutes so that'd be your safest route.

The other alternative would be to render each act to mpeg-2 using a DVDA template + a wav file and author from them. Using End Actions you can create a Play All, Play Each act DVD. Down side is during the Play All playout there'll be a slight pause as the player finds the next video. If you've got a real program break there anyway no problem.

Bob.

Sprague wrote on 9/30/2008, 5:27 AM

Hi Bob,
Yeah, I also noticed that when I have a project any larger than say 5 minutes Vegas stalls for a bit when opening it causing HUGE heart palpitations! Thanks for the info on the AVIs. When you nest a project of 10 or 15 minutes does it take you forever to import it? Maybe I'm not waiting (5 minutes and counting) long enough?
ST

farss wrote on 9/30/2008, 6:19 AM

I haven't tried nesting anything that long however Vegas does build a proxy file and that can take some time, certainly around real time at least. If you're nesting some complex project it could take quite a long time to build those proxies so yes, wait at least 2x the length of whta you're nesting at least.

Bob.

Sprague wrote on 9/30/2008, 6:35 AM

Thanks Bob, I'll try that.
ST

Sprague wrote on 9/30/2008, 7:02 AM

UPDATE: OK, I tried something different and had great success, perhaps someone can explain why the difference. This time I went into the Exploring window which lists my hard drives etc, found the "acts" and dragged them onto a new timeline with zero trouble and 100% efficiency. Why would this way work so well over trying to import them from the "Import" option on my project menu (which even after 25 minutes of waiting didn't import)?
Thanks to all who've helped me with this!!
ST

Dan Sherman wrote on 9/30/2008, 7:33 AM

Was not aware it is possible to re-render an mpeg-2 file again with no compression.
Anybody besides "bop" doing this.
Rendering bits of a project to .avi seems to be the best way to assemble a project in my experience.
As for nesting,---too many bad experiences to go down that road again.

SCS PBC wrote on 9/30/2008, 8:03 AM

Was not aware it is possible to re-render an mpeg-2 file again with no compression.

Try it, you'll see. Be sure that you render with the same project properties and render parameters as the original render.

This is a huge time-saver, and a good way to make small changes to a project after it's already been rendered.