REAL grouping?!?

Ben wrote on 1/9/2002, 12:49 PM

I'm currently still using Vegas Audio 2 - waiting for 3 - and haven't tried VV3 yet. One of the big questions for me is, is Vegas Audio 3 going to have PROPER event grouping? By proper I mean, you group the events and then you can move them anywhere (either in time or across tracks)without the group formation breaking.

Currently, grouping leaves a lot to be desired. If you try and move the group across tracks, it all goes horribly wrong.

Anyone got any ideas on this, esp. SF?

Cheers
Ben

Comments

SonyMLogan wrote on 1/9/2002, 2:15 PM

Ben,

"grouping" as released in Vegas 2.0 and beyond by default only applies to maintining relative event positions in time, but not across tracks. From your message I gather what you are looking for is that grouped events move together across time and tracks.

There is a way to select all events that are grouped with currently selected events (SHIFT+G). Once selected, events will move together in the way you desire.

There is also an internal pref that auto-selects all grouped events when an event is selected. Hold down shift while activating the Options->Preferences menu. At the right side you'll notice an internal tab - select this tab. Now search for an item named "Event Group Selection" - and change it's value to "TRUE". Now, you should get the behavior you are after by default.

stakeoutstudios wrote on 1/9/2002, 2:31 PM

lol.. great! another feature I didn't know that's gonna be very useful. While you're at it, is there or can we have a 'global lock' feature, where it locks all the events in time... but you can still chop off or drag away the useless audio data like amp noise etc? I find myself often accidentally moving a track in time by a little bit. OK so I can undo... but :oP

thanks,
Jason

redmt wrote on 1/9/2002, 9:21 PM

I 've a bit of a problem with accidentally moving events also.

Also, when I select a different set of events to group than my existing group, what happens to the first group?

Rhythmystik wrote on 1/10/2002, 3:32 AM

Matt,

Thanks for the grouping selection tip - very helpful!

Ben wrote on 1/10/2002, 5:56 AM

Wow, Matt, that's great - exactly what I was after! Why the hidden options; surely that should be enabled by default? I can't imagine why anybody would want event grouping that only works across time and not tracks.

Anyway, really appreciate your help.

Thanks
Ben

Ben wrote on 1/10/2002, 5:58 AM

BTW: any other tips hidden in that 'internal' tab that we should know about?!?

Cheers
Ben

SonyMLogan wrote on 1/10/2002, 12:10 PM

I forgot to mention in my earlier message that there is a downside to changing the event grouping behavior with the internal preference - some right-click menu items don't show up unless a single event is selected. In general stuff on the internal page is not guaranteed to be bug free. ** Experiment at your own risk! **

As to why this isn't the default: It was the default behavior in Vegas 1.0 - but there were problems. Once video was added to the mix in Vegas 2.0, the need arose to allow Audio and Video to be locked in time but free to be moved independently across tracks. So we introduced the "time-lock" behavior and hid the group-select-lock mechanism.

In the end I guess the reason comes down to a decision on what was most important to work on given the priorities at that point in time. There is always much more we would like to add than time permits. I will certainly keep group-selection improvements in mind as we move forward with future projects.

zonk wrote on 1/12/2002, 1:26 PM

Matt,

Since you are open to Grouping suggestions, having multiple Groups to work with would be useful, i.e. Group 1, Group 2, etc. Also, the option of spliting an event in the Group and being able to re-integrate the split off event, after it is moved, back into the it's Group. My work-around for now is to remove all events from the original Group and then create the Group again with the added event. Thanks for your time.

zonk

Cheesehole wrote on 1/13/2002, 1:40 AM

to re-integrate your split event, select an event from the original group, hit SHIFT+G (selects the rest of the group), then, SHIFT-CLICK the event you want to add to the group, then hit G.

is there an easier way then that? i'm not sure i understand what you mean by 'removing all events from original group' etc...

the biggest problem i see with grouping is that when you try to split a group with several events into two groups using the split command, you get a totally screwed up grouping structure that makes no sense and creates more work for me. i pointed this out long before VV3 shipped with this web page:

http://ben.orona.com/split/splitting_headache.htm

but the problem is still there in VV3. it's really truly annoying. no one at SF has been able to explain to me why Vegas behaves this way. maybe if there was some logic to this behavior it would be an easier pill to swallow. for now it just makes my editing experience somewhat frustrating.

- ben (cheesehole)

zonk wrote on 1/13/2002, 8:29 PM

Thank you Ben. Will use your method. I don't suppose this is in the manual... Will RTFM. Will also read your linked web rant.

What I meant by 'removing all events from original group":
Using the selection tool on the original grouped events, right-click Group>Remove from.
Then, selecting the original events plus the 'new' (split) event, right click Group>Create new. Shift-G is better than using the selection Tool and "SHIFT-CLICK the event you want to add to the group, then hit G" also better than my previous method. You da man.

Is there an easier way? Yes. What I am asking for, to be more specific, is a right click option for non-Grouped events to add them. This would be nicer than the 4 step mouse-keyboard method, no? I used to think Grouping in Vegas required that the Group must disband to accept new members. Seems they must meet to vote on it. What I am asking for is one step where the new member can opt in. Not very democratic, but efficient.

Thanks again.

zonk wrote on 1/13/2002, 9:00 PM

I am sure you can totally hose Vegas with experimental tweaking of the internal Preferences, but since you asked... You know how each new Vegas track always has Noise Gate, EQ and Compressor open as plugs? Take a look at Insert Effect 1, Insert Effect 2, etc. This is where the default track plug choices are. The Value field chooses the plug via the CLSID designation. And as you can see by the entry for Insert Effect 4, all zeros will choose no effect. Easy enough to copy the zeros and replace Insert effect X to have no effect. I just moved 2 to 1 and 3 to 2 and the 0s from 4 to 3 and the Noise Gate which I never used is history. You could choose any other available DX plug and have up to 4 as defaults, but I'm not sure why or if it would be worth the trouble. I figured, perhaps foolishly, that this may have bought me a little CPU overhead with mondo projects also. SF told me once that the presence of any plug, whether used or not, uses some CPU if it's loaded. Some use very little CPU overhead like the mostly useful and certainly efficient Vegas Track plugs. Some more, like Acoustic Mirror which sounds great and is a CPU hog.

To find out a DX plugs CLSID number, Analog X made a free app called DXMAN which displays all your DX plugs. Info button reveals the CLSID. Also handy for removing poorly written DX plugs that may not have uninstall options. DXMAN will let you kill them from being displayed.

Be careful in there. A little knowledge is a dangerous proposition.

zonk