Soft Contrast flickering issue

StardustCreations wrote on 12/18/2016, 11:46 AM

Greetings fellow editors,

I'm having a bit of a problem. I recently started using the vignette option of the Soft Contrast effect setting, and since then I noticed that on some clips (particularly brighter ones) the corners or edges will sort of blink and flicker. But ONLY when I enable the vignette setting. I've tried playing around with it but to no avail, and the only thing that seems to help is moving the plug-in BEFORE the pan/crop in the effect chain. But that is the sort of thing that would get to be a bit of a pain. Also, just to clarify, the way that I add color correction is collectively to the individual clips in the timeline.

The blinking isn't something too terrible, but I've only just started using this setting for color correction, so it might be worse for some other clips.

It would be so great if there is anybody who could help me out with this issue, as I couldn't really find any other topics on the matter.

My program is Vegas Pro 13.0 (build 290) and my OS is Windows 10, but you can ask me to provide more info for you if I forgot something important.

Also here are the vignette settings I use for the plugin:

Thank you!

Comments

Kinvermark wrote on 12/18/2016, 1:24 PM

I tried your vignette settings, but did not see any flickering.   Is the flickering evident in the final render or just on the timeline? Also, what are the soft-contrast effect settings and what are media / project details?

StardustCreations wrote on 12/18/2016, 1:36 PM

I tried your vignette settings, but did not see any flickering.   Is the flickering evident in the final render or just on the timeline? Also, what are the soft-contrast effect settings and what are media / project details?

The flickering is present in both render and preview. Also, I have a whole chain of color correction plug-ins as well that maybe, combined with the Soft Contrast, causes the flickering. I'm not sure how to show you the effect chain though.

Here are the settings for the Effect tab:

Project settings:

Here are the copied media settings under General from one of the clips (the rest should all be the same):

General
  Name: S01E13.mp4
  Folder: C:\Users\User\Documents\Vidding\Reign
  Type: AVC
  Size: 959.61 MB (982,644,961 bytes)
  Created: Thursday, December 15, 2016, 1:12:23 AM
  Modified: Thursday, December 15, 2016, 1:27:33 AM
  Accessed: Thursday, December 15, 2016, 12:29:55 PM
  Attributes: Archive

Streams
  Video: 00:42:23.207, 23.976 fps progressive, 1280x720x12, AVC
  Audio: 00:42:23.232, 48,000 Hz, Stereo, AAC

ACID information
  ACID chunk: no
  Stretch chunk: no
  Stretch list: no
  Stretch info2: no
  Beat markers: no
  Detected beats: no

Other metadata
  Regions/markers: no
  Command markers: no

Media manager
  Media tags: no

Plug-In
  Name: compoundplug.dll
  Folder: C:\Program Files\Sony\Vegas Pro 13.0\FileIO Plug-Ins\compoundplug
  Format: AVC
  Version: Version 13.0 (Build 545) 64-bit
  Company: MAGIX Computer Products Intl. Co.

(Also a note: I just now updated to 545 build)

 

Kinvermark wrote on 12/18/2016, 5:30 PM

Sorry, no luck so far re-creating flicker from soft-contrast blur vignette.   Maybe someone else will chime in.

As a workaround for the blur vignette, you could instead try applying a gaussian blur with a feathered mask.

 

set wrote on 12/18/2016, 5:33 PM

Do you apply the slow motion on the event clip you are applying Soft Contrast?

Setiawan Kartawidjaja
Bandung, West Java, Indonesia (UTC+7 Time Area)

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StardustCreations wrote on 12/18/2016, 5:43 PM

Sorry, no luck so far re-creating flicker from soft-contrast blur vignette.   Maybe someone else will chime in.

As a workaround for the blur vignette, you could instead try applying a gaussian blur with a feathered mask.

That's alright. Thank you for looking into it though, it means a lot! As for the workaround, I'm not really familiar with that method...I just tried it with cookie cutter, and it doesn't seem like it will work, also I'm not really sure how to create it with traditional mask. But using a mask on every clip I can see becoming pretty inconvenient anyway...I like to just be able to include everything in one effect chain. But thank you anyway for the suggestion!

 

StardustCreations wrote on 12/18/2016, 5:44 PM

Do you apply the slow motion on the event clip you are applying Soft Contrast?

No, it appears to do it whether there is Velocity effect applied or not.

StardustCreations wrote on 12/18/2016, 6:14 PM

If it helps, here are a couple of clips that have the flickering:

On the first one it's in the upper left corner, and for the second one it appears on the left from top to bottom.

I just observed that for the second clip that flickering only occurs if I add the pan/crop zoom out effect. If I take that off everything is smooth. Moving the pan/crop tab to the very end of the effect chain does the same thing, but not for the first clip.

It's all very strange. XD

set wrote on 12/18/2016, 6:27 PM

Looks like it has trouble detecting the edges...

I had similar flicker issue on my last project starting at 3:52

But for this one, I had Color Curve and Soft Focus to 'soften' the Background. But need to experiment with this Soft Contrast.

Setiawan Kartawidjaja
Bandung, West Java, Indonesia (UTC+7 Time Area)

Personal FB | Personal IG | Personal YT Channel
Chungs Video FB | Chungs Video IG | Chungs Video YT Channel
Personal Portfolios YouTube Playlist
Pond5 page: My Stock Footage of Bandung city

 

System 5-2021:
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-10700 CPU @ 2.90GHz   2.90 GHz
Video Card1: Intel UHD Graphics 630 (Driver 31.0.101.2127 (Feb 1 2024 Release date))
Video Card2: NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3060 Ti 8GB GDDR6 (Driver Version 551.23 Studio Driver (Jan 24 2024 Release Date))
RAM: 32.0 GB
OS: Windows 10 Pro Version 22H2 OS Build 19045.3693
Drive OS: SSD 240GB
Drive Working: NVMe 1TB
Drive Storage: 4TB+2TB

 

System 2-2018:
ASUS ROG Strix Hero II GL504GM Gaming Laptop
Processor: Intel(R) Core(TM) i7 8750H CPU @2.20GHz 2.21 GHz
Video Card 1: Intel(R) UHD Graphics 630 (Driver 31.0.101.2111)
Video Card 2: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1060 6GB GDDR5 VRAM (Driver Version 537.58)
RAM: 16GB
OS: Win11 Home 64-bit Version 22H2 OS Build 22621.2428
Storage: M.2 NVMe PCIe 256GB SSD & 2.5" 5400rpm 1TB SSHD

 

* I don't work for VEGAS Creative Software Team. I'm just Voluntary Moderator in this forum.

Kinvermark wrote on 12/18/2016, 6:29 PM

Another wild guess :)  - do you have motion blur applied to that track?  Turn off make a difference?

StardustCreations wrote on 12/18/2016, 6:31 PM

Another wild guess :)  - do you have motion blur applied to that track?  Turn off make a difference?

Oh no I haven't had that turned on during this process. Lags the editing too much.

StardustCreations wrote on 12/18/2016, 6:37 PM

Just did an experiment: removed all other color correction, leaving only Soft Contrast, and the flickering is still visible.

Aurelie wrote on 4/18/2024, 12:48 PM

I know this is an old topic but I've been having the same flickering issue with soft contrast. I didn't really get to the bottom of the issue but I found a way around it. Just remove soft contrast from each individual clip and add it to the video timeline instead. Hope this helps someone.

StardustCreations wrote on 4/20/2024, 11:39 PM

I know this is an old topic but I've been having the same flickering issue with soft contrast. I didn't really get to the bottom of the issue but I found a way around it. Just remove soft contrast from each individual clip and add it to the video timeline instead. Hope this helps someone.

Not sure if I ever even thought of that?? Thank you for sharing! I'll have to keep that in mind.