Tips on editing - Vegas 8

essami wrote on 2/23/2010, 1:31 AM
Hi!

Ive been working with Vegas and using it for audio since version 1 and for video since I started doing videos in 1996 I think. I still haven't found a totally comfortable way to edit videos where I have several takes. Let's say I have a music video where I have 10 video tracks where the musicians play through the song, then I have 5 tracks where they play together and another 10 with close ups and various insert material tracks. The way I've done it now I sync everything according to the final audio thats on one track and all the video tracks are on top of each other. I have about 50-80 video tracks on top of each other. Then I start looking through the material by soloing a video track and if I find something I want to use I copy paste it to a master video track where all the final video material goes to.

Sounds difficult and a very "wrong way" to do it? It does seem a bit cumbersome and I'd love to hear how YOU edit and how you handle a fair amount of material and takes and what you use to choose between them? Do a lot of people use the trimmer? Ive never figured out a way to use it to my advantage.

Sami

Comments

Grazie wrote on 2/23/2010, 1:49 AM
You have asked a most wonderful question! - I wish we spent more time delving and reviewing our own ways of doing this type of stuff - thanks for asking.

I use everything at my disposal:-

1] Media Manager for clip and colour way viewing

2] Nested Veggies and then some!

3] I use "TAKES" a lot to audition Events

4] I am a notorious Serial-Veggist! - They're very small

5] Solo-ing is good, but as you say, can get cumbersome very quickly.

6] What you COULD try are Nested Veggies as TAKES!! - After all Veggies are now classed as Events.

Great question.

Grazie
PeterWright wrote on 2/23/2010, 1:51 AM
Have you tried the built in Multi camera? I'm not sure it would handle 80 tracks, but if it can, or you can reduce your number of tracks, then this job could be easy and fun.

On your preview you would have every shot that you have available as a choice, simultaneously, just like a live studio director, plus you can change your mind any time.

You can use keyboard numbers, or simply click on the desired shot in the preview screen to change from one camera/shot to another.

The Trimmer only looks at shots in isolation - multi camera on the Timeline lets you decide, in context, and you don't even have to stop playback whilst you edit!
Grazie wrote on 2/23/2010, 1:53 AM
Thanks Peter! I forgot that one!

Grazie
Rory Cooper wrote on 2/23/2010, 4:29 AM
The full length runs or sequences place on individual tracks then sync to audio track , delete individual unused audio tracks = all except main audio track
Select all . Select tools create multicam track .

Do the same with your cutaways or b roll footage

select Ctrl+shift+d

You will now have 2 tracks synced to audio, the bottom track which when you scrub through will have all the cuts between the lockdown cams
Now the top track cutaways will overrun the bottom track and still allow selecting between cutaways and where there is no b roll media track 2 will dominate

Selecting solo will help to select between b roll and lock down cams and which shot you want to run with

I don’t try to do a finished edit from start, I do a run through then tweak and then another run ,tweak some more

Rory

essami wrote on 2/23/2010, 5:28 AM
Hey that multicam sounds and looks pretty cool... i tried it and in practice I dont think I can make it work though. Running 20 "cams/takes" of HD material simultaneously in one window just wont run on my computer :) Im able to run two in draft quality. Shame, looks like it would be pretty handy...

Sami

TeetimeNC wrote on 2/23/2010, 6:26 AM
Sami, could you use Rori's multicam idea but first render your HD to low bit rate proxies and use something like Gearshift to do your edits on those proxies? Then you could "shift" back to your HD for final render.

I am assuming here that Gearshift would work fine with multi-cam edit. Anyone know for sure?

PS: I agree with Grazie - I love these threads where everyone shares workflow ideas. I ALWAYS learn something new.

Jerry
PeterWright wrote on 2/23/2010, 7:34 AM
Sami, there's a workaround which used to work with Excalibur's multicamera, so not sure it'll work with the built in facility:

After enabling Multicamera, render to New Track, say as a widescreen DV.avi. This may enable you to preview all 20 cams smoothly whilst making edit decisions - but you won't get the changing coloured Tally indicator around the current camera.