Vegas native stabilization vs plugins

bitman wrote on 1/11/2019, 5:25 AM

I have a bit of a luxury problem on choosing the "proper" stabilization plugin (or native Vegas 16 solution).

Over the years I acquired up with Prodad Mercalli V4, newblue stabilizer, and more recently Boris CC optical stabilizer, and the native Vegas, including the new one (on media effects only). The Vegas one, to be honest I have not used yet.

With "proper" I mean easy to use, slow down preview and render as minimal as possible, and best quality.

What are your preferred ones? I know Mercalli is popular, but I like to hear your opinions.

I can try for myself to see what is best, but I would like to know in my case which one to try out first as default as not to waste time trying out every method/plugin for each individual clip.

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3POINT wrote on 1/12/2019, 12:15 AM

@ Nick Hope

That's true, Deshaker was my favorite stabilizer 10 years ago and was in that time already easy to handle with the Deshaker script. The big disadvantage then and now, it is terribly slow.

Former user wrote on 1/12/2019, 1:57 AM

@NickHope @3POINT
I tested the VirtualDub Deshaker that comes in HappyOtter and I was impressed with the result. In some situations the stabilization was better than the native stabilization of Vegas and of the Mercalli V4 plugin.

The slowness, I believe, is due to the fact that in addition to analyzing the timeline event to apply the stabilization, it also renders the final file.

The other stabilizers only parse the event in the timeline and apply the stabilization, but do not process the final file.

3POINT wrote on 1/12/2019, 3:15 AM

@NickHope @3POINT
The slowness, I believe, is due to the fact that in addition to analyzing the timeline event to apply the stabilization, it also renders the final file.

The other stabilizers only parse the event in the timeline and apply the stabilization, but do not process the final file.

No, to stabilize the event on the timeline there is first one rendering with a lossless codec of that event, then this rendering is analysed by Deshaker (two passes when I remember right) then the result is rendered again (with lossless codec) and exchanged with the original on the timeline. The final and third rendering is done by Vegas when exporting the project. That is in fact two more renders than applying the other stabilizers.

Former user wrote on 1/12/2019, 7:26 AM

No, to stabilize the event on the timeline there is first one rendering with a lossless codec of that event, then this rendering is analysed by Deshaker (two passes when I remember right) then the result is rendered again (with lossless codec) and exchanged with the original on the timeline. The final and third rendering is done by Vegas when exporting the project. That is in fact two more renders than applying the other stabilizers.

@3POINT

Thanks,

You were able to explain the process in more detail. That is precisely the reason of te slowness.

Len Kaufman wrote on 1/12/2019, 12:34 PM

@3POINT Thank you. You solve a long-time mystery for me.

AVsupport wrote on 1/12/2019, 10:41 PM

IMO Mercalli4 gives better stabilization when you have a gimbal source. Also benefit is you can use full hardware acceleration, let your GPU do the work! Especially since VP is such a CPU Hog.. Also nice is FX level opposed to the mystery media level hidden agenda. Unfortunately I'm finding issues with Mercalli are: when you have 50p on a 25p timeline, or 50p timeline, 50p souce slowed down to 25p.. exploring..

3POINT wrote on 1/13/2019, 12:54 AM

Unfortunately I'm finding issues with Mercalli are: when you have 50p on a 25p timeline, or 50p timeline, 50p souce slowed down to 25p.. exploring..

Disable resampling.

NickHope wrote on 1/13/2019, 1:01 AM

@NickHope @3POINT
The slowness, I believe, is due to the fact that in addition to analyzing the timeline event to apply the stabilization, it also renders the final file.

The other stabilizers only parse the event in the timeline and apply the stabilization, but do not process the final file.

No, to stabilize the event on the timeline there is first one rendering with a lossless codec of that event, then this rendering is analysed by Deshaker (two passes when I remember right) then the result is rendered again (with lossless codec) and exchanged with the original on the timeline. The final and third rendering is done by Vegas when exporting the project. That is in fact two more renders than applying the other stabilizers.

The input file for Deshaker can be provided by Debugmode Frameserver, instead of an intermediate. HappyOtter can automate all that and bring the final result (or results, if you stabilize a batch) back to the timeline. It's slick but the first analysis pass does take time.

3POINT wrote on 1/13/2019, 1:51 AM

Nevertheless Nick, it's time-consuming.

I must say, the Vegas team did a great job with the new Vegas stabilizer. I'm just waiting for also a batch stabilisation script for it, besides Vegasaur.

Peter_P wrote on 1/13/2019, 7:16 AM

Many years ago I developed an event FX for Vegas pro to be used with the very good VD Filter Deshaker from G. Thalin. But for performance reasons I stopped working on it and switched to Mercalli V2 with quite good results.

Now I’m using Mercalli V4 as event FX until I get same or better results from the Vegas internal stabilizer.

AVsupport wrote on 1/13/2019, 10:53 PM

Unfortunately I'm finding issues with Mercalli are: when you have 50p on a 25p timeline, or 50p timeline, 50p souce slowed down to 25p.. exploring..

Disable resampling.

unfortunately that's not the magic cream ;-/

3POINT wrote on 1/13/2019, 11:56 PM

Unfortunately I'm finding issues with Mercalli are: when you have 50p on a 25p timeline, or 50p timeline, 50p souce slowed down to 25p.. exploring..

Disable resampling.

unfortunately that's not the magic cream ;-/

I have used Mercalli in a 24p timeline on 48p media with disabled resampling, no problem!