Video Event FX

TomG wrote on 5/15/2011, 3:59 PM

Hello everyone,

I'm a hobbyist and took a lot of digital video ($750 Sony camera) at my son's wedding. Unfortunately I am just not seasoned enough to "plan ahead" regarding shots and found a few shots in the interior of the reception hall (during daylight hours) which I liked but have a lot of background light from the windows.

Can anysuggest a good video event fx I could use to tone down the background and highlight the people in the foreground? I have tried the color balance, fill light, white balance, and soft contrast without much luck.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

TomG

Comments

erikd wrote on 5/16/2011, 3:00 AM

Sony Levels. This does the best job of recovering lost detail from images that are blown out because of light from windows, etc.

Erik

TomG wrote on 5/16/2011, 9:58 AM

Thanks, Erik

That event FX worked out great. Probably not using it properly but just using a preset of "brighten" makes the video look much better.

Is there any place where I can get a quick tutorial on color levels and gamma?

Tomg

johnmeyer wrote on 5/16/2011, 10:22 AM

Any even better approach to over-exposed footage is detailed in this great old thread:

Help with Over Exposure!

Go down to the sixth post (by malowz), and you'll see that the trick is to put a 100% invert filter on either side of your Levels or Color Corrector fX (these are the two fX which have a Gamma function). Your Gamma function will now work in the opposite sense. What does this accomplish? Well, as described in that thread, Gamma works in a non-linear way on the midtones, gaining darker portions of the image by a different amount than the brighter portions. If you simply use Gamma by itself, you end up making the dark parts too dark, while not taking down the brights by much. If you invert the Gamma function (the first Invert fX), you end up making it work in the opposite sense. The second Invert function then returns the negative image back to a positive. As you'll see from that thread, the results can be quite good (although you can never recover anything that has completely blown out sections).

TomG wrote on 5/16/2011, 2:36 PM

Thanks, John

That is indeed a great tip and I appreciate you sharing it with me. It's amazing how Vegas can make even a hobbyist look like a "pretty good" hobbyist. I appreciate the explanation of the Gamma function.also.

I will probably this effect quite a bit. Is there a way to construct this effect and save it somewhere so I can apply it with the same settings from a pull down? I know you can do this but I when I save the effect, I don't know where it is saved or under what name or how to assign a keyboard shortcut to it.

TomG

johnmeyer wrote on 5/16/2011, 3:29 PM

I will probably this effect quite a bit. Is there a way to construct this effect and save it somewhere so I can apply it with the same settings from a pull down? I know you can do this but I when I save the effect, I don't know where it is saved or under what name or how to assign a keyboard shortcut to it.Search under the Vegas help with the keyword: Packages.

The short version is that, when you have the combination of fX filters you want, and have changed all the settings, click on the add fX icon as if you were going to add yet another fX. In that dialog, click on the Save As button. The combination of fX and settings for those fXs should be saved. The location is usually in the "Filter Packages" folder. You can apply this fX by first clicking on this folder and then assigning the package, just as you would assign a single fX. You can also open the Plug-In Manager (View menu) and drag and drop from that window.