Total project time reduces when I insert transition effect

[BruceWilliams]

I am new to VideoStudio 8 and have set up a simple project of 6 jpeg images each of 5 seconds duration (using insert media file to timeline). As expected when I play the project it takes exactly 30 seconds to run through all 6 images. However when I introduce a single 2 second transition (any transition) between 2 of the images the total project time reduces to 28 seconds. If I insert another 2 second transition the total project time reduces to 26 seconds - and so on. There must be something wrong somewhere? Please help a confused beginner.

[sjj1805]

Total project time reduces when I insert transition effect

But of course it does!
Think of it this way. Take a piece of film lets say 10" long. Now take another pice of film also 10" long.
Lay them in a line butt ended with each other and the total length is 20" long.

Now move the second piece of film so that it overlaps the first piece of film by 1" (This is a transition) and the total length is now 19".

[Ron P.]

Hi Bruce, and welcome to the forums..

There's nothing wrong, that is the correct behavior. A transition is a progression between two clips. The time a transistion uses is borrowed from each of the adjacent clips. So as in your case, a 2 second transition, will use 1 second from each of the adjacent clips. So the total length will be shortened by the amount of your transitions.

In other words a transition does not have it's own time, it is part of the clips times.

Hope that helps explain it..

Ron P.

[BruceWilliams]

Thank you Steve and Ron,

Your very clear explanations make perfect sense - although I must confess I probably wouldn't have worked it out for myself. I have been using Photo Story 3 (designed for still images only) where the transition does not effect the overall run time of the project (I just tested it to make sure). Now I know that I don't have a problem - other than maybe being slow on the uptake - I can simply adjust image display time to compensate. I had previously created a simple 5 video clip project but of course the transition effect was not so noticable. Once again thanks for the amazingly quick responses and the warm welcome.

Regards - Bruce

[profk99]

Thanks, guys, for the information! How counterintuitive! I'd imagined a transition would simply overlay a "splice" or possibly lengthen a scene, but SHORTEN it? I timed this many times and was baffled.

I am working on a relatively complex project--adding recorded dialog, sound effects, and music to a 50-year-old S8 home movie reel. I have over an hour of tediously-positioned clips in the project, and now am trying to add transitions. Obviously a misteak (sic) not to do these as I go, as the video shortens(!) for each transition I add and sync is lost progressively along the timeline. Now I know why. But it DEFINITELY is not the right way for my project.

It's a nice explanation that the two pieces of film would have to overlap for a crossfade. But for fade to black or a 3D effect the two scenes do not overlap. They are "butt-spliced" and simply dim and brighten, or are otherwise manipulated. In an Album transition I can see the video playing throughout the transition. How does that shorten the length of the video track? As Bruce pointed out simpler software doesn't behave that way.

Is this because there is simply a rule that the transition time is ALWAYS subtracted, whether it's needed or not? If so, there needs to be an easy way to adjust all the tracks to keep sync.

Ripple-edit mode doesn't allow a transition to be added. Am I still missing something? (Headscratching preparatory to wallbanging with same...)

Bob

[Ron P.]

Bob,

In VS anyway, a transition is blending 2 different clips. So as Steve stated, it's like overlapping 2 pieces of film. The total film length will be shortend, by the overlapping (transition) times.

For Ripple Editing to be effective, you need to enable that from the start. As you probably are aware you can choose which tracks to enable. The Ripple is based on the Main Vdeo Track. So changes to it, cause all other Ripple enabled tracks to shift.

What I see that is happening with the transitions not being allowed, is when you have 2 audio clips butted against each other, then VS will not see a gap for the transition in the main video track. (That probably is as clear as muddy water). What I done was test what is happening is your case. When I moved one of the audio clips so that there was a gap, then the transition was allowed. I know, doesn't make sense to me, but that's what's happening when Ripple edit is active on the required tracks..

I don't know of an easy solution in your case.

Ron P.

[profk99]

Ron: Thanks for the tip! I'll try it tonight.

I managed to fix about a third of the project so far by minimizing the number of transitions to add. I turned OFF ripple edit, applied the transition, set its duration (3 sec), and stoically took the 3-sec shortening. Almost as painful as a real circumcision!

I then selected the first following title and shift-clicked the last title to select all inbetween. Then I clicked the leftmost of the selected titles and dragged the whole chain of titles exactly 3 sec to the left. Perfect!

After doing the same thing to the dialog and music tracks I had ONE whole transition done. Much like shaving with tweezers.

Hopefully your trick will work for the remainder of the job and be more like shaving with a razor. I don't expect shave cream.

Sure would be nice to have this glitch fixed.

Bob

[profk99]

Ron: Thanks again for the valuable clue.

I have finally finished my project by inserting a dozen 3-sec transitions. This is painful in Roll Edit mode because each transition shortens the video track by that same 3 sec. Thus the additional audio and title tracks go out of sync and are TEDIOUS to fix.

Of course, Ripple Edit is the way to do this, but VS did not allow ne to insert transitions in Ripple mode. As you pointed out, the problem turns out NOT to be in the Video track, which is where my attention--and the useless VS error message--were focused, but in the ancillary tracks. It's logical, but not obvious, that if there's a music or dialog track spanning the cut where the transition is being put, VS doesn't know how to handle it.

The solutions are:

* Apply the transitions as you go, not when the project is nearly done.

* To add a transition to an existing project: Choose Ripple Edit. Under every insertion point, make sure there is a gap in every track below the video. Each gap must have at least the same duration you want for the transition, and must END at the insertion point.

This is easy if you are using something like SmartSound music, which adjusts itself when its duration is changed. Narration tracks need to be manually trimmed. None of this would be necessary if inserting transitions left the duration of the Video track alone!

Bob

[Ron P.]

Bob,

Glad you got it to work Thanks for the tips on this, as I know other users will probably benefit from it.

Maybe Ulead can work on the Ripple Edit, to where it is an Intelligent Ripple..

Ron P.

[sjj1805]

An alternative suggestion - use straight cuts instead of transitions.
In fact - unless your using crossfades - transitions casn become distracting and tedious to watch. Look at Television programs and Hollywood films - you don't see them littered with lots of fancy transitions.

Transitions are great for spicing up slideshows and here there shouldn't be a problem with sound because the still images don't have sound anyway.

I know it's tempting for new users to get carried away with transitions to 'impress friends and family' but believe me, in a year or two look yourself at something you created and don't be surprised to find yourself cringing and saying to yourelf "Did I really do that!"

[profk99]

Ron: Thanks for the good advice!

I used about a dozen "Kool" transitions for 144 clips. These were "Albums" that worked very well to separate the major, but minimally-related, sections of this 50th-wedding-anniversary opus. They work here because this is actually 18 50-foot 8mm reels, taken over 10 years starting in 1956. I assembled them into distinct events, e.g. honeymoon, travel, visiting relatives, children, etc. So a big break worked fine between these (think Rob Reiner's "Princess Bride" and its big book prop.)

The other transitions are are a couple of dissolves and maybe a dozen crossfades.

Previous projects of mine did look pretty cutesy, but I'm happy with this une.

BTW: This worked so well I am planning to dig out my own ancient film reels and do the same. I captured the video from commercial transfers on DV, and played the AVIs for the couple while I shot their commentary. I split the sound track and combined the dialog WAV file with the video and SmartSound music. I even added ambient sound for a couple of kids' parties at an amusement park. Tough to do on VS with only 3 audio tracks. Heck of a lot of work to get everything together.

I may go to MS8 Pro. I used a trial version, but the learning curve was too long for my deadline this time.

Thanks again. Glad folks like you are around!

Bob

[sjj1805]

You may be interested in this:
Converting super 8 Films

You may find the way I presented the films of interest, a neat little twist that made them more interesting.

[profk99]

Sorry, Steve. I was replying to YOUR post before, though I am certainly grateful for Ron's help as well.

I read your other post and like your creative concept of a film within a film. I'll try it next time. In this case my cousin had already sent his selection of 18 reels to a commercial service, so trimming was not necessary.

They provided two DVDs, which were disappointing because, although he did a rather good job of holding the camera steady and taking long-enough scenes, he sometimes forgot to set the focus and exposure, and sometimes used daylight film indoors (young readers: Daylight films turn out very yellow shot indoors, as white balance was set at the film factory in those days.) Boy, we don't realize how good things are now!

I talked him into paying extra to get DV tapes as well, as the company does the scan to DV, then converts to MPEG-2. Having fought in the MicroMV trenches for 4 years, I prefer to edit DV, and do as few conversions as possible. The transfer cost about $200, and the extra DV tapes $40.

When I volunteered to "clean up" his video, I was thinking just levels, color balance, and sharpening. My bright idea turned into an ordeal when I thought of adding dialog. And music. And Kool transitions, and... (In the computer business we call this "Creeping Featurism".)

Then I found Pinnacle S9 didn't include a sharpen filter--you have to buy a $99 package of useless Kool stuff to get this! No way! So I used a freeware add-in. Perhaps a bad idea.

After spending a week on the first batch of films, I tried to render. On a decent 3.0 GHz machine it took 22 hours for a 64-min project! Then it crashed without outputting DVD files!! Several times!!! Just before leaving to visit my cousin in Florida, I removed all the menus and successfully generated an AVI of video and dubbed dialog from S9. Goodbye Pinnacle!

I added music and menus on our vacation using my notebook using Ulead VS9. I was able to burn an excellent DVD with a nicely finished label, as my HP notebook has LightScribe capability.

Ulead's product is much more stable and better supported (really!) V9 did such a fine job that I am using ULead for the whole job on the sequel--the remaining hour of video. It renders a complete DVD with menus in 3:20. Unfortunately I upgraded to V10 which has a new, over-automated DVD menu system. And the "shortening" phenomenon popped up, which I never observed in editing with Pinnacle. When I have time, I'll check it out...

Bob

[profk99]

Steve:

Slightly off topic, but in response to your post:

In transferring video by photographing a projected 8mm image, did you get any artifacts from not synchronizing the projector (16 fps) with your camcorder (25 fps)? From what I've read, low-end commercial transfers use a synchronized projector with a 3-bladed shutter; the high-end systems do a frame-by-frame scan (at 2 or 3x the price.)

My cousin's low-end transfers had no moving bars, were steady, and were nicely trimmed to fill the frame without obviously cutting off much of the image. They were indistinguishable from camcorder video except for the normal 8mm film problems of low resolution, grain, focus, and exposure. And dirt. Fuzz in the film gate adds a nostalgic touch now and then.

[sjj1805]

found best results were obtained by having the camera fairly close to the screen and alongside the projecter. Obviously you need to film in 4.3 mode.
The biggest impact on my recordings was my camcorders steadyshot function.

• Turned on - lots of pulsating.
• Turned off - no pulsating.

Try and get the screen something like 4 feet away (or less). The camcorder and projecter side by side and the same height. The camcorder mounted on a tripod.

I was extremely surprised at the quality of the captured videos. I was expecting flashy flickers, dark videos and washed out colours.
In fact the videos were steady. I found that you needed to project 'close up' and then this increased the brightness.

The biggest problem is getting things in focus because you have to do it twice. Once from the projector onto the screen, then the second from the camcorder viewing that screen.

I borrowed my projector from a friend so that I could do mine. In return I converted all of his films in the same manner. He was gobsmacked at the results and told me that he could not have had them done anywhere near as good if he had taken them to a professional.

Thats not bragging but a fact of the difference that can be achieved by someone doing this as a hobby rather than for profit. If it's your hobby you can spend more time on a project. If your a professional you have to consider turnaround times otherwise you would be working for a £1 a hour!