How do you use picture in picture

[jparnold]

I used to use MediaStudio Pro to create picture in picture especially where the picture starts small and grows to cover the entire background video clip.
I looked for and found a video filter which I thought would allow me to do the same.
However after viewing the 'help' for the filter and trying just about everything I could think of I cannot achieve what I want to do if start with a video clip and then have another video clip appear (very small) in one area of the background video and then slowly grow larger to eventually cover the background video clip.
I can make the picture in picture appear and grow larger but it covers the entire background video clip with black effectively covering it no matter what size my picture in picture is.
I looked for a chroma key to cover the black out but could not find it.
I feel so annoyed as I have been using VS for years and thought that I could work out everything I tried but this has got me beat and the help isn't very intuitive.
Help!

[AussieTX]

You must first apply a Mask to the pic/video you place the Picture in Picture filter on. In your case the full screen Mask from the group of Masks but try a couple you may like the effect of the other shaped ones as well.

[jparnold]

Ok applied a mask (the full screen one) but now my picture in picture is entirely black. Played with the 'opacity' without any difference.

Once again where is the inuitiveness in VS these days? Wished there was a text book explaining all these things instead of the scant descriptions
in the user guide!

Note the picture in picture appears ok in the 'preview window' but when I exit the 'picture in picture' customise screen it reverts to black.


PS Forget it. Another VSX4 anomaly. I was dragging the 'scrubber; for the effect (which displayed the P-in-P as black but then tried 'ply' and it displayed correctly.
This is so annoying. The 'circle' transition effect does the same at times. So Bl**dy annoying! Is this in the X6 wish list? It should be.
Intuitiveness will never overcome this! Or has it been fixed in X5?

[Kingston]

What I do with NewBlueFX's PiP and Chromakey (Video Essentials II Collection) is to turn on Video Studio's Chromakey, set similarity equal to zero, and pick neon green for the color. Just turning on VS's Chromakey makes NewBlue's effects see-through where there is suppose to be see-through. Picking neon green (0,255,0) keeps VS's chromakey from keying out black in the actual image. You would pick some other unlikely color if neon green is actually in the image.

[jparnold]

Sorry just noticed a few typos which may make the following sentence

PS Forget it. Another VSX4 anomaly. I was dragging the 'scrubber; for the effect (which displayed the P-in-P as black but then tried 'ply' and it displayed correctly.

I should have typed

PS Forget about replying as I have determined the problem.
I was dragging the 'scubber' in the preview window to check the effect. This displayed the P-in-P as black but when I clicked on the 'PLAY' button the P-in-P displayed correctly.

So there is no problem now.

Regarding my wish for a text book has anyone had a look at the book named
"Picture Yourself Making Creative Movies with Corel VideoStudio Pro X4" http://www.amazon.com/Picture-Yourself- ... 21&sr=1-12 and if so how good (or bad) is it?

[manglwise]

Wished there was a text book explaining all these things instead of the scant descriptions
in the user guide!

It seems to me that lack of quality documentation is the norm these days. Company's rely too much on forums like this to supply the answers to the questions the users of their product have. Even more sad is that the help files don't always get updated from version to version.

I too, am curious about the "Picture Yourself Making Creative Movies with Corel VideoStudio Pro X4" book. I was thinking of getting it when I upgrade from VSX2 to VSX4 or VSX5.

[BrianCee]

does this video tutorial help John :- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=molIs1o0eiQ

There are many more on youtube.

[jparnold]

Thanks Brian,

I must try and remember to check out Youtube for anything else I am trying to resolve as it has a wealth of tutorials on all sorts of things (like Flight Simulator which I often look up).

An earlier reply to this question suggested placing a frame on the P-in-P (which I did) but it seems that it is not needed.

I had never used P-in-P before having resorted to using MediaStudio Pro to do such things including 'moving path' (and then output to DV file and import the clip into VS) as I have only upgraded (from VS10) to X4 since my last trip.

I had a similar (problem) experience a few weeks ago with using Pan and Zoom especially determining that Logarithmic Interpolation needed to be 'unticked' is to allow positioning via key frames to work. If even a few words for each of these were added to the user guide (explaining each one) I would have saved a lot of frustration and also hair on my head (which I now don't have much of).
I don't expect a user guide to go into examples but it should explain what each 'feature' of the product is for.

And (to Manglwise) there seems to be an abundance of good books available for all sorts of software especially Microsoft but also Adobe products such as Photoshop and Premiere). I guess because VS is not as used as much it doesn't attract writers. Thank goodness for Youtube and these forums and the people who spend time to do video tutorials and answer posts.