I'm sure I'm doing something wrong, but I can't get the pan & zoom filter to reliaby replicate what I see in the options dialog after returning to the timeline. My project settings are 720x480, 4:3 aspect, render non-square pixels set. When I drop a single still onto the timeline and add the pan&zoom filter I see the image fine and go through setting up key frames. Later, during instant playback or rendering my settings seems offset (generally moving my original off to the right, maybe?). Things are even more unpredictable when I try to combine a moving path (for rotating a vertical pic) with pan & zoom (I'm not even sure this is necessary, because it seems the advanced moving path can do all that the pan & zoom does, but I'm not sure). I did see where others have found this filter must go last, but I have problems when it's the only filter attached to the still.
At present, I always give up with the stills within Video Editor and drop out to Proshow Gold, where I render the whole clip to MPEG and reimport. This works, but I'd like to sometimes just stay within MSP and it seems doable. I was kind of hoping that as a stopgap (before MSP8) that the new version of PictureShow would allow its projects to be dropped into the timeline a la Cool3D or Video Paint. Doesn't seem so, though.
P.S. Does MSP keep the resolution of my stills until render time?
Thanks for any pointers!
-David
pan & zoom unexpected offsets
P&Z is not like MP where you set a start, intermediate and an end points and it goes in straight lines: it follows bezier curves to smooth the movement. For example, if you set three points in the form of L, starting at the top, the movement will be a smooth curve, starting at the top, going to the left, cutting the corner at about 45° to below the horizontal and then back up to the end point. Is this what you are seeing? If you want to narrow the "drift", you can put in more keyframes - P&Z has no reasonable limit, unlike MP which allows only 16.
As your still image is in a file, this is not altered. The preview image is pre-rendered to your project settings for display. If you do not use Smart Render, your final render will always go back to the original file.
As your still image is in a file, this is not altered. The preview image is pre-rendered to your project settings for display. If you do not use Smart Render, your final render will always go back to the original file.
[b][i][color=red]Devil[/color][/i][/b]
[size=84]P4 Core 2 Duo 2.6 GHz/Elite NVidia NF650iSLIT-A/2 Gb dual channel FSB 1333 MHz/Gainward NVidia 7300/2 x 80 Gb, 1 x 300 Gb, 1 x 200 Gb/DVCAM DRV-1000P drive/ Pan NV-DX1&-DX100/MSP8/WS2/PI11/C3D etc.[/size]
[size=84]P4 Core 2 Duo 2.6 GHz/Elite NVidia NF650iSLIT-A/2 Gb dual channel FSB 1333 MHz/Gainward NVidia 7300/2 x 80 Gb, 1 x 300 Gb, 1 x 200 Gb/DVCAM DRV-1000P drive/ Pan NV-DX1&-DX100/MSP8/WS2/PI11/C3D etc.[/size]
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sheinb
Thanks for the info.
While I do see the smoothed trajectory, that's not quite the problem I'm seeing. What I see is a discrepency between the setup path from the dialog and the actual rendered series. It seems like more of an aspect ratio problem than mismatch between the linear/bezier paths. E.g., at the end of the path, which should be right on my endpoint (I believe) it's off by maybe 20-30% of the image size.
My question about the the resolution had to do with whether zooms acted on the original image (i.e. not on a prescaled version). From you answer, it seems that this is the case, so that I keep the resolution as good as possible until the render.
While I do see the smoothed trajectory, that's not quite the problem I'm seeing. What I see is a discrepency between the setup path from the dialog and the actual rendered series. It seems like more of an aspect ratio problem than mismatch between the linear/bezier paths. E.g., at the end of the path, which should be right on my endpoint (I believe) it's off by maybe 20-30% of the image size.
My question about the the resolution had to do with whether zooms acted on the original image (i.e. not on a prescaled version). From you answer, it seems that this is the case, so that I keep the resolution as good as possible until the render.
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sheinb
Thanks Gorf,
I checked, and it looks like images I drop on the timeline or in the media folder have the frame-based (progressive) mode selected in the media source options, so that doesn't seem to be the problem.
I can't quite nail it down, but I see the problem almost always if I try to use the Advanced 2D Motion Path to reorient a vertical still. Even with horizontals, though, I have to check carefully to see that my pans don't get shifted. I'm really hoping the next version of MSP will handle dropping verticals onto the timeline and use the metadata to figure out they are vertical (Vegas does something like this, and they have a nice Crop tool immediately accessible on each clip, hint hint). In any case, with enough adjustment between the Pan&Zoom dialog (sometimes resetting with the red square, e.g.) and then scrubbing over the timeline during instant playback I can usually catch the offset. I just wish I understood which setting is causing the problem. I really have the impression that the center of the frame is shifted in a way that would be correct for 16:9 even though I'm rendering at 4:3. In any case, although the output is actually very good when it works, handling stills with crop/pan is quite a bit of work in MSP7.
I checked, and it looks like images I drop on the timeline or in the media folder have the frame-based (progressive) mode selected in the media source options, so that doesn't seem to be the problem.
I can't quite nail it down, but I see the problem almost always if I try to use the Advanced 2D Motion Path to reorient a vertical still. Even with horizontals, though, I have to check carefully to see that my pans don't get shifted. I'm really hoping the next version of MSP will handle dropping verticals onto the timeline and use the metadata to figure out they are vertical (Vegas does something like this, and they have a nice Crop tool immediately accessible on each clip, hint hint). In any case, with enough adjustment between the Pan&Zoom dialog (sometimes resetting with the red square, e.g.) and then scrubbing over the timeline during instant playback I can usually catch the offset. I just wish I understood which setting is causing the problem. I really have the impression that the center of the frame is shifted in a way that would be correct for 16:9 even though I'm rendering at 4:3. In any case, although the output is actually very good when it works, handling stills with crop/pan is quite a bit of work in MSP7.