Editors

Adobe CS6 trial versions are available for download

Vitaliy_Kiselev — Wed, 25 Apr 2012 22:09:54 +0000

Adobe CS6 ESD Trials

Adobe Creative Suite 6 Production Premium

http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/tdrc/index.cfm?product=production_premium&loc=en_us&sdid=JUJDJ&virid=adbe2012-JUJDJ

Other downloads

http://www.adobe.com/downloads/

FCPx on Mountain Lion rocks - lot faster at transcoding too !

AfricaGH2 — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 22:53:26 +0000

I've posed this a few places but here are my observations of ML & FCPx:

Ok so I'm not running a 100 core cluster just a dual core 2012 i7 mac mini with a AMD Radeon HD 6630M / 256 MB but wow, FCPx is a lot faster on the transcoding side. I swear I benchmarked 3x for 1080p60 transcoding now it's more like 1x (one min of footage take one min to transcode to prores proxy and regular prores)!!!

Also OSX finally plays AVCHD natively even my nice 1080p60 footage at 28mbps does not stutter and it uses way way less CPU cycles.

Looks like they are finally using Open GL. (On my shite box Windows 7 laptops I've been able to play native avchd with low cpu usage for the past year so well done apple for catching up)

This is great new for us cheapskates using minis instead of Mac Pros

Can someone confirm this speed increase just in case I've been drinking too much of the Job's Kool-Aid.

Adobe Cloud Subscription

pvjames — Sun, 29 Apr 2012 18:09:23 +0000

Wasn't sure to add this on the CS6 topic but i wanted to ask your opinions on the new paradigm Adobe will have everyone subscribing to with their Cloud Service. Of what i see, there are pros/cons. It depends on your situation and how deeply you use the Suite. This is something Adobe will eventually have ALL join but right now you have the option to either own CS6 or subscribe. May not be the case for CS6.5 or CS7. What do you think?

edit: extra info- If you subscribe using the Creative Cloud Membership option, the computer needs to connect to the Internet once per month to check its license. If you don't have a connection when it tries to check, the software won't stop working for quite a long time; it just needs a connection once per month.

If you instead use the perpetual license option (i.e., the usual, "old" way), not Creative Cloud Membership, then the computer never needs to be connected to the Internet; you just have to enter an activation code that you can get using any Internet-connected device (like your smartphone or another computer).

There's a Creative Cloud FAQ list here: http://www.adobe.com/products/creativecloud/faq.html

Adobe Premiere Pro 6 from CS6

sohus — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 16:30:12 +0000

Sneak peak at the Adobe Premiere Pro 6 interface:

I see some small improvements but not as much as I hoped.

I did see something about OpenCL as CUDA alternative.

Adobe Subcription Plans?

bwhitz — Sun, 24 Jun 2012 22:20:52 +0000

Anybody try Adobe's new subscription plans with CS6 yet? I think I'm about to try it for After Effects. Seems to be a great deal so far... just wondering if anyone's ran into any snags or problems?

Cropping for different aspect ratios

shian — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 20:39:54 +0000

Since I get asked this a lot, I figured I just show you here how I do it. I've shown all the GHearHeads how to do it in AE, but here's how you do it in FCP 7, just go to your sequence settings and conform them to something similar to this.

1920x1080 is 1.77:1

1920x818 is a perfect 2.35:1

1920x1038 is 1.85:1

Minimising hum and noise in your picture

mrbill — Wed, 13 Jun 2012 02:52:32 +0000

Here's a trick I'd like to share with you. After shooting a relatively lo-light interview, I got back to the edit suite to find noise bars and hum all over the picture. Here's what I did to minimise it, which is effectively using phase cancellation as a de-noiser. Warning - this will ONLY work with a relatively static interviewee. First, edit your interview content onto the top track of 4 video layers. Advance the mark in point on your source clip by 3 frames, then edit onto the bottom video track. Repeat for the next 2 video tracks (so we have 3 layers that are 3,6 and 9 frames ahead of our top track. Apply a 50% superimpose effect on tracks 2 + 3. Then cut a soft edge mask out for the interviewee on the top track (video 4). The varied phase relationship between the video tracks cancels out a huge percent of the picture noise - try it, it saved this interview for me!

Snapseed for iPhone/iPad/iTouch

stoney — Tue, 05 Jun 2012 00:02:36 +0000

I like Snapseed app from iTunes. It's good for quick photo editing from the mobile devices. Usually it's not free, but it's free today :)

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/snapseed/id439438619?mt=8

Interlacing -- why is this still an issue?

ahbleza — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 10:59:47 +0000

I'm working for a producer whose editor demands PAL 50i. I've tried to persuade him that 25p will give superior results, but the editor insists that 50i is better for a TV channel workflow. What has been the experience of other editors working in PAL land? Surely 25p is going to give fewer artifacts and smoother video, even though most TVs are going to be showing in 50i (or even 60i.)

Foundry nuke 6.3

TrackZillas — Tue, 29 May 2012 12:27:53 +0000

Does anybody know how to import GH2 footage into Nuke 6.3? or how to set-up a template for GH2 footage.. Can't find no beginner tutorials online showing the import process.

Perils of switching from Final Cut to AVID

ahbleza — Tue, 29 May 2012 13:26:39 +0000

Here's an interesting article on the problems found with a production house who switched from Final Cut Pro to AVID.

http://magazine.creativecow.net/article/a-cautionary-tale-for-the-fcp-switcher

Quote:

"To their credit, Avid listened to everything we had to say and tried to help. In fact, they did help a lot addressing some issues along the way. Sending Bob Russo down here spur of the moment was above and beyond what I would have ever expected, given how small of a shop we are. I had multiple conversations with product managers, engineers, and others at Avid. They really were all trying their best to help us through the situation and get us back on track.

But the software itself was throwing up roadblock after roadblock, mainly because of the way the database works. It was doing what it was designed to do, make sure that all of the media was tightly controlled so that the editor can always find the original clips. And as such, it had a very rigid way of working which conflicts with the "new, more open Avid."

GH2 Log and transfer problem! please help asap!

jclmedia — Mon, 14 May 2012 20:25:31 +0000

I use FCP 7, Last nite i was tryin to log and transfer my clips on fcp an i get a red stop sign and they dont even transfer. I used 5DtoRGB and the files seem fine. I get a error saying the clips are missing data or somthing.

please help me..

How do you deliver content? The bandwidth topic.

5thwall — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 18:20:28 +0000

This is a continuation of a discussion that started in the Final Cut X topic: http://personal-view.com/talks/discussion/comment/57810#Comment_57810

The subject of tapeless deliverables was brought up, which was very timely for me, since I was in the middle of a job that was going crazy with uploading deliverables. Curious to know, how are you delivering final masters to your clients? Is it still tape? Do you see a decline in tape and an upward trend in digital delivery? How do you bill for upload time?

This is a topic for us to discuss the future of delivery in terms of bandwidth. Ideas, recommendations on best practices in the work environment. I'm very curious to know what your personal standards or your company's standards are for delivering digital content. Where do you see the need for bandwidth in small business and homes over the next few years - and will it be affordable? How do you organize the vast swath of files and content that's created?

Let's keep the NLE debate out of this conversation and focus on the realities of our day-to-day needs in delivery. Please post in the Final Cut X topic if you've got "beef" (and you know I do!).

Lossless trimming/splitting/joining of AVCHD files

spk — Wed, 02 May 2012 13:26:55 +0000

Is this possible? If so, which software can do it? If not, which software/workflow comes closest?

(My preference is for open source software that can be used on a Mac, but this is not crucial.)

Cheap NLE, Lightworks

Faudel — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 15:14:26 +0000

I know some of us are interested in cheap NLE

http://www.lightworksbeta.com/index.php?option=com_kunena&func=view&catid=19&id=21314&Itemid=269

Avid's Scriptsync tool

GOODEMPIRE — Tue, 10 Apr 2012 19:21:19 +0000

I've just discovered how handy it is for editing long form. Do you guys know if there is anything similar as an add-on for FCP or CS5? It looks like a good reason to switch. Although I'm totally in love with Premiere. Check this:

http://www.avid.com/us/products/Scriptsync

Good Deal: DAZ Studio Pro, Bryce Pro and Hexagon for FREE

Vitaliy_Kiselev — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 16:24:07 +0000

Save you about $830, and this are not trials :-)

http://www.daz3d.com/

Unlocking Nvidia gpu for mercury playback on laptops

peterosinski — Wed, 04 Apr 2012 00:17:27 +0000

http://skiboblog.skibovision.com/?p=1

quick little thing I put up with links to a great program that unlocks GPU for mercury playback. This is only reccomended for GPU's with minimum of 1GB RAM.

Premiere CS5: fade-in effect - what a neurotic PITA

LPowell — Wed, 08 Feb 2012 05:30:33 +0000

I can't believe what a neurotic PITA it is to apply a simple fade-in to a clip in Premier CS5. The miniscule GUI glitch that control this effect on the timeline is barely even visible, much less something you can precisely grab with a mouse pointer and manipulate. The interfaces are all completely unlabeled of course, and there's nothing in the Adobe help site that even mentions the word "fade-in".

Even if you know exactly what wrist contortion they expect you to perform, the damn thing won't respond unless you know the secret incantation that uncloaks the grayed-out Add Keyframe button on the Video track tab. The genius that designed this POS cannot even explain it in English - Adobe had to resort to pasting a screenshot of the GUI in their keyframe help page to literally show you what must be done. Before you can click the button to add a keyframe, you have to open the completely unrelated Effect Controls Panel, display the unlabelled thing on the right side of it and click in a blank area to get yet another timeline slider to show up. Only then will the freaking button uncloak, magnanimously allowing you to click it to insert an invisible keyframe mark in the timeline.

To actually apply the fade-in is even more abusive. First you have to click on little dot next to the keyframe cloak and select "Show Opacity Handles". Then this impossibly tiny hairline shows up on the painfully narrow timeline where a thumbnail of a frame obscures it. Now you're expected to grab the tiny one-pixel left edge of the hairline and drag in down to black out the start of the clip.

I really sympathize with people who have deal with such merciless crap to make a living. It's even worse than programming in C++.

SmoothVideo Project (SVP): Fast Frame Interpolation for slow motion and frame doubling

tida — Fri, 30 Mar 2012 07:48:15 +0000

SVP allows you to watch any video on your PC file with frame interpolation (like you can watch it on high-end TVs and projectors). It increases frame rate by generating intermediate animation frames between existing ones to produce very smooth, fluid and clear motion. The technology is well-known for a while ("TrimensionDNM", "Motion Plus", "Motionflow" and others), but now it's available for free to PC users with simple GUI and just a couple of mouse clicks.

http://www.svp-team.com/wiki/Main_Page

Especially interesting is also the AVISynth plugin SVPflow which could be the successor for MVTools if it comes to rendering:

http://www.svp-team.com/wiki/Plugins:_SVPflow

http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?p=1567405

Anamorphic workflow for edius NLE

ipcmlr — Sun, 25 Mar 2012 15:31:03 +0000

Just got my Eiki 16f and was testing it out last night with the GH2. I put the footage in Edius. Problem is aspect ratios to choose from when the clip is in the bin only goes up to 1.5x I can export it to a 2x stretch but it would be cool to see the stretched video before exporting to a file.

Anyone have ideas on how to do this?

Also anyone can show what their anamorphic workflow is?

This focusing 2 lenses is an absolute pain btw!

Different times at one location: Extended dynamic range solution for 1080p Videos

tida — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 07:41:57 +0000

MARCH-09-2012 - I did put an update of TimelapseVid.py, ExposureFusionVid.py and SlowMoVid.py (new) in the attatched Macros v2 file.

Below you will find a user friendly freeware solution where you can extend the dynamic range for AVCHD timelapses, slow motions and freeze frame videos. This solution invites your creativity to work with different time measures at one location.

Don't worry that it's based on Avisynth scripts as they were created automatically and in most cases you even don't need to modify them. You also need AvsPMod which is the basis of this user friendly method.

Install the TimelapseVid.py and ExposureFusionVid.py files into the \AvsPMod\macros folder or subfolder. You will find then as soon as you freshly start the AvsPMod application and enter the menu "macros". For the ExposureFusionVid script you need to download a fuse/fusemask plugin which you will find at http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=152109. Save the fusion.dll file into the Avisynth\plugins folder.

In my opinion this macro method has a lot of potential to be optimized by this community. I hope you will have a lot of suggestions to improve it. Maybe you have ideas for other procedures....

The following video should demonstrate how it works.

==== TimelapseVid.py ====

This procedure is focused on a simple 360 degree shutter angle timelapse workflow. It has similarities with the methods used by @GH13Timelapser discussed by http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/595/mjpeg-fps-setting-for-timelapse-on-gh2/p1 but can run now with AVCHD files like *.MTS. Also @balazer described AviSynth Overlay methods in http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/1559/avchd-1080p-time-lapse/p1. The resulting script of this macro is based on Avisynth TemporalSoften.

First you will be asked for the video file which should be converted into a timelapse or averaged frame video.

The second dialog box (see attatched picture) will ask you to enter used shutter speed, the frame rate of the resulting video, the timelapse rate and GOP. The generated script will take care about the correct GOP at given Shutterspeed. Usage of Group of Pictures (GOP) at different shutter speeds with 24p and Panasonic GH2 was discussed by @duartix at http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/comment/39686#Comment_39686 and http://www.personal-view.com/talks/discussion/2396/gh2-motion-fluidity-360%C2%BA-shutter-test-on-slow-shutter-speeds./p1.

Put in the third dialog box the name of your script. It is recommended to save the *avs scipt under similar name of the video that in future you can trace back what you have done.

In AvsPMod you can check what you have done. Please also read the comments in the script to learn how to optimize your results.

Now you can use this *avs script in Virtualdub, MeGUI or whatever to create the final timelapse video file.

Comment: You can create an "averaged frame video" by just set TimelapseRate to Framecount. You end up in a video with just one frame. It could help for example to clean up a market place with moving people. This averaged frame should be over- or underexposed and can be used for subsequent Exposure Fusion procedure. In the Exposure Fusion procedure it would be converted into a freeze frame video with exactly same number of frames of the reverse exposed timelapse.

==== ExposureFusionVid.py ====

ExposureFusionVid is a user friendly solution to improve the dynamic range of the timelapse. You can even work with different time units at one location. You can combine timelapse, slow motion or freeze frame videos with each other. Important is that one video has to be overexposed and the other should be underexposed.

First you will be asked for the first video and subsequently for the second. If you have created an "averaged frame video" you have to open it by the first dialog box.

Then you will be asked for the name of the *.avs script which should be saved.

In AvsPMod you need to check the script for further optimization. Read the comments. You will see that there are two different mask methods which can be applied for the fuse method. Play whith them until your reach the best result.

Again, now you can use this *avs script in Virtualdub, MeGUI or whatever to create the final video file.

==== SlowMoVid.py ====

SlowMoVid.py can be used for progessive as well as for interlaced videos. If the base is progressive motion estimation will be derived by mvtools. If the video is interlaced QTGMC or Yadif will at the first step take care about deinterlacing. Subsequent motion estimation will be carried out by mvtools.

==================

You need to install following plugins in your Avisynth plugin folder:

GScript.dll download from http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=147846

MVtools2.dll download from http://avisynth.org.ru/mvtools/mvtools2.html

RemoveGrainSSE3.dll download from http://www.removegrain.de.tf

Yadif.dll download from http://avisynth.org.ru/yadif/yadif.html

Fusion.dll download from http://forum.doom9.org/showthread.php?t=152109

Recommended Premiere Worfklow for GH2 25P footage?

Marco — Fri, 09 Mar 2012 04:31:22 +0000

What is the recommended workflow/settings for Premiere Pro (on a Windows PC) for 25P GH2 footage so that Premiere interpretes the footage correctly (not as 50i, but as 25P)?

My timeline in Premiere Pro is 25P progressive.

Thanks for your help.

Text Aliasing Premiere

rubberbandito — Mon, 27 Feb 2012 08:18:45 +0000

Can anyone help. See pics, bad.jpg and good.jpg. Good shows how the text looks on blu ray and digitial render. Bad is how it looks when I render to DVD. My project was edited on 1280x720 29.97 timeline in Premiere Pro. And all the text plates are the same 720 p. I tried a bunch of stuff: I tried changing text boxes to DV quality and I get same result. I tried interpreting footage as 1.2 DV widescreen. Still bad. Nothing works. Do I just have to live with this. How do the big movies make it look good? Do I have to use bottom third color scheme. I think this would do it, to use opacity on bottom third.

FCP Update 2012 10.0.3

alcomposer — Sat, 05 Nov 2011 06:21:35 +0000

Just posting here as I missed this TOTALLY!

2012 Early Update- Bringing professional monitoring options! TTL!

http://www.apple.com/finalcutpro/software-update.html

I shouldn't even be excited about this - but I am! ;-D

HELP FCP5 multicam woes

B3Guy — Thu, 29 Dec 2011 02:16:46 +0000

Hey, all. I am getting darn near ready to blow my top, but here goes.

I've been pretty ladylike to FCP throughout this whole process. I wish to multi cam edit between two clips I have from a wedding I shot. Both clips are 422 Pro Res files, identically specced, AFAIK. 1080p, 24fps. I have binned the two clips together, selected them and "Created multiclip". I have dragged said multiclip clip into an appropriately specced Pro-Res 422 1080p 24fps sequence. I can watch either angle of the multiclip without rendering.

I have set the gang to "Open", I have set everything to "dynamic". I can play back the mother trucking son of a bee-sting piece of bovine excrement multiclip just fine . . . until I attempt to "switch angles"/make a "cut"/switch shots/whatever the heck you want to call it. Then everything stops playing back, and it makes no cut. This is a solid hour of wedding footage that I REALLY don't want to have to edit without multiclip. Any ideas what I am doing wrong?

Adobe people are becoming exaggerated?

Kihlian — Mon, 16 Jan 2012 14:41:26 +0000

I use for mi work thys 3 software: Premiere, Photoshop and After Effects. Powerful tools that complement each other very well and allow wonderful things. But I am more and more 'pissed at Adobe, for the upgrade policy, for the continuos new releases without real news, for the price. In photoshop normal people use only few tools and can do the same work probably with Gimp, and the more people use Gimp and donate to him (like here) and more and better can become. I will ask to you what alternatives (better open source) could we have to Premiere and After Effects.

AE CS5 as a simple timeline editor

stoney — Thu, 05 Jan 2012 04:27:01 +0000

I've been jumping between PP CS5 and AE CS5 where AE edited one clip at a time.

Currently I'm trying to use AE as the only editor. Importing, trimming, ripple insert, overlay insert, footage replacement, fading in/out effect, render queue, change default options, a lot of cool shortcuts, etc. All good except a few things.

RAM Preview was the only way to hear the sound, but it's so freaking slow to render. I have 8GB RAM. Anyone knows how to preview sound quickly? Launch external player? Increase RAM?

Once a MTS footage has been trimmed and inserted as a layer, is there a way to export the trimmed layer to DNxHD and automatically replace the content of the layer with the newly generated DNxHD file? This would shorten the transcoding process, save a lot of disk space, and fasten the color correction afterward.

When a layer's trim length changes, any easy way to ripple it to layers below it?

Thank you in advance.

After Effects from a N00b

itimjim — Mon, 02 Jan 2012 09:47:38 +0000

We shot part of our first short film earlier last year as a bit of an exercise for learning film making. The rushes were adequate in quality, but there were things all over the place that were wrong...and still are :-). Oh, and we're doing the acting ourselves for now, as we don't have the heart to involve anyone who can even remotely act, to our amateur film crew. This exercise has put us a few steps closer to feeling more confident however.

Anyway, in an effort over Christmas, having a little time to myself, I decided to embark on learning a bit more about After Effects. And what better footage to work on than our incomplete short. We'd done a few edits and quick grades, but nothing serious, so now was the time.

First of all, the script called for this to be set at night time, and we'd shot in the daylight. Plus, there was supposed to be a character that magically appears in the garage, and we'd left the bloody side door open! We also wanted to add some form of special effects, knowing full well it would look cheesy, we just didn't want it to look like we'd drawn them on with crayons.

I've put together a few screencasts of our learning process and what we did, and I just thought they might be useful to anyone that is very new to all of this. These are by no means tutorials though, just commentary around what we did, why and our learning experience.

After Effects Door Removal Clone Tool (Part 1)

After Effects Door Removal Clone Tool (Part 2)

Learning After Effects Commentary: Crop, Levels, Day for Night

Learning After Effects Commentary: Light Effects and Motion Tracking

And here was the result of my learning efforts, which I was quite pleased with considering how much of a novice I am.

Camera: Panasonic GH2 (Unhacked)
Lens(es): Panasonic 14-140 4-5.8
Software: After Effects/Premiere Pro CS5.5, 5DtoRGB Batch, Red Giant (Looks, Shine), Video CoPilot (Optical Flares)

Hope its useful to someone.

Tim

Linux Users. How ya Livin?

mee — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 12:12:37 +0000

Just thought it would be nice to start a thread for Linux users to share which distro they are using, what programs they are using, how they are using them, and maybe some examples of their work. Personally every time I go back to Windows I cringe, and I would love some inspiration from some fellow Linux users. Personally I bounce between Mephis, Zorin, and Linux Mint, but have tested at least 20 other distro's.