multicam question & 1st impressions

[Jason Ramsey]

First post in the Canopus forum. whoo! I am trying out the demo version of edius right now. I have resolved to wait a couple weeks to see what Barry is talking about with vegas, but as of right now, I think I am going to be an Edius man :)
Anyways, one quick question, and a comment on the layout.
question: on multi cam, I want to be able to switch back and forth between audio as I switch from video feed to video feed. As of right now, all the audio is playing at the same time. How can I do this?

The layout is interesting. The first time I loaded it up I just stared at it for a few minutes like... uhm, huh? But I am slowly but surely figuring it out. One thing that is just weird as anything though... The video tracks on the timeline. the first one has its own "scrollbar" and all of the others have one combined scrollbar. make sense? for example, if i have four clips on the time line in four seperate tracks, track 1 is alone. then the other 3 tracks I have to scroll back and forth to see them.
I was looking at a tutorial to make it look like ppro. It was kinda interesting because they explained this absolutely weird way of making edius capable of letting you bring in a clip and it automatically putting the video and the audio on seperate "tracks". that was cool, cause its similar to vegas that way. except i can't organize them how i want (that i know of). all the video are from bottom to top on the video section of the timeline. (1 is on bottom, 4 is on top) then all of the audio do the same thing below that. so if i am looking at track 4 it is all the way at the top for the video, and the audio is at the very bottom. They just get further and further apart. I wish i could rearrange it all independently. like i have track 1 of video on top and track 2 below that, and maybe the audio clips for each one inbetween, whatever. So to sum up my ramblings, the layout seems kinda weird, maybe incomplete. Don't know if there is any difference from the demo version and the release of broadcast 4 though, or if i can customize in the manner that i am talking about but don't know how. Other than that. I am finding it not too difficult to figure out how things work. Its not to bad.
I saw how in a tut video though, that they had several palettes snapped togethor. where you just clip the tab for each one to get what you need instead of trying to spread it out over the whole screen. without dual displays it is definitely not easy to fit everything on my screen without being able to do that ( again similar to vegas). but this i know you can do :)
anyways, sorry for the long post ( again) and if you can find my questions in here, any feedback would be appreciated.
thanks a bunch
Jason

[bhiga]

Hi Jason,

If you use VA tracks (instead of V tracks) for each virtual camera, when you cut between them, it'll mute the audio of the cameras that aren't selected.

This won't however, work if you have audio and video off, as only V and VA tracks can be made virtual cameras.

Personally I prefer to use VA tracks for audio that's associated with video - makes it easier to keep track of. I use the A tracks for unassociated audio.

Yeah, 1 VA always wants to be "seen" - I could swear at one point there was an option to turn this off, but I can't seem to find it anymore... Maybe I was dreaming. I'd like all the tracks to go together though.

As for the palettes, you can "dock" Bin/Information/Effect/Marker together. I prefer to dock Bin/Effect/Marker together and leave Information separate as that's where you see the filters/keyers on the selected clip (also how you get to bring up the settings for filters/keyers).

For single-monitor use, I switch the Monitor window to Single mode (View|Single Mode), move the docked Bin/Effect/Marker window to the upper-right, put the Information window to the left of that (between Monitor and Bin), and stretch the Timeline across the bottom.

But that's just me. Remember that you can save multiple different layouts too, so you can switch between different arrangements depending on what you're doing, similar to how Premiere Pro has different layout "modes."

We should be getting a new trial with Broadcast features very soon now, but things are a bit crazy since we all leave for IBC next week.

Brandon

[Jason Ramsey]

hey brandon,
Thanks for the reply. Using the va tracks instead solves half of the problem. On playback it plays only the audio of the selected feed, but on edit (when i am selecting the cams) it only plays the audio of the initial cam i started with and does not switch. Please tell me i am just stupid and that is not the way it works. Otherwise it is pointless unless I am cutting music videos or something with an independent audio stream. I can make it switch audio with the cam while I am making the edits between the various cams right?
One more question. In project settings to the left on the bottom of that window... the field order... it only seems to do bottom field first. Since I am working with interlaced and seem to be getting some nasty lines with any movement, i was hoping to change this. Can I without actually changing the properties of each individual clip, which doesn't seem to be solving the problem. Then again I haven't messed with it much yet either. Can I not change the field order in the project properties? Sorry for the rudimentary q's but I am not too experienced yet, and the canopus part of this forum isn't to popular yet:) nobody to say "dummy, if you did a search you would see that this topic has been discussed a million times" :) i am looking forward to those days though
anyways. thanks
Jason

[bhiga]

Hi Jason,

When you make the initial run-through with Multi Cam, you will hear all the audio from all the tracks.

After the tracks are cut with Multi Cam, you hear only the audio from the selected shots, as the other parts will be disabled.

Switching to a different camera, assuming they're all VA tracks, will switch both the audio and video.

Essentially what EDIUS does is it cuts all the camera tracks at each switch point, and disables all the clips in the camera tracks except the selected one. That effectively mutes video (and audio on a VA track) for the non-selected cameras.

The design is such that you're switching based on what you see, versus what you hear, since with only stereo output (well, you can 8-channel if you have EDIUS HD, but...) it's hard to tell which audio belong to which camera.

On the interlacing front, most likely everything is set up correctly and you're just seeing interlacing artifacts in the preview, because the computer preview is progressive. Try switching the Overlay to ODD or EVEN field display, instead of FRAME in the View menu.

Brandon

[Jason Ramsey]

ok. great. thanks again. It would be nice if the audio switched on setting of multicam as well, though. ah well.
Thanks for all the help. I do like the software so far. in general I am finding the effects to be fairly robust. I haven't found any pan/zoom options, and am under the understanding they may not be there.
One other minor annoyance is working with the transitions. It just seems picky sometimes when I am trying to place a transition between 2 clips. I really do miss the vegas interface, of just overlapping the clips however far i want, and then placing the transition, as opposed to placing the transition, and then lengthening or shortening it.
Anyways, thanks again for all the help.
Jason

[bhiga]

ok. great. thanks again. It would be nice if the audio switched on setting of multicam as well, though. ah well.
Hi again Jason,

Can you describe what you'd like to happen? Somehow I feel like I'm not completely understanding what you mean, or we're out of sync here...


I haven't found any pan/zoom options, and am under the understanding they may not be there.
The 2D Picture-in-Picture and 3D Picture-in-Picture keyers will do some of that. Both are keyframable.


It just seems picky sometimes when I am trying to place a transition between 2 clips.
Depends on what the "Extend clip length at transition" setting is. If it's on, then a transition will only be placed between two adjacent clips if there is enough header/trailer available on the clip to extend it to cover the transition. You can check this easily by placing two untrimmed clips on the timeline next to each other. If you can't put a transition between them, then Extend clip... is on.

This is actually a useful feature for keeping things in sync though, as the timeline length doesn't change when you put a transition in. Very important if you have to adhere to a fixed-length timeline.


I really do miss the vegas interface, of just overlapping the clips however far i want, and then placing the transition, as opposed to placing the transition, and then lengthening or shortening it.
Yeah, that's a little different... You can right-click the transition and set its duration to a precise value after placing it.


Anyways, thanks again for all the help.
You're welcome. :)

Brandon

[Jason Ramsey]

Hey thanks again for the reply.

in regards to multicam... I am saying that while i am playing the footage and actually choosing which cam I want, it would be nice if the audio switched each time i assign a new cam, not just when I play it back after I assigned the cams. Make sense? Not really a big deal on that one though, as i think i am finding workarounds for it.

I figured out a better way (for me) of doing transitions. I just put the clips on seperate tracks and i can overlap them that way. then i can place the transition on the top track, and when i drag it, it will snap to the clip below. That's probably the way everyone does it, i don't know. It's cool though. very easy that way. Just have to put things on different tracks when i want a transition effect.

Also figured out how to do transitions on my multicam edits. just extend the section of the track that is about to become the active camera back if it is on top. Or extend the currently running cam forward into the track that is about to be active. then just insert the transition as described above. yay. again probably common knowledge for all of you folks, but it was exciting for me none the less. One could cruise through some 2 cam live event stuff like this.

Thanks for all your help brandon.

Sincerely,
Jason
p.s. the more i am using this trial version, the more i am falling in love with it, and the less I miss vegas. :) woooo!

[bhiga]

in regards to multicam... I am saying that while i am playing the footage and actually choosing which cam I want, it would be nice if the audio switched each time i assign a new cam, not just when I play it back after I assigned the cams. Make sense? Not really a big deal on that one though, as i think i am finding workarounds for it.
Ahh, got it. Yeah, I see what you're saying. The problem is that the cut-points aren't added/replaced until after you stop playback, so it just keeps playing whatever was enabled before you started playback.


I figured out a better way (for me) of doing transitions. I just put the clips on seperate tracks and i can overlap them that way. then i can place the transition on the top track, and when i drag it, it will snap to the clip below. That's probably the way everyone does it, i don't know. It's cool though. very easy that way. Just have to put things on different tracks when i want a transition effect.
Yup, that's one way you can do it. However, I usually use single track transitions because...

After you set your multi cam sequence as you like it, you can Compress to single track, which will copy all the selected shots to a single track back-to-back (you'll have options for using a track that isn't a camera, or making a new track).

You'll notice the clips on the track are darker than the others - that's because they're already selected for you.

Then, you go back to Normal mode (F5), and since all the clips are already selected, just drag a transition over a gap and boom you get the transition between all the clips!

You can still go back and change individual transitions by simply dragging another transition over it too.

It's a convenient feature that existed before the multi cam function, but now it's even more convenient.


Thanks for all your help brandon.
No problem! EDIUS may not be the most feature-rich NLE out there yet, but it's pretty darn cool for a lot of situations.


p.s. the more i am using this trial version, the more i am falling in love with it, and the less I miss vegas. :) woooo!
You'll still probably end up going back to Vegas for audio-oriented stuff, but hey, nobody's good at everything, heh. It's all about choosing the right tool for the job.... or constantly reconfiguring your Dremel tool for the task at hand, heh.

Brandon
PS: I'm off to Europe for IBC, so I won't be around for the next 2 weeks or so.

[Jason Ramsey]

i'll have to try what you are saying about multi cam transitions. don't quite get it just reading it.

I'll just load up sound forge for my audio. I can do that right

have fun at ibc. your presence will be missed here as the canopus section of dvx user isn't so busy. YET!
jason

[bhiga]

Hi Jason,

Quick reply to get you on your way before I go start packing and stuff...

Create enough VA tracks for your multi cam shoot.
Enter Multi Cam mode (F8)
Put your shots on the VA tracks.
Make sure the tracks are assigned camera numbers (the little C's near the track labels)
Play through and switch back and forth.
Go to Mode | Compress to Single Track (it's toward the bottom)
Choose New Track from the drop-down for convenience - that'll create a new track.
Go back to Normal Mode (F5)
Expand the Transitions group in the Effects palette.
Choose your favorite effect (Dissolve, Circle, whatever) and drag it over the clips on new track.
You should get transitions added between all the clips.
Hide/mute, or delete the "camera" tracks (note that if you delete them, you can't go back and make adjustments to your cuts, so I usually hide/mute them).
Play the timeline - you should get all your shots with transition and audio crossfade between each shot.

We'll have more How To's for the new stuff in EDIUS 4 on the website very soon - we've just been really busy with the IBC preparations.

If the above didn't make sense, just keep playing with it. I'm sure you'll get the hang of it.

Have fun!
Brandon

[Jason Ramsey]

makes perfect sense. thanks a bunch. and you have fun at ibc. lucky punk :)
Jaosn

[deebee69]

Is there a bug here or is it me?
Ive copied your workflow for multicam,however I cant see the transition after compressing to single file.whilst working in multicam mine dosent show me a live play back of the transition applied.
When I click on the multicam icon and come out of the multicam feature Ican then get a live preview of the transition.
Why is this? this makes applying transitions awkward
Any ideas?

[Jason Ramsey]

i'm not quite following you, but if i remember correctly i think you do have to come out of multicam (hit f5) if you compressed to a single track. Also, Brandon said you can mute the multicam tracks so you just have the compressed track active.
When you say transition are you saying you are actually applying a transition or just the switch from cam to cam?

[deebee69]

Thanks Jason
I think after rebooting up today the transitions seem to be going on and can be previewed ok in either multicam on or off mode
Maybe yesterday edius 4 broadcast got a bit buggy and sticky but they seem tobe working ok today .
However Im in the compressed to single track mode today as this is how far i got yesterday when i saved the project.
I will try and repeat the multicam setup again useing 5 tracks or monitors and let you know if Im still having difficulties.
Thanks for your help and must ad that so far edius 4.01 seems to cope very well with p2 mxf files from the hvx [we must keep in touch].

[Jason Ramsey]

ok. make sure you don't upgrade to 4.02 though. apparently (according to the canopus forum) it has created some problems. One of which has to do with multicam, if I remember correctly. 4.03 is supposed to be coming very soon though ( at least the beta version), I think.
Sounds good. Yeah let me know. I am just kinda learning on Edius right now, as I am screwing around with the Trial version of 4 pro, before I upgrade all my equipment.
Jason