Has Vegas improved with HVX200 compatability?

DavidBeier

DavidBeier

Veteran
I'm about to build a new computer rig and may end up changing editors. I'm still not gonna buy a MAC so Final Cut Pro is out and I have a powerful hatred of Premiere.

For the last five years or so, I've been using Avid Xpress Pro. Now I just found out that it's being discontinued and merged into Media Composer. I'm debating if I want to stay with Avid or perhaps give Vegas a try.

I've heard some wonderful things about Vegas in the past. That it's powerful and very easy to use. One thing that kept me away however was its inability to play nice with panasonic MXF files and P2 cards. I don't want to have to get another utility to convert all my footage. I just want to be able to quickly and easily import the files into the program and start editing.

So, have things gotten better? How does one go about editing HVX200 footage with Vegas? Is Vegas comparable to Avid Xpress Pro in things like color correction?

Thanks.
 
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(Vegas will never support Panny MXF files but, since they are competitors they made a deal to allow raylight to work so user could edit with this workaround)If you get raylight you can drag and drop MXF files right into vegas without rendering. When your done editing, render out to whatever. Vegas 8b is buggy use 7 or 8a. Not sure how it compares to Avid, but I refuse to use Premier also.
 
I'm not so sure they made a "deal" to "allow" Raylight to work; it would have worked regardless. They were, however, according to Marcus, very helpful in the development of Raylight.
 
*sigh*

Sony strikes me as powerfully stupid on this issue. Refusing to support Panasonic MXF is beyond idiotic. I don't care if they're competitors, it makes little to no difference as far as camera sales go. Someone isn't going to buy a different camera in the price range of $4,000-$9,000 just so it'll work with a $500 NLE. Sony is just throwing away business. Fox stations all around the country and numerous filmmakers and videographers have already made the choice to go with Panasonic and DVCProHD. Sony could be easily taking a lot of business away from Avid and Premiere but apparently just doesn't want the extra cash. Once again...idiotic.
 
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DavidBeier said:
*sigh*

Sony strikes me as powerfully stupid on this issue. Refusing to support Panasonic MXF is beyond idiotic. I don't care if they're competitors, it makes little to no difference as far as camera sales go. Someone isn't going to buy a different camera in the price range of $4,000-$9,000 just so it'll work with a $500 NLE. Sony is just throwing away business. Fox stations all around the country and numerous filmmakers and videographers have already made the choice to go with Panasonic and DVCProHD. Sony could be easily taking a lot of business away from Avid and Premiere but apparently just doesn't want the extra cash. Once again...idiotic.
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No it isn't. We've sold many copies of Raylight to Fox stations and to other stations as well. The extra $195 is not a big deal to them. Technically it makes no difference if the plugin is supplied by Sony or not. On the other hand sales of Raylight support DVXUSER since we purchase a banner ad here every month. Sales of raylight have allowed us to introduce other products that assist HVX users such as Raylight MXFX, Raylight for Mac, and Raylight Decoder. We have an improved version of the raylight plugin coming soon called Raylight ULTRA which will have metadata slates and faster playback. Also with our support staff (four people now) we are far more responsive to customer needs and provide better support than Sony.

The biggest problem with Vegas is not the MXF suppport but the RGB pipeline which does not take full advantage of DirectShow. That's why Edius is faster for example. But Vegas audio features easily trump Edius and Vegas is much more stable than Premiere, and so IMHO Vegas+Raylight is the best choice for HVX editing on the PC.
 
DavidBeier said:
Sony strikes me as powerfully stupid on this issue. Refusing to support Panasonic MXF is beyond idiotic. I don't care if they're competitors, it makes little to no difference as far as camera sales go. Someone isn't going to buy a different camera in the price range of $4,000-$9,000 just so it'll work with a $500 NLE. Sony is just throwing away business. Fox stations all around the country and numerous filmmakers and videographers have already made the choice to go with Panasonic and DVCProHD. Sony could be easily taking a lot of business away from Avid and Premiere but apparently just doesn't want the extra cash. Once again...idiotic.
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Seems to me that it's Panasonic which is to blame for not doing more to make DVCProHD a universally supported format. If it was just Sony being stubborn, why don't all other NLEs and the Windows OS have built-in DVCProHD support? What's the licensing cost these days to use DVCProHD?
 
Back to the originial question, I've found that Vegas works works seamlessly with the MXF files and Raylight. I don't have to open Raylight or do anything with it unless I want to convert MXF to AVI (handy for working in programs outside of the NLE). In fact, the MXF files work with Boris Red 4.2 right in Vegas with no issues at all, which is great for titling and effects within Vegas. As I said earlier, I can also use the standalone Boris program with the AVI's created with Raylight, which is great for more complex composites that can't be done in Vegas because of limitations in Vegas (only the current frame is passed to a third party plug-in).

I also like the "bin" structure in Vegas for sorting files in a project. Until we get more access to metadata, it is an easy way to keep cards and files straight. Color correction is improved as well and you can get some interesting results in 32 bit mode.

I also like the audio capabilities with Vegas, both built-in and as add-ons. Sound Forge works seamlessly handing files back and forth; and Cinescore also works faultlessly to provide interesting backgrounds at a reasonable price.

I don't know about other NLE's, but if you avoid the common gotcha's in Vegas (limit images to under 2K, change the video settings for more memory and less core threads), then you should be good to go with few problems. I often find myself with multiple programs open and Vegas still plugging along without a hiccup.

Mark G
www.newmediadevcorp.com
 
mvb said:
No it isn't. We've sold many copies of Raylight to Fox stations and to other stations as well. The extra $195 is not a big deal to them. Technically it makes no difference if the plugin is supplied by Sony or not. On the other hand sales of Raylight support DVXUSER since we purchase a banner ad here every month. Sales of raylight have allowed us to introduce other products that assist HVX users such as Raylight MXFX, Raylight for Mac, and Raylight Decoder. We have an improved version of the raylight plugin coming soon called Raylight ULTRA which will have metadata slates and faster playback. Also with our support staff (four people now) we are far more responsive to customer needs and provide better support than Sony.

The biggest problem with Vegas is not the MXF suppport but the RGB pipeline which does not take full advantage of DirectShow. That's why Edius is faster for example. But Vegas audio features easily trump Edius and Vegas is much more stable than Premiere, and so IMHO Vegas+Raylight is the best choice for HVX editing on the PC.
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There's some functionality which would be nice.

1) 1080/24p (2:3) support.

2) The ability to bring in all four audio channels with the video (though this may be a Vegas limitation)

Nice to hear about the addition of meta data support.
 
Kevin Shaw said:
Seems to me that it's Panasonic which is to blame for not doing more to make DVCProHD a universally supported format. If it was just Sony being stubborn, why don't all other NLEs and the Windows OS have built-in DVCProHD support? What's the licensing cost these days to use DVCProHD?
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Kevin, please don't start trolling here without reading the history. EVERY professional NLE on the Windows OS provides DVCPRO-HD support. Avid, SpeedEdit, Premiere, EDIUS, even Liquid has it. All the Autodesk products have it. Everybody has it. Native, built-in, proper MXF support from the factory. The only major NLE that doesn't have it is Sony Vegas. Surprise, surprise.

And you can get a FREE DVCPRO-HD codec on the Windows OS. Two of them, actually. You can download it for free from Avid for Quicktime, or you can install the Windows Media Player free codec when you install the P2 Viewer.
 
Wadro said:
(Vegas will never support Panny MXF files but, since they are competitors they made a deal to allow raylight to work so user could edit with this workaround)If you get raylight you can drag and drop MXF files right into vegas without rendering. When your done editing, render out to whatever. Vegas 8b is buggy use 7 or 8a. Not sure how it compares to Avid, but I refuse to use Premier also.
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I just got my Vegas Pro 8 a few days ago. I was wondering how do I know if it is an 8a or 8b? I will be getting my Raylight this weekend.

How well does vegas handle 1080i 24/pa or would I need to film in 720p 24pn?
 
David Jimerson said:
There's some functionality which would be nice.

1) 1080/24p (2:3) support.
Click to expand...

I don't know if Raylight will ever be able to do that real time
because sometimes you have to decompress 2 frames to get one.

However Raylight MXFX can pre-process 3:2 pulldown in 1080 line format and output 24P MXF files which are importable into Vegas.


2) The ability to bring in all four audio channels with the video (though this may be a Vegas limitation)
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That will definitely be in, as an option.
 
New_Zealand said:
I just got my Vegas Pro 8 a few days ago. I was wondering how do I know if it is an 8a or 8b? I will be getting my Raylight this weekend.

How well does vegas handle 1080i 24/pa or would I need to film in 720p 24pn?
Click to expand...

The Raylight plugin handles 24PA and removes the pulldown automatically.
 
You might want to look at the "Corrado" sticky in User Films. Adam filmed with HVX and is editing with Vegas 8. He just posted a screen shot of the timeline and says the editing is going very well. Maybe worth checking.
 
Kevin Shaw said:
Seems to me that it's Panasonic which is to blame for not doing more to make DVCProHD a universally supported format. If it was just Sony being stubborn, why don't all other NLEs and the Windows OS have built-in DVCProHD support? What's the licensing cost these days to use DVCProHD?
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????

Ummm...huh? All the other pro NLEs do support MXF. In fact, not only do they support it but Premiere, Avid, and Edius all brag about their P2 and DVCProHD support on their websites and the boxes since they know how many people use Panasonic P2 camera and DVCPro HD. Regaurdless of one's opinion on the Pansonic P2 cameras, they have been enormously successful in the market. That's why Sony's decision is so perplexing to me. It's just throwing away a large number of potential clients and with absolutely no real gain. Like I said before, I'm not going to buy a different camera in the $5,000 price range just so it will play nice with a $500 NLE. And yes while Raylight seems like a decent work-around and one I'd probably use if I already had Vegas, I'm not going to invest in a product that apparently isn't interested in playing nice with my footage. I've actually decided to stick with Avid and modify my specs since I like its workflow, memory-management, power, and the MXF support (I'll get a version of Premiere from a friend as a back-up). This was perhaps the closest I've ever come to jumping ship from Avid and, had Sony not put his silly bottle-neck on things, I may well have taken the plunge.
 
DavidBeier said:
????

And yes while Raylight seems like a decent work-around and one I'd probably use if I already had Vegas, I'm not going to invest in a product that apparently isn't interested in playing nice with my footage. I've actually decided to stick with Avid
Click to expand...


Avid cannot remove pulldown from P2 files without Raylight MXFX. Look at avid.com's main page and click on the featured tutorial for changing frame rates.

or click

http://tinyurl.com/avidfix

Also it will be up to MXFX most likely to bring metadata into avid (not quite ready yet).
 
I downloaded Vegas Pro 8 onto my HP laptop. I downloaded the Panasonic AG-HVX200A P2 disc (Utility Software) I think that is the disk that I needed for the p2 card.

Thought I had the PCMCIA in the laptop but ended up getting an adapter. after all is done I put in the P2 card and NOTHING. Nothing is shown. I wonder if I need to download Raylight before I would see something come up?
 
vegaspro80b_enu.exe this is the download file name.. stay away. Use vegaspro80a_enu.exe instead
 
If Sony were not "helpful" as you say, It might have worked regardless, but would probrably be more buggy than it is now. So to take the heat off (SONY) they decided to be helpfull.. Sounds like a deal to me.. But what do I know... by the way, AWESOME SOUND DVD YOU GUYS DID.. And to clear things up, if Sonic Foundry still owned Vegas it would support P2 100% from day one.. THINK ABOUT IT.
 
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