Hi Dave -

Help us out a bit... by "network crawl", do you mean lower third? new ticker?

... and what do you mean by "n lines" and "n/2". It may not be secret code to you, but it has me baffled

Cheers - Tony
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Hi Tony,

Yes, I want to crop out the bottom portion of the screen (maybe only 10%-15%), which often contains a scrolling stock ticker, latest football scores, breaking news headlines, etc.

Now let's say the above is the bottom 70 "lines" of the screen/video. After cropping those lines away, I would like to replace them with black, and then move the entire remaining visible portion of the clip down by 35 (i.e., 70/2) lines, so that there is an equal amount of black at the top and the bottom, such that the video is vertically centered on the screen.

Does that help? Sorry for the confusion, and thanks for replying!

Dave

Ah! "n" as in algebra. I got it.

The specifics of this depend on the actual (vertical) position of the scores/logos you need to block out, but the approach can be the same. Three easy possibilities:

• Crop the video with first & last keyframes set the same (screenshot attached) - you lose a bit of top/bottom/side vision, but no black bars. Steps shown here - https://youtu.be/qLZUyFsNqEc


• Apply colour boards to top and bottom (screenshot & instructions attached)


• Use a premade overlay with black top & bottom & transparent centre section (screenshot attached). I'd attach the actual overlay, but it won't match up with your video. You'll see in the screenshot, it doesn't block the news logo properly.

Cheers - Tony
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Hi Tony,

Thanks for the great guidance, I appreciate and think I essentially understand - but I'm still struggling getting things to work.

In the Power Tools Crop/Zoom, it looks like I can use the blue circle in the middle of the clip to drag the clip "down" in order to crop the bottom area that I want to get rid of. And when the clip is moved "down", it looks like black does fill in at the top of the clip/screen. Is that right?

So let's say I want to get rid of the bottom 80 lines of a clip and keep all the others, and have 40 black lines at the top and bottom when all is said and done. If I move the clip "down" so that 40 lines (of the 80) at the bottom are cropped, 40 black lines appear to be added at the top. That leaves 40 lines at the bottom still to be "removed". It seems like I could apply a black overlay of 40 lines at the bottom. And then I'd be done. Is that right?

I'm also struggling with keyframes. It doesn't seem like I'm duplicating them correctly - the entire clip doesn't seem to be affected.

Finally, is there any way to precisely/exactly specify (or monitor) the number of lines cropped, as opposed to simply dragging the box and guessing?

Sorry for my ignorance but I'm very grateful for the help, and I have to believe there are others who could also benefit.

Thanks again,
Dave B.

Hi Dave -

Sorry - maybe I threw too many options at you.

If you post a screen shot of your video (take a snapshot in PDR) showing where the bits are you want to crop out or disguise, we'll be able to give you more accurate guidance with you particular clip.

In Crop Video, you're not actually moving the clip anywhere on the screen - you're telling PDR where to crop it. If you need to move the clip up, down or sideways, you'd do that in PiP Designer or in the Preview window.

If I understand you correctly, you want to end up with a 40px (lines) black bar top & bottom. The attached overlay would achieve that - no cropping - just drop the overlay in a higher numbered track... er - assuming you're working with a 1920x1080 video.

Cheers - Tony
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Ooops - missed a couple of your questions.

I'm also struggling with keyframes. It doesn't seem like I'm duplicating them correctly - the entire clip doesn't seem to be affected.

Duplicating keyframes in any part of PDR effectively means NO CHANGE. i.e. zo zoom, no resizing, no motion, no nothing So - if there is a keyframe at the start and another at the end & they're both the same NOTHING happens.

Finally, is there any way to precisely/exactly specify (or monitor) the number of lines cropped, as opposed to simply dragging the box and guessing?

Unfortunately, NO. It's mostly guesswork. Using the grids helps, but you're still relying on your eyes. The overlay I attached, however is pixel accurate.

Cheers - Tony
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Hi Tony,

Thank you again. I think I (finally!) understand how to work with the keyframes across the entire clip. For anyone else's reference who might be reading this: make the changes at one keyframe (ex. the one at the beginning of the clip), jump to the other keyframe (ex. the one at the end of the clip), click the "duplicate" button and click the appropriate popup menu choice (ex. "Duplicate Previous Keyframe"). The changes are then copied across the whole clip uniformly. Now that I understand how to execute it, I'm embarrassed at how simple it is!

I also discovered the useful view magnification selection at the bottom right of the Crop/Zoom window - selecting a value >= 200% helps me to see exactly which lines are being cropped.

So, it turns out the actual number of lines that I want to crop from the bottom is 36 (not 80). So here's what I'm planning to do:

1) Use the Crop to crop 18 lines from the bottom. When I drag the clip "down" to do the crop (using the blue circle), 18 black lines fill in at the top in the result, which is actually what I want!

2) Use an 18-pixel/line height overlay in another track (as you described) to mask the remaining 18 lines at the bottom.

End result - bottom 36 lines gone, replaced with 18 lines of black at the top and bottom. All other lines of the clip are retained; and the aspect ratio unchanged.

That's the theory anyway - hopefully the practice matches!

One more question - I have a total of 7 clips that I want to apply this same set of modifications too. Is there any "shortcut" way to make the changes across all 7 clips at once, or do I need to repeat the modifications for each clip?

Thank you again for your patience as I learn and your willingness to help!!!

Dave B.

Hi Dave -

Glad you're getting the result you're after. Yes - you are getting on top of the keyframe concept!

Unfortunately, with Crop/Zoom, there's no shortcut. You need to crop each clip separately. You could, if you wanted, produce the 7 clips to a single video file then apply crop/zoom/overlay to the combined group. That would work best if they were to be sequenced li8ke that in the final timeline.

There are other parts of PDR where you can use the copy/paste keyframe attributes feature - that saves a mountain of time, but it doesn't apply to crop/zoom.

Cheers - Tony
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Hi Tony,

Just one quick sanity-check question...

Thank you - it's a great idea to produce all the clips into one movie, then reimport and apply these changes to just the single movie clip. My question has to do with any re-encoding/loss of quality. If the original video clips are all H.264 720p60, and the clips are edited and produced as the same then reimported, edited again (cropped, overlay, etc.) as a single clip, and produced again as the same, is it the case that there shouldn't be any rencoding or quailty loss from the original? If so, what if during the "produce" steps, one of the "fast video rendering technology" options like SVRT is selected - would that have any effect?

I really appreciate your willingness to answer all these questions!

Dave B.

Dave -

That pre-producing suggestion is less-than-ideal, especially as the video had already been processed before you started working with it.

You can avoid further quality loss by doing just as you've said... produce to H.264 720p 60 matching the video bitrates - edit the combined produced clip - then reproduce using the same profile.

Yes - if there's an SVRT profile available, use that. All the better.

Cheers - Tony
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Thanks Tony - just one follow-up question to what you said:

> That pre-producing suggestion is less-than-ideal, especially as the video had already been processed before you started working with it.

So even if the original video is 720p60 and the "produce" result is 720p60 (at the same or greater bitrate), you're saying that importing the original video into PD always results in some processing/quality loss? (In other words, initial video import always results in some quality loss?) Just making sure I understand...

(But as you said, reimporting after producing, editing again, and producing again to 720p60 at the same or greater bitrate won't result in any *further* loss.)

All of this is very interesting...

Dave B.

Hi Dave -

My response was a bit "guarded" because of the unknown - we don't know anything about how that video was processed before you started working on it... unless I'm misunderstanding the situation.

If it had been an original clip straight off the camera, you could be more certain about the end product. I did some tests here - http://forum.cyberlink.com/forum/posts/list/46380.page#240531

Anyway Dave - you'll see immediately whether the pre-producing process has any detrimental effects.

Cheers - Tony
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Ah, OK. Thanks for the link/examples. Yes, the original clips are straight video captures at 720p60 (using a Hauppauge HD PVR2) and as such haven't been "touched" by anything else before I use PD with them. I understand that of course PD needs to do some processing when it loads clips and reencoding when it produces movies... but as you say, if the _format_ was the same throughout the process (720p60) I was just wondering how significant that reencoding might ultimately be.

Based on all I've learned, I'm guessing the quality of the result will be fine. I'll let you know - it's been hard lately to find time to actually try most of this! :^)

Dave B.

Hi Tony,

A positive update and another question...

Thanks to you, I managed to crop the bottom and wind up with the black bands on the top and bottom as I wanted! So I am very grateful and hope this will help someone else who has the same simple editing need.

I do have another question regarding SVRT rendering during production. The first time I produced the video, it was to merge the clips into one (per your suggestion) so that I would only need to apply the crop and black color boards to the one resulting clip. On the "Produce" screen, I was able to choose SVRT rendering during this production - and it went quickly and the quality looked good. The file size was 4.1 GB for 42 minutes of video.

After that was completed, I imported the new "merged clips video" back into PD and applied the crop and the black color board, and again all went great. However, when I went to produce again, I could *not* select the SVRT rendering as before - only the Intel Quick Sync Video (which I did not select). This time, the production took much, much longer, as no fast renderer had been selected. And, the resulting video was over 7.3 GB for the same 42 minutes in length! So my question is: Should I be able to select SVRT rendering again during this second (final) production? Why was the final video file size so much larger? What (if anything) am I doing wrong, or don't I understand?

Thank you again for all the help,
Dave B.

Dave -

Yes - that's what you'd expect. SVRT would be available if your source clips could be matched by a PDR profile (i.e. no re-rendering is required).

After you brought that combined produced clip back into the timeline, SVRT would still be available BUT not once you apply an overlay or crop the video... because it's been edited the whole thing has to be re-rendered. So - yes - the render time would be much greater.

I can't account for the massive difference in file size, but it would depend on the exact edits that were made and the profile used for production.

Cheers - Tony
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Hi Tony,

Thanks for the reply - I found the "SVRT track" display option in the timeline and this seems to bear all this out. What I did before the first production (cutting and adding cross-fade transitions) apparently did not require re-rendering ("timeline_1.jpg") and allowed me to select SVRT for the production ("produce_screen_1.jpg"). But what I did before the second production (cropping and adding a black color board track to the timeline) apparently did require re-rendering ("timeline_2.jpg", as you said) and did not allow me to select SVRT for the production ("produce_screen_2.jpg" - attached to next reply).

One thing I noticed between timeline_1 (i.e. after only cut and fade edits) and timeline_2 (after first production, reimport, and crop and color board edits) is that the SVRT analysis for the two was different. In timeline_1 the analysis indicated that the existing "AVC 1280x720 60p (24Mbps)" profile could/should be chosen for production. In timeline_2 the analysis indicated a "Custom Profile" should be chosen - the only apparent difference being the bitrates (timeline_1: 22.500K; timeline_2: 12.654K). However, in the Produce screen I could not see how to create such a Custom Profile.

I'm wondering how/why the bitrate changed? And it went *down* from 22.500K to 12.654K. When I produced the second movie, I used the existing "AVC 1280x720 60p (24Mbps)" profile since I didn't know how to create the recommended Custom Profile. Did choosing a higer bit rate than what was indicated by the SVRT analysis somehow cause the resulting file to be so much larger?

I hope I'm not monopolizing your time too much, but there's so much to learn/understand and I'm hoping others can folow along and learn as well...

Thank you again,

Dave B.

...attachments...

Dave -

I can't explain the difference in "suggested" bitrates. When I replicate the process here, the SVRT profile & the suggested custom profile are in the same ballpark. 24000 vs 21800

If you have increased the bitrate from the initial render, that would explain the greater file size. VBR is the most significant factor.

After you've done your cropping etc, the best thing to do is just produce to EXACTLY the same profile you used in the first place. That minimises loss of quality.

Cheers - Tony
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Quote: I'm wondering how/why the bitrate changed? And it went *down* from 22.500K to 12.654K. When I produced the second movie, I used the existing "AVC 1280x720 60p (24Mbps)" profile since I didn't know how to create the recommended Custom Profile. Did choosing a higer bit rate than what was indicated by the SVRT analysis somehow cause the resulting file to be so much larger?

SVRT is affected by the colorboard content in video track 2. As proof, slide the colorboard down the timeline a bit so it does not start at 0:00 and remove the "orange i" enhancment from the video then do Alt+S to refresh the SVRT information. You will probably recover your orignal profile.

SVRT really does not matter here once you add the colorboard, the entire timeline needs to be encoded anyhow. You have also applied some type of correction, the "orange i", would have been better to do that initially.

Jeff