Hi Tony,

I don't know if I understand fully what you are trying to do but do you know that you can move the blue vertical line of where the video is playing one frame at a time by using the full stop and comma button?


If you the picked the exact same frame in all the tracks and split the pips at this point delete what you don't want then snapped them all to the blue vertical line, would that work?

Cheers

Robert

My youtube channel====> http://www.youtube.com/user/relate2?feature=mhsn

Oh Robert -

You had me all excited for a minute. Yes, I knew about moving the cursor/scrubber/thin blue line using the full stop and comma.

Because I'm switching (often) from one camera view to another, I've been keeping each clip whole, without splits. In the softer flowing dances, I use a bit of semi-transparent overlay (it's probably called something clever than that).

No - all I want to be able to do is nudge the whole clip one way or the other.

Mate - I really appreciate you trying to sort me out... in fact it was you who first alerted me to the full stop/comma trick. Thanks for that.

Cheers - Tony
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Hi Tony,

The only reason I mentioned the split was to have the ability to snap the videos to the same blue line, synchronising all of the pips before you start switching camera views. You may only need to split out the first second or so of each pip track. If you have them all lined up at the beginning you should not have to nudge them one way or the other during the editing process.

I use the same process with my hanggliding videos with my separate voice recorder track. I synchronise the video and separate voice recorder track at the beginning then making sure I cut out video and voice recorder both at the same time the synchronisation stays true through to the end of my editing.

I am just a novice with pips etc, so I may be barking up the wrong tree, but it may give you a inspiration to find a way that works for you.

Cheers

Robert S My youtube channel====> http://www.youtube.com/user/relate2?feature=mhsn

Robert -

Why don't you glide your way over here - I'm sure a couple of novices could work their way through it!

The attached pics show the timeline of the one I'm on now - it's number 20 of 32 - The frame is one full screen PiP, about to fade to 2 crops of the same clip over a long shot.

When can I expect you?

Cheers - Tony

Edit: change of plan - it didn't like my attachments!
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I posted the same question about the audio track a few months ago and got an answer that may work, but since I don't know how to search my previous posts, I have no idea how to find it. That doesn't help, but it means there may be an answer when the right person comes online. __________________________________
CORNBLOSSOM

I'd think Tony would be aware of that utility, if not, here it is.
http://forum.cyberlink.com/forum/posts/list/8021.page#33169

Jeff

Hi Jaime & Jeff -

Yes - believe me - I've using the magnifier built into Win7! It certainly helps, along with expanding the timeline.

I'm really not sure there IS an answer, in PD, Jaime... nor am I sure that the "right" person will have one either. We live in hope, I guess.

Cheers - Tony

Hmm - Robert must be on his way over...
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Hi Tony,

Like Robert, I am not sure I completely understand either - nor do I have a hang glider to fly over for a couple of cold ones while we go exploring.

I assume the forced "snap" to timeline is the main cause of your grief. A wild guess, but do you think this might get you closer to the holy grail ..... ?

1. Place the 3 videos and PIPS as close as you can in the timeline. Let PD do its own thing by allowing it to "snap" them horizontally.

2. Play the video with PIP1 and PIP2 to the end and take note how many milli seconds each one is out of sync with the other. Lets say PIP1 and PIP2 are out of sync x and y milli seconds each.

3. Trim the start of PIP1 and PIP2 by x and y milli seconds respectively to eliminate the error. This effectively should synchronise their start when you place them in the timeline and PD snaps to grid..

I am hoping that might give you the required result.

You could also try this method in combination with your colour board (option 2) in your original post.

Sorry if this does not quite make sense.


Cheers - Con



Windows 7 - i7 860, 8Gb RAM, 2 x 1 TB HDD, GTS 250 1Gb Video

For some reason I thought there was more to that answer. It would be nice if we could nudge any selected clip with the arrow keys, but not for now, I guess. __________________________________
CORNBLOSSOM

Wow! Something I've never noticed before. Bottom left corner of PD there is a slider. Move it all of the way to the right and it zooms on the timeline so that you can move clips a frame at a time. Does that help at all, or is that what you've already tried? Sorry, I can't answer your color board question. __________________________________
CORNBLOSSOM

Hi Everyone,

I’m probably misunderstanding the primary question here, something I often do.

But if I expand my timeline view to the max, I have always been able to easily click and drag any image, or video or audio clip, or text clip, either left or right, in increments of one single frame at a time.

Just to verify, I did a test where I...

- Expanded timeline to Max.
- Placed image in PIP1.
- Set duration of image to 00:00:00:02 (the lowest it will go).
- Placed a 32 minute video clip in PIP2.
- Opened Trim Room, zoom in view to max, verifying image (at 00:00:02) was 2 frames.**
- Clicked on video clip.
- Gently drag clip to the right, and it “snapped to” half the duration (or 1 frame) of the 2 frame image.
** (A true frame? PD refers to them as frames.)

That seems pretty precise. But again, I may not be understanding the primary question here correctly.

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Well -

That's an answer, CP!

I just replicated your procedure above and found that, with the timeline maxed out, I was able to move an image of 0:0:0:02 duration (2 frames) from an initial starting position of 0:0:5:00 to begin at 0:0:5:01.

I was also able to do that with long clips. So - the minimum snap to distance is 0:0:0:01.

Thanks to your timely pointer, I see now that - even though I was expanding the timeline - I just didn't give it enough.

I'm very hopeful that, when I try it with a real project, with bulk PiPs & overlays, that it will behave as it just did.

Cranston - I'm going to head off and attack another bunch of hip-hopping, tap dogging, toe pointing dancers and see if I can't get them all lined up and under control.

Thank you everyone - Robert, Jaime, Jeff, Con & Cranston - for taking an interest in the problem. I guess we all learn from trying to contribute & asking questions. It's very much appreciated.

Geez - how come it sounds so simple when you say it like that? And how come I didn't see it? And how come Jaime had never noticed the little zoom bar at the bottom. And Andrew hadn't heard of packing a project? Shut up, Tony!

Cheers - Tony

Oh - on using splitting as a strategy... I'm sure there are some cases where that works well. I've used it in shorter/simpler projects. Unfortunately, whether one trims a bit off or not, one is left with the same issue. The points of the videos you're trying to line up are still not lined up.
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Here's an observation that I've discussed with Carsten and Dafydd.

Project in NTSC, .mp4 or .mpg at 29.97 fps (haven't tried others)

Timeline therefore marked at 30 frame markers per sec

Expand timeline to single frame (max)

Time 0 - scubber on timeline marker frame 1 (as expected)

Step forward 1 frame at a time

By 3:27 scubber starting to position itself in advance of frame marker
It still moves 1 frame at a time but not in line with the timeline.

By 17:03 the scubber is half way between 03 and 04 frames
By 31:09 the scubber has advanced 1 frame

You can play with the preview time adjuster - so shrink the timeline to normal, move the preview scubber to say 31:09 and then expand the time line to see where it actually falls.


I did do a video of it back in December but forgot to post it up for Dafydd to forward it to CL.

My upload is playing up (or down actually) at the moment so I wasn't able to upload it to seemyworldonvideo this morning, I'll try later.

On a similar "micro" note - At such expanded timelines it shows audio markers can only be placed at a minimum of 5 frame intervals.

Don't really know if any of that means anything?

Cheers
Adrian
Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated. (see below)
Confucius
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Who stole my 'r's'?
Or possibly one of my fingers?

For scubber ead scrubber.

Thank you Dafydd for pointing that out so sympathetically.

Cheers
Adrian Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated. (see below)
Confucius
AMD Phenom IIX6 1055T, win10, 5 internal drives, 7 usb drives, struggling power supply.

Excellent observations Adrian... and - yes - they mean something!

Previously, I hadn't checked further up the timeline to make any observations of my own. It's surprising that the behaviour of the scrubber placement and frame markers didn't appear to be consistent.

Naturally, I checked. Wherever I went on the timeline, the scrubber and clips could be moved a minimum snap-to distance of 1 frame. In each case, they remained aligned with frame markers. This applied to media in PiP, Voice & Audio tracks.

I've attached an illustration...

Adrian - I just couldn't get my scrubber or clips (in any track) to land anywhere but on a frame marker. Odd that.

Thanks for throwing your scrubber into the ring.

Cheers - Tony


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Hi Tony,

I think - from your timeline - you have it set to PAL (25fps)- can you try with a project set to NTSC (30fps)?

Cheers
Adrian

Life is really simple, but we insist on making it complicated. (see below)
Confucius
AMD Phenom IIX6 1055T, win10, 5 internal drives, 7 usb drives, struggling power supply.

EDIT, ADMISSION, APOLOGY & THANK YOU:

Having retested the NTSC scrubber alignment phenomenon, after seeing Adrian's findings, I wanted to correct my poor observations earlier (below). They (& I) were wrong. My apologies for posting before thoroughly checking. Thank you to Adrian for being a gentleman & not jumping down my throat!

In follow up testing, I found that, in an NTSC project, the scrubber aligns with the time markers at approximately (ie. visual, rather than quantified):
00:00:00:00 - 00:00:34:07 - 00:01:06:13 - 00:01:40:18 - 00:02:14:03 - 00:02:46:19 - 00:03:19:03 - 00:03:52:24... etc

I've posted 3 of the relevant screen shots.

Adrian -

Of course, the PAL markers would be set differently to NTSC.

OK, fellow investigator of minute detail, I've done as you suggested, setting the project to NTSC, & worn out the clicker on my mouse & the full stop key to bring you these findings.

Two factors interfere with the accuracy of this data - the marker icon attached to the scrubber & my eyesight!

My observation here is that the scrubber (and therefore the points at which clips/images can begin) aligns with the timeline markers about every 5 minutes.

At 00:00:00:00, the scrubber is aligned with a time marker. After that, it "creeps" almost imperceptibly ahead of the time markers...

At 00:05:00:00 (or thereabout... that's where the two factors above get in the way), the scrubber and time markers are in alignment again.

I continued testing that observation at each 5 minute interval up to 01:00:00:00, after which I became bored. Being the party animal I am, I then repeated the whole thing with the project set to PAL. This confirmed my previous observation that (in PAL) the scrubber remains aligned with the timeline markers up to 01:00:00:00, & thereafter I guess.

I don't know what all of that means, but it might be useful.

Cheers - Tony
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Hi Tony

I don’t profess to fully understand your issue but I had a similar problem trying to sync an original music track to very average video sound with two PIP’s.

I had to do a work around:

1. Before importing sound/music, produce the PIP tracks as an MPEG.
2. Import this MPEG timeline.
3. Import the sound/music into the voice track.
4. Find the point where the error is and split the track.
5. Import the right split into the music track and overlay it by a milli fraction under the voice track.

Good luck.

Neil
Happing editing

Best Regards

Neil
CubbyHouseFilms
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