Messages posted by Scott7268

Quote Hi A Bogus Exception -

I thought someone should try to help you out before your post disappears off the front page.

What you've found about the lack of keyframing with 3D-like titles is correct.

If you use NewBlue Titler Pro, you should be able to achieve what you want. After you format your title, look under Effects and select Turn > Slow Turn - then turn on keyframing. Add the keyframes where you want, then set each one.

Attached is a screenshot of the NBTP Effects workspace & a produced file showing the sort of title I think you're after.

Cheers - Tony

I'm using PD 19 and the bundled NewBlue 1.5.

Every example showing NewBlue shows a solid, static background. I want my 3D title to follow a path on my video. Your original advice was back in 2016. Has anything changed?

Quote Interesting ideas and thanls for sharing the image of what you're hoping the finished product will look like.

If you have the NewBlue Titler Pro add-in, you can do all of those things for your titles - reflection, motion, perspective.

If you don't have that, you can use the Motion Tracker and keep a label stationary over the lake as your drone flies. You can't change the perspective or cast a reflection, but you can add a backdrop and shadow and the MT tool can adjust the size of the text automatically if the drone flies closer to or away from the lake.

I can think of a similar compromise with your arrow graphics. I haven't used the tool at all, but at first glance it seems like you can animate the arrow stretching to indicate flow. The shaft length can be keyframed to grow longer while the arrowhead's proportions won't change.

If you want to add perspective, make the animation, set a green color board behind it and produce it. Replace the shape with the produced clip and chroma key out the background, then you can use the blue freeform controls like the tutorial video shows to give the moving arrow any perspective you like.

Thank you for the QUICK and thorough advice.

I tried NewBlue Titler Pro. It does all the things I want, except I can't figure out how to syncronize the titles with my video. In the New Blue interface there's a black background (no video preview). When you make title in NewBlue, apparently you can't manipulate any parts of it (location, scale, etc) in PowerDirector. I found a tutoril video showing a bizzar workaround to syncronize NewBlue titles to the preview video using a Sony video editing software (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXXD06pKEAI). All of the examples I've found on NewBlue tutorials show animated titles on a static image background, sort of like PowerPoint.

Any ideas?

Thanks again!

Scott

Am I missing something obvious, or is it impossible to apply perspective to shapes and text on PD 19?

Of course, 3D text comes with depth perspective, but I can't find any way to key-frame 3D text. So I tried using regular text titles/labels. But with regular text you can't skew the perspective (as it's described in this tutorial video (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_7KD9bSHWE )

I simply want to put a text label on a lake, maybe cast a shadow from the text down onto the lake, and have the text remain centered on the lake as the video moves.

I want to use flat arrows to show the direction from which water flows over a waterfall. The shape tool feels like it's missing all the features one would expect with a vector shape tool--keyframing every conceivable aspect of a vector shape. Easy shape manipulation is the primary benefit of a vector shape.

I attached a screen shot from PowerPoint showing what I want to do.

In my video, a drone flies over the lakes very slowly. I want labels, like in the PowerPoint example, to follow the lakes as the drone flies over. I also want to animate the arrows flowing over the waterfalls.

Thank you ahead of time for any help.

Scott

Quote I'm a little unclear as to what you're wanting to do because you imply that you want to move the objects' screen positions but then talk about selecting those clips en masse on the timeline.

Ash's suggestion will work if you're wanting to move the clips to a different part of the timeline, that is to change the time location in your video.

If instead you're looking to change the onscreen location, you'll need to make the changes one by one using the PiP Designer - although there's a very simple and 100% accurate way of doing so.

Open the first clip you want to move and take a look at the Position settings. If you're wanting to move the clip up and to the left (which I assume is what your hand-drawn arrows show), you can either drag the object in the window or type in a smaller X value (to move the object left) and smaller Y value (to move it up).

Either way, once you know the difference between the starting position and the desired location, you can make the same edits on the other clips and simply subtract the same values from their relative positions. While that's not quite as easy as dragging them all at once, it will ensure that they'll retain their exact formation in the new location.

Thanks. What you said (above) is exactly what I'm trying to do. I was affraid the solution would be to use the PIP editor and move each thing separately. LOL. But using the position values is a good workaround, although VERY time consuming if you need to move 30 things only a few pixles.

One more related question...
How do you refer to graphic incarnations of clips or pips? Even searching for help on this topic, everything related to clips ends up referring to the timeline. What's the term for the "image" of the clip or pip?

Thank you SO MUCH for helping.

Scott

Sometimes the simplest things in Power Director are the most complicated to figure out.

Here's a hypothetical scenario.

I have four video PIPs (I guess you'd call them) playing simultaneously.
I precisely positioned the four videos in relationship to each other on the screen.

I worked for an hour lining the videos up, spacing the, and placing object on top of them.

Then I discovered that the whole group of videos and objects need to be moved to another location on the screen.

In most applications, one would simply select all of the objects (shift-click or ctrl-click), then drag the selected objects together to the new location. Or one would group the objects (Ctrl-G) then select the group and drag the group as one object.

Aparently NOT THE CASE in Cyberlink Power Director 18.

I can select one clip at a time in the timeline, then drag that clip's video object to another spot on the screen.
I can multi-select clips on timeline and move the clips up and down, left and right on the timeline.
But when I multi-select clips on the timeline, nothing appears selected on the screen.

I can't figure out how to reposition multiple video objects simultaneously.

Please help!

Thanks. Scott