Announcement: Our new CyberLink Feedback Forum has arrived! Please transfer to our new forum to provide your feedback or to start a new discussion. The content on this CyberLink Community forum is now read only, but will continue to be available as a user resource. Thanks!
CyberLink Community Forum
where the experts meet
| Advanced Search >
As it happens this issue seems to have disappeared for me too. I don't know when or why, but for the last couple of days the volume has been at maximum level. Let's hope it stays that way.
Since the 2nd of december the preview volume slider is always set to zero on startup. (Not to be mixed up with the mixing slider's zero which means "normal" volume.) Now that I know to always press CTRL-U and drag it up to maximum level it's not a too big issue, but it's still a bit annoying. Anyone else experiencing this? Does anyone have any suggestion on how to make it stay at maximum level?
Good to know. Thanks!
It would be great if I could choose the second post as the one that solved the issue, but apparently one cannot mark one's own answer as the solution.frown
The volume slider in the preview window was for some reason set to zero. I remember now that this has happened once before, but then I discovered it before posting here. Anyone else who's had this kind of behavior? Is there a keyboard shortcut that I may have touched by accident?

By the way, the volume symbol for this regulate always looks the same, so there is no way to tell what the volume is set to unless you click on it.
Suddenly I have no audio playback in PD. It's completely silent. It's only in PD19 I have this issue. I've opened the same movie in PD18 and there I have audio. What is wrong? I can't remember if I've used PD19 after canceling the unistallation of PD18 with its installer the other day, but that's the only extraordinary I've done lately.

(It's half past midnight here, so I'm going to bed now.)
Quote

By default custom titles should save to C:\Users\[username]\Documents\CyberLink\PowerDirector\19.0\MyTitles.

Each title has a separate folder but they are named in numerical order not as the title room library alias given under a save as function.

Backup one level in path for other items of potential interest.

Jeff


Thanks Jeff!
Where can I find the my Custom templates folder(s) for the Title Room, Transition Room etc, and what are their names?

I've found folders which apparently contains the included templates for the different rooms, but I'm having trouble to find any folder namned Custom or similar.

I want to make a separate backup of them.
Quote

PD version 20 was released in September of 2021.

Jeff


Yes, thanks, I know. However I'm not going to buy it yet.

But while we're here I'll take the opportunity to add a question.

PD19 was running when I went into the control panel to uninstall PD18. Then I got this message. Why can't PD19 be running during the removal of PD18? It seems as if some files are shared by both programs and I fear trouble if I continue with the uninstall process.
Quote

PowerDirector 20 is the product, 365 is a sales gimmick for the monthly or annual subscription based licensing model that has constant, mostly fluff type updates, fonts, sounds, background dance music, title packs, transitions, pushed patches,...on and on that are not available to the PD20 perpetual license holders. The PD20 standalone perpetual licensed product only gets periodic bug fix patches, often lagging the same PD20 365 license bug patch push substantially.

The left two products here https://www.cyberlink.com/store/powerdirector-video-editing-software/buy_en_US.html?affid=2581_1709_540 under "Lifetime License" are the perpetual license PD20 products, the right 3 products are PD20 under the PD365 Subscription model.

Jeff


Thanks Jeff!

I wonder why they always seem to make things so difficult. People are not as stupid as they sometimes seem to think. (Although it's a serious company with good support and so on).

I think there was a discount on PD20 before but seemingly it has expired before I could find it. Think I'll wait for a while, bought my PD19 quite recently compared to the PD18-19 upgrade.
Now and then I get a commercial tip in PD 19 about PD 20 but that goes to 365 instead. I can't find any PD 20 link for downloading. Where is it?
Quote

As indicated in my initial post, are you consistent in PD with timecode. One can also change the timeline to 25fps to match your DP timecode and then do no frame adjustment. When producing in PD, go to 50fps if that's what your source video is.

Jeff


Yes, the source video is at 50 fps.

In the preferences Timecode is set to drop frame "Yes" and cannot be changed.

Aha, one can change the timeline regardless of the framerate in the source video. Didn't know about that. Thanks.
Quote I guess that I have to recalculate the start and end frames since I've got 25 fps in DP and 50 fps in PD. All frames in between should not be an issue.

Yes that's it! If the starting framecount in DP is 12 I just adjust it to 24 in PD. Likewise if the ending framecount is 19 I make it 38 in PD. Then, when inserting the audio file in the timeline it has the same frame lenght as the precut, and is perfectly syncronized.laughing
Quote

No such thing as 50 FPS (PAL) drop frame as you note in PD nor in general.

In PD timeline timecode as well as fairly general, ":" separation is non drop frame timecode, while ";" is for drop frame timecode.

Jeff


Thanks!
I guess that I have to recalculate the start and end frames since I've got 25 fps in DP and 50 fps in PD. All frames in between should not be an issue.
Quote

What it's doing is important, I'm sure it's good as you say. I ask because for a clip at ~03:07 duration, drop frame timecode differs by about 8 frames at NTSC 60fps, which is about your magnitude of difference you showed. Don't know if you are 60fps as you never said. Additionally, what timecode PD's Precut uses has been an unknown as well since “;” used in the in/out timecode specification which implies dropped frame timecode. It does not change to “:” with timeline setting. This causes a difference when trying to cut a specific duration too and move it to the timeline when timeline is set to drop or not drop frame timecode. I’d simply use split in the timeline instead of Precut since split obeys timeline timecode specification so you know exactly what you have.

I really think the intended use for Precut was to carve up a long recoding to close duration chunks for scenes and then do final cuts in timeline.

Jeff


I'm sorry, I forgot about the frame rate. It's set to 50 FPS (PAL) drop frame in PowerDirector. Digital Performer sets it to 25 FPS. This is how it's explained in the DP user manual.

"Files at HD frame rates of 50, 59.94 (drop & non-drop), and 60 (drop & non-drop) can also be imported, but the frame rate is set to the corresponding half rate."

The MOTU Tech Support should be able to clarify if it's drop or non-drop but I'd guess it's drop frame since that's much more common these days.

So what you're saying is that since the Precut setting has for instance 00:05:10:25 it means non drop frame and not drop frame,
and 00;05;10;25 means drop frame? And that this causes a malfunction in the timing since it's always set to non drop frame in the timelines of both the precut and the preview window regardless of the preferences setting? If so I must say I'm really starting to have my doubts about the competence of the programmers.

Yes, I've been using the split timeline option until recently when I came to think of this method as easier, but it may not be so after all.
Quote To follow along, one would probably have to share a few files and a pds project. Through the years, PD is not known for being highly frame accurate. Several items could be at play though. What timecode does DP use being primarily an audio editor, audio typically in ms not frames, how does it generate SMPTE. To do this, does it use dropped frame timecode or not, are you consistent in PD. Source video being a fixed framerate is probably a must for something like this, is your source video a fixed framerate?

Instead of manually aligning, have you tried to sync by audio in PD and then trim as desired?

Jeff



Sync by audio seems to be a good option, didn't know about it. I'll give it a try. Thanks!

Yes, I've set DP to frame time code. Since you can import videos it's also possible to do this. I'd say DP is very good in this matter, people use it for film scoring.

Okay, PD is not very frame accurate. That could be the reason of course. Is PD 365 more accurate in this matter? Maybe a trial version of that one could help.

It's too much of a drag and time consuming I think to share such large files. Furthermore I don't feel like sharing my expletives which pop up now and then during unsuccessful recordings, haha!
This is about making a music video from a precut.

After importing an audio file into PowerDirector with the same minutes, seconds and frames as the original, the soundfile becomes somewhat longer in PD, in this case 9 frames. This means that the audio files is out of sync.


1. I make a recording with video and audio simultaneously.


2. I import the movie into Digital Performer (known as DP instead of PD).

3. Since I start the camera recording first I need to move the soundfile in DP later in time afterwards, so that the audio files will be syncronized. This is done by also importing the movie audio into DP and align the audio files by simply dragging the DP audio file later in time, looking and listening until they match.

4. When I've found the take I want to use I make a new audio file from - in this case - 00:10:15:05 to 00:13:12:15. This file is in other words 00:03:07:10 long.

5. I make a precut with exactly the same frametime values as the soundfile.

In position: 00:10:15:05

Out position: 00:13:12:15

Duration: 00:03:07:10

6. I drag the precut into a track.

7. I drag the imported audio file into an audio track and there it is, but it has the duration 00:03:07:19.

If I start playback the audio file in the video is suddenly clearly out of sync with the imported DP audio file (Broadcast Wave). The imported audio is played back earlier than in the movie so you'll hear an echo effect. One could guess that moving the precut nine frames earlier in time would solve the issue but it doesn't. Then it's much more out of sync but in the opposite direction.

Since I move the audio file manually before exporting the selected portion of it, it's natural that it won't be a hundred percent accurate. But it should be at least as accurate in timing as it is in Digital Performer, that is no discrepancy should be audible.

This is not an issue if I after lining them up in Digital Performer make an audio file from beginning to end. Then they match exactly in PowerDirector too. But then I have to make the selection of the specific take within PD, which means more work since it's not optimized primarily for audio.

Therefore I have to try different in and out positions until I find the right ones. It's only a few frames backwards or forwards, but as you can understand a bit annoying. As said the lengths are identical, but in the previous project I took a close look at the movie start time in DP (or if it was the end time, can't remember now) and I could see that the frame displayed there was not the same frame as the one displayed in the precut. In the current project I'm not able to see any difference.

I've got the latest patch by the way, 19.0.3226.2.
Quote

Did you try it?

Jeff


Now I have tried it. It still won't work.
Quote

Did you try it?

It has no effect on picture, no, it's not for black and white, it is just the timecode reference.

Jeff


Haven't tried yet, but I will. Maybe not tonight, it's just past midnight here so I'm soon going to bed.

However this YT-video says otherwise.
https://youtu.be/ykjyNeuQROU
Go to:   
Powered by JForum 2.1.8 © JForum Team