Here is what I found in PD11.

I Have a PNG image that is transparent in the sky area.

Just for a test, I put that image on TR2 and a light Yellow color board on TR1.

The Yellow does show through the transparent area of the PNG.

I attach that Image so you can experiment if you wish.

The help does not say anything about alpha channel, but in certain conditions it does utilize transparency.

Plus Transparency is spoken about in many places in the Help.

I do not know if that helps.

I Also include a screen shot of the PD 11 Preview window with the Yellow color board and Mountain image.
If you have PD11, why not just experiment?


Carl312: Windows 10 64-bit 8 GB RAM,AMD Phenom II X4 965 3.4 GHz,ATI Radeon HD 5770 1GB,240GB SSD,two 1TB HDs.

Thanks for your response, but I was referring to videos with transparent backgrounds (referred to as "alpha channel") as opposed to a still photo (png) file. Just so you understand what I am talking about, imagine a video of flames shooting up - but there is no background (transparent.) With that video you can lay it on top of another video such that it appears that the flames are moving and engulfing the subject that is behind it.

That's a simple example. One aspect I like to work with is producing my own videos with a person speaking in front of a green screen. By using a green screen it's easy to eliminate the background to make it invisible such that all you see is the individual speaking. Then the person can be placed on top of any other background (a still photo or another video) to make it look like it's really all one video.

Once again, thanks for your input but it isn't quite what I am looking for.

Anyway, I did run a test just now and I imported a video file that I know has an alpha channel (transparent background.) Power Director still doesn't seem to recognize it. Upon importing the file it fills the entire transparent background in with a solid black opaque color. What a big disappointment.

I've brought this up with previous versions and I would have thought by now that they would have addressed it. Really, it should be a simple fix for the programmers and it would make the product so much more desirable and valuable to a wider audience.

I think I understand what you mean - if your shooting on a green screen back ground why not just use chroma key? this will render tha back ground essentialy transparnt
Chris Tayler
taylerchris@gmail.com

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Because I'm talking mainly about importing videos that already have the background keyed out. There are so many stock videos, such as the one showing flames like I mentioned, as well as those that show snow falling and raindrops, etc, that I would like to import into PD and incorporate them into my own videos. There are so many great effects like that with the backgrounds already keyed out and it makes no sense to try to recreate them from scratch within PD. And, to be honest, the chroma keying in PD isn't as good as in many other programs. If I'm going to key out my own green screen background I get better results in other software programs that I would like to import into Power Director.

Bradshaw -

What you've found is exactly what's there. PD doesn't support alpha channel video.

Your observation of how chroma key functions is pretty accurate too... not one of PD's greatest assets.

Cheers - Tony


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