VEGAS Movie Studio 17 New Release
This week Magix announced the release of Vegas movie Studio 17 with a bunch of enhancements and improvements depending on which level of the software you are running.
So just to recap for anyone not up on the Magix, Vegas, Sony situation here’s the short version.
Sonic Foundry started off making audio editing programs sometime around the stoneage then at some point still back in the mists of time they came up with a video editor.
That editor was the original Vegas.
Then the whole shebang was sold to Sony (as Sony Creative) who subsequently added a consumer level editor which we now know as Vegas Movie Studio.
A few years back Sony were struggling to keep up with the evolving video software siuation so they sold all their audio and video software to Magix… and here we are!
This week an update was released for Movie Studio which now takes us to Vegas Movie Studio 17!
Vegas Movie Studio Updates
At all levels of the program we have:
Redesigned Transition and Effects Libraries
The effects window has been completely redesigned so that plug-ins and other effects can be searched, tagged, or added as a favorite.
Improved Trim Handles
This may seem to be a bit minor but like all video editing software Vegas did suffer a little from making some of the controls a bit tiny.
Project Location Memory
All software allows you to reload a project and continue editing so that no big deal.
However Vegas have improved this feature so that the project file also “remembers” exactly at what point you were at in that project and starts you off from there.
Black Bar Filler
A semi- automated tool to add black bars or backgrouns to video that have been shot in a different resolution to the final output.
For example you shoot a widesceeen video but want to upload to a site that only displays vertical videos or square videos.
Storyboard Enhancements
Now you can add the same media to a single storyboard multiple times but the thumbnail that shows will come from the exact in-point of that clip.
That means that even though you have the same clip loaded, the thumbnail will be different making the whole editing experience way less confusing.
GPU Accelerated Decoding for AVC and HEVC
Just a natural progression of development taking into consideration newer CPUs, GPUs and HD video formats.
Available only in the Platinum and Suite version only:
Unified Color Grading Workflow
A reworking and refinement of the color grading tools to make the whole color grading process faster and easier.
Optical-Flow Slow Motion
This is a Vegas plug-in that creates super-smooth slow motion effects without the need to go to other third party slow motion plugins or tools.
Warp Flow transition
As it suggests this in another “in-house” plugin which allows you to create transitions by morphing from one shot to the next.
You can check out my current Movie Studio Review here and hopefully by next week I will have that pages updated for the new version.
In the meantime here’s a cheesy promotional video from Vegas Creative Software for your viewing pleasure!
Sound Design Tip: Editing Tones, Drones & Music
This is another quick tips video from the Film Editing Pro website and YouTube Channel and one I really, really think is interesting.
In the video you will notice an audio technique that is rarely discussed outside of fully professional productions.
The technique in question is the use of drones and I am not talking about the flying ones!
The drones in question here are constant drones of sound or music that underly the scene being shown.
They can can be incredibly powerful without the viewer even be aware of what is going on and that’s pretty much always the best way.
Check out the video to get an idea of the subject then go to the link to get the full rundown.
If you don’t think you could use something like this in simple home movies or projects then I think you really need to think again!
Lighting Overhead Shots: Filmmaking 101
I have added this video to the Friday Roundup this week because there have been quite a few tutorials recently covering shooting videos at home.
A few of them have covered techniques for shooting overhead shots using stuff you most likely have lying about the house already.
Most of them have not really gone too much into the lighting side of things so the video below should address that.
The beauty of top down shots is that in reality you only need one light!
Forget all that key light, back light, fill light stuff altogether!
Well maybe not altogether but for the most part one will do the trick as you will see in the video.
The key takeaway here is that for these top down or overhead shots what you really need is a big, soft, wide light source.
PowerDirector – Combining the Shape Designer with the Motion Tracker
Over the past few years the development of consumer level video editing software has undergone a slight change in direction.
Prior to that the driving force behind nearly all new updates of the software regardless of brand was the addition of new features.
That “new features” war went on for quite some time until I am guessing it got to the point where there really was no need for any more “new features” as such or, the basic achitecture of software at that level simply could not take any more!
So over the past few years what has been happening is that most software companies have been working on the integration of existing features with other existing features.
A perfect example of that popped up this week from CyberLink.
For quite a while now their editing software PowerDirector has included a shape designer so you can internally design and add various shapes to you projects.
It has also had the ability to execute motion tracking for some time as well.
This week for the PowerDirector 18 Ultimate and 365 version they added a new “feature” which is actually an integration of those exisiting two.
So now you can use the Shape Designer in conjunction with the motion Tracking module.
How To Make The Ghosting Effect – CyberLink PowerDirector 18
This is a very simple way to add the ghosting effect to any of your videos as demonstrated in CyberLink PowerDirector 18.
Bottom line is that any video editing software I can think of will allow you to do this so just watch the video to get the overall concept.
You will need video editing software which has the ability to change the speed of clips in the timeline and adjust the transparency of a video track.
Easy Low Budget Lighting Setups At Home
The guys from Filmora usually put together some pretty good tutorial videos on shooting videos and editing them as well.
I particularly like the one I have added below because in a very practical way it walks through some common lighting problems most of us are probably having at home right now.
Filmora9 Version 9.4.5 Live Training
If you are using Filmora as your current video editing software or are thinking of choosing Filmora then these Q&A videos from Daniel Batal are a must.
In this video he is in a general sense covering a few of the new features in the latest updateof the software.
However what inevitably occurs is that he gets swamped by questions and the livestream can go just about anywhere!
In fact so much so that this week’s Q&A is just short of two hours long.
Now I have been testing and using Filmora for about two years now but despite that I always learn something new from the sessions.
In my opinion it is users like Daniel that really prove beyond doubt that fallacy that the reason you can’t pull off some effect or whatever is becuase you need more advanced software.
Daniel shows how to squeeze every last drop out of what at face value is supposed to be quite a simple piece of video editing software.
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