How else do you change a transition time except by changing the length of the media? I use Premiere 6 at work and found Vegas to be as refreshing as a mountain spring. Vegas shows the transition curves. Premiere doesn't. It lets you modify the curves. Premiere doesn't. Vegas has every track an A/B track. Premeiere doesn't. Premiere also doesn't let you adjust the fade on it's first video layer (which is annoying).

Premiere Pro is susposed to allow you to do all of this stuff. Adobe said they were working on Premiere Pro for about 3 years. In that time they realesed Premiere 6 and 6.5. So what they are basicly saying is that they've been releasing non-pro versions to the public for 3 years and decided to relesae a pro program after Vegas came around and did all this months ago.

I'm specifically addressing transitions and not the entire interface. The fact of the matter is it is more difficult to employ a transition in Vegas than other NLE's at the most fundamental level (a simple dissolve). I believe a software engineer somewhere along the line decided this was a better way to add transitions or perhaps the criteria was "a different way" of applying transitions to distance the product from competitors.

The question still remains. Does anyone make a plug-in that causes the transitions to behave like other NLE's (Premiere, Ulead).

The way other NLE’s handle transitions has been a source of confusion to their consumers. I’ve seen Pinnacle Studio users asking why their video got shorter and now it ends before the music track that they perfectly aligned. “All I did was change a few transitions”. ;-) Or how about, “I keep typing the duration in the transition dialog but I can’t make the transition on my 4 second clip longer than 4 seconds”. Like the source of a transition gets magically created somehow.

No, I think Vegas has it right and all the other NLE’s have it wrong. To lengthen a transition I MOVE the media. Direct manipulation. It should be painfully obvious to me that when I move the media, the duration of the overall project will shorted or lengthen. I hope Vegas never changes because I don’t have to interact with another dialog box. I just want to move the media and get on with editing. That’s one of the beauties of Vegas, direct manipulation equals less dialogs; less dialogs equals greater program flow; great program flow equals more productivity for me.

Here’s a tip for setting accurate transition lengths: Double click on a transition. This will create a looped region of just the transition. On the 3 lower right timeline readouts, the third one (all the way right) will be the length of the region. Drag either edge of the region and watch the readout and stop when it’s the length you want. Drag the clip to the region marker (it will snap if snapping is enabled). You now have a transition with the duration you wanted.

Instead of a plugin, SoFo could just add a duration entry field to the existing transition dialog box. Would that do what you want? It would either ripple the media or leave a hole depending on your ripple edit settings.

~jr

"More difficult"???

Vegas: Overlap two clips.

Done.

How is this more difficult that other NLEs? Please tell me how you could possibly perform this action in an easier fashion. Keep in mind that the "clairvoyant" module hasn't been developed yet ;)

Eugene, how do YOU do fades in Premiere? I have to put stuff on 2 seperate tracks, then adjust the fade envelope on the upper layer and then the lower layer (when I'm not using the A/B track). In Vegas I just drag one clip ontop of another. From what I've heard, Final Cut Pro is like this too. I find it very easy.

It's a pain in my butt to do fades in Premiere. If you are doing the fades in Premiere/Vegas with a transition effect, they are handled simular (i think). In Vegas, if I have 2 video layers that you want to fade in/out, I just drag the fade envelope icon (in the upper left/right of you clip. looks like a triangle) to the length I want it and do the same on the buttom layer. Or, I use the disolve transition and drop/drag it to the end of the clip (or start, depending) and then adjust the length by moving the vertical har to the left/right of the transition/fade.

If you're just comming over from something else you will find Vegas different, but give it a week and you won't want to go back.

My understanding is that Vegas began as an audio editor and the track design involved cross-fading audio in a quick easy manner. I know that Eugene isn't talking about simply clicking the button at the Vegas 4 track header which switches the view to A/B tracks, because that still doesn't create a graphic of the transition. HOWEVER, my assumption has been that SoFo leapfrogged over the idea of a transition graphic by making all transitions instantly viewable in real-time in the viewer.

I've just completed a 25 minute dance sequence using 2 vid streams. Up beat and very pacy! - To do this, I used Excalibur. This allows for multicamera work. . . .okay . . . briefly, I ended up placing 226 edits - could have been more, much more. Using Excalibur, dissolves and overlaps were placed within 10 seconds - all of them! All I needed to do was the fun bit, placing Markers at the various switch-over points, and that was it! Trés Elegant!

Grazie

The sofwares I chose a few months ago to introduce myself to NLE were Pinnacle 8 and VideoStudio demos. Yes, these are entry-level programs with simplistic methods. I dabbled with Premiere a bit. Coming from my perspective I've gone from the very simple drag and drop to the a bit more complicated little triangle & drag. Had I started with Vegas then I might not have the bias or preference that I do now.

The two fundamental issues I highlighted were the inability to set duration for a specific time period and the lack of a visual. I think it's VideoStudio or Premire that represent the transition as a yellow vertical block. I like that it's visual.

JohnnyRoy gave me the method to determine duration. editor3333 explains that the product began as an audio editor and that the drag feature was employed for audio, which makes sense. That explains how Vegas uses it, perhaps not because it’s the best method for an NLE but because Vegas is an extension of an audio program. At least that is my contention

I still maintain my point of view that if there were one thing I would change or at least offer with Vegas is a more visual method of applying transitions.

What we have here is a failure to communicate.

Basically what Eugene is saying is he got hooked on the low end, demo type, free with a paid box of cerial video editor that pretty much has dumbed down things so much you have to run really fast head first into a brick wall in order to use.

Vegas, regardless of it's audio counterparts, it an absolute ease to work with.

The transitions are about as basic as you can get to use and to understand.

Anyone....repeat - anyone who has a problem with Vegas video transitions has probably ran head first into that brick wall one time tooooooooo many.

But hey.....a wise man once said that it takes all kinds. I guess that is true.

For me....I don't like the way Vegas makes you have to put your video on the event track in order to edit it!!! I don't know why we just can't tell vegas what we want and have it do it for us.

And then that one part - that I really don't like - is you have to double click that icon on the desktop in order to start the program!! I mean, how difficult is that! I'm so use to just pushing a button that says "start"! Why do I have to use my mouse anyway!

Why can't I just talk to the computer the way I see those people do it in Star Trek? I mean that would be great! But I'm sure that the SoFo programmers have this mission to make life difficult for us users!!

They all suck!

The way Vegas creates transitions by overlapping, IS one of its best features, but if you are suggesting that a visual representation akin to the little animations that play in the transitions tab (even as a still version) would be cool, I would tend to agree.

Hell, that would be VERY cool.

Let's also face that setting a transition of a specific duration is NOT particularly easy in Vegas and needs to be improved.

You can copy and paste transitions by right-clicking and using paste event attributes.

There is no plug-in that I am aware of to do what you are looking for.

Gary

Drag a clip so it overlaps another. Transition done. There can surely be no easier way (unless you use Vegas' automatic overlap facilty)

And it IS VISUAL - there is a clear overlap area showing, with the fade type depicted. There are a choice of 25 Fade Types - all of which show VISUALLY.

If you replace the default dissolve with another Transition, it's name appears VISUALLY on the overlap region.

What's not easy and not visual about it?

Heck...while we are on the subject - how come spelling has to be so hard? How come we can't spell words they way they sound? I mean....hell...visually it would make more damn sense!!

Like....uhm....let's say the word "dead". It looks like "read"...or "read"...which is really "reed" and "red".....so you should spell it "ded"!! Now visually that make sense!!

And then take "school"? Who the hell came up with that word!! It makes no visual sense what-so-ever!! Anybody with a 1 grade edjakashun nose that it shuld be "skool"!

And....how come I have to have a shoe for my right foot....AND my left foot? How come my shoos can't be the same for either foot? I mean I tried to put a "L" and an "R" on the toes of the shoo, but I can't read it upside down and backwards!!

Stop the world I want to get off!!!!

Sometimes is wish there was a sticky on top of this board that says

"Vegas IS NOT LIKE ANY OTHER NLE YOU HAVE EVER USED*!!"




*please consult your manual for further details.

And since we are on the subject....what's up with women?

How come they have to be soooo difficult to understand?

If I were God...I would have supplied us with a user manual and a more visual way of understanding what women want!! I mean...."No" means "yes", "yes" means "maybe", "maybe" means "I'll think about it" - and "Uhg!! That was nice!! Now get the hell out!!" means....well, I'm not sure what that one means!!

See what I mean!!! It's confusing!

If women came with like a visual way to let us know what they wanted....that would be the shitz!! They could have this LCD screen in their stomach area that when they have soemthing on their mind it would light up or something.

And then...they could have like a little antenna on top of their head that lights up right before the screen comes on (this way, in case they had clothes on you would know you could tune in to their stomach and watch!!)

Now that would be a great visual!!

God didn't make a women manual, but Al Lowe did! check it out here:
http://www.allowe.com/book/The%20Female%20Argument%20Dictionary.htm

well, it's not quite a manual, but funny.

disclaimer: I have nothing against women. my wife is one, my mom is one, and my boss is one. I like women.

God's website has a Multigender Users Guide (7 trilobytes, free download). It's searchable.

Why wasn't my wife delivered with a printed copy -- is the stork too lazy? My Kinko bill was enormous.

Brandon's Dad

One thing about this board (turn on sarcasm) is that someone can make a suggestion and everyone accepts it as a suggestion rather than a complaint (turn off sarcasm).

Come on people, what is wrong with a suggestion to improve a product for someone's use. If you don't like the suggestion, you are free to say so, but to slam the guy like he is a complete idiot defeats the purpose of boards like this. Would Vegas be where it is today if nobody suggested how to improve it?

I would like to be able to set durations for transitions because I learned to edit in the Linear world and I know what a 1 sec transtiion feels like it. It is not always easy to set duration by overlapping because the size of the overlap varies based on the zoom level of the timeline. You lose the visual feedback of a dissolve transition. This is just a suggestion.

Dave T2

Dave T2’s comment was very practical. Some are still overlooking the central points:

1. The inability to set duration for a specific time period
2. The lack of a visual.

Dragging is the way it’s accomplished. The issue is not that the transition is dragged into place/duration but the above two points. Implementing the aforementioned changes would not interfere with those of you accustomed to the way it’s done now but would enhance the product and broaden it’s appeal for the those of us who’s heads have hit the brick wall one too many times.

I don’t understand the logic that accepts the fact that the inability to set specific duration demonstrates that Vegas is somehow superior to other NLE’s. It is superior overall but not concerning the transition feature related to visual and duration.

Eugene and DaveT2,
You've hit the nail on the head.

I do an aweful lot of hack work, going through hours of video and cutting bits out.

For obvious reasons I'd like to make all my dissolves the same length and it is extremely tedious to do. Probably if I pulled my finger out I could write a script to do it or buy Excalibur but it really should be in VV.

I say this for another reason, in the inverted logic of this world a product is oftenly judged by what people produce with it. VV is making good inroad into the market of first time users, if their associates see a good result from it they will buy it also. If it looks like crap they blame the product not the lack of skill of the user. I'd suggest VV should by default make ALL transitions of fixed length by default.

If you know what your doing no drama to turn it off but if you don't it dramatically reduces the chance of dodgy results.

I write code for part of my living and I'm not very good at it. But one of its strengths is that users who don't know what they are doing can muddle through without creating disasters.

"Some are still overlooking the central points..."

I know I kid around alot and can be more than a little sarcastic.....but no one is missing the central point - except you. Well, and anyone else who finds adding transitions so difficult in Vegas.

If you don't like the way Vegas handles it's feature....you are more than happy to use that other Adobe product.

Don't get me wrong....suggest away. That is what the suggestion box is for. But if your suggestion is to remake Vegas to be more like another application - then you need to go back and use the previous application.

I would't sweat it though - I know some people who still use their 8-tracks. But they still keep bitching because the latest Brittney Agularia project they can only find on CD! So much for progression.

Tell me...you guys wouldn't happen to be from Canada, would ya???

LOL! I kid around a lot too. wink, wink... and some people still have a VERY thin skin.

What bunches my shorts up is now that there seems to be a pretty large influx of Ex "P" users is some of those guys seem to want to change Vegas in how it does some things or they gumble out loud wondering how come Vegas does it different than that goofy "P" product. Answer: Vegas does many things different because once you get use to it you'll find it works better.

As far as transitions, I think its pretty cool how easily Vegas lets you play 'what if' and you see the result in real time (more or less real time depending on the power of your CPU and how complex your project is getting)

Also what has apparently escaped many is transitions have got a big boost in version four. Its all explained in what's new in the Vegas Help system.

Hint: Those that didn't read what's new and are old school and have used Vegas for awhile should be pleased you now can apply the same transition and length across a range of events on the timeline.

All that said it would be a nice addition to be able to specify the time of a tranation in time... just don't take away the ability to overlap and see the effect... that's too much fun to play with.

I have used many edit programs...from Avid Symphony to Quantel's Henry.... not sure what you mean when you say applying a simple transition in Vegas is difficult? Actually it's very easy and can take less keystrokes than most any other program. You are working on your timeline....you set your in/out with one simple stroke to 24 frames- at the end of your last clip. You drag your new scene to your maker- and you have a 24 frame dissolve! You dont have to drag an effect, set durations, midpoints, special start and end parameters.... its very quick, simple and efficient conserving keystrokes- whick over the long haul save time in workflow... how simple and precise Vegas is! Not sure about your comments and complaints- but then again- I did not read all the posting before responding...