Tiles in Sony Vegas Pro

[zoobie]

Thought I'd ask first before manually attempting this huge project.
I was wondering if there's an efficient way to make a template for 3 vertical tiles...kind of like a picture in a picture.
This way, I could pop in different clips to see in which position (red, yellow, green) they should display. (See attachment)
Thanks

[poisondeathray]

If I were doing it in vegas, I'd probably do it with mattes. 6 tracks. 1,3,5 are the control mattes; 2,4,6 are the tracks for the videos

The matte is just white/black in thirds. 1 would be left third white, rest black, 3 would be middle third white, 5 would be right third white

For each control matte , you apply the mask generator FX, set to luminance, and each you set compositing mode to "multiply mask"

Make the track below it (ie. 2,4,6 where you have your clips) a compositing child

So all your actual video clips are popped on tracks 2,4,6 in whatever combinations that you want, and you just need to extend the control matte layers to the the same length.

[Cornucopia]

+1. Most efficient and versatile that way.

Scott

[budwzr]

You can make the mattes using the Cookie Cutter and TrackMotion tools. Use Media Generator to create the white background. Same principle PDR stated above, but Cookie Cutter mattes can be animated.

[zoobie]

I've a chroma key bg on some shots. I guess I just make another track.
Haven't done anything yet but read up on different methods.
Thanks

[poisondeathray]

I've a chroma key bg on some shots. I guess I just make another track.

Yes, it doesn't matter. You just insert a new track below with the BG . (the BG layer is placed in the same child hierarchy level)

[zoobie]

It's looking good so far.
How do I tell the media generator to exactly cover 640px left, center, and right?
640x3=1920HD
Right now I'm eyeballing it.

[budwzr]

Track Motion.

[poisondeathray]

There are probably several ways to do it within vegas. Another way is to insert generated media (white) and use a mask with the event pan/crop , so draw a "rectangle." When you click vertices with the pen tool, you can enter values to be precise (for example, for the "left" white strip, top left would be x=0,y=0, top right would be x=640,y=0, etc...) . Others prefer to do it in an image editor e.g. photoshop, gimp, paint.net etc... (all you need is a still image , and drag out the end), or even avisynth

The benefit of doing it within vegas, is it's dynamic and animatable with keyframes. It might not be important for this particular project but just something to keep in mind for other projects. If you have a png or bmp image imported, you have to go back to the other program edit, then reimport

[budwzr]

In this snap a white generated media was added to the timeline. Note the sizing options in the TrackMotion dialog. Width, Height, and X/Y positioning are there.

[zoobie]

I'm learning the track motion method before going any further.
Appreciate the help but it's hard to see the images on this little tablet.
My desktop is now dedicated to processing video.

[budwzr]

It would serve you well to understand what TrackMotion can do. It's an indispensable tool, especially when compositing, which is what you are doing. The Vegas help describes it as a simple picture-in-picture tool, but it also has 2.5D z-depth built in.

You have to turn off "Maintain Aspect Ratio" and turn on 4-way transforms. Just like Pan/Crop. You might have to overlap a pixel or two between mattes to avoid any line between them.

Make the first matte, then use it as a template to make the other two. Duplicate it twice and slide the 2nd and third triangles using the arrow key with horizontal lock on.

Just play with it until you get that Ah-Ha moment.

[zoobie]

I found it's kind of hard to have an "ah-ha" moment operating track motion when half the buttons at the top are clicked...by default?
Anyway, I can now finally see it's a powerful tool for PIP, match moving, etc.
Thanks everyone.
Now it's up to me to utilize all of the above.

PS -The tiles are a thing of beauty...sniff

[poisondeathray]

BTW, red, yellow green is the flag of Guinea

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Guinea

[budwzr]

I still can't figure out what he's making. A slot machine?

[zoobie]

I thought the flag may be Jamaican, mon...