Pinnacle STUDIO 9 User Manual

Studio 9

Professional Quality Movie-Making

Special thanks to Mike Iampietro, William Chien, Richard Edgley, Ivan Maltz, Jon McGowan, Keith Thomson, Jörg Weselmann, and Chris Zamara.

Documentation: Nick Sullivan

Copyright © 2003 Pinnacle Systems, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Pinnacle Systems is a registered trademark, and Pinnacle Studio, SmartCapture, SmartMovie, Hollywood FX, RTFx and VST are trademarks, of Pinnacle Systems, Inc.

QDesign MPEG-1 Layer 2 Fast Encoder/Decoder copyright © 19962002 by QDesign Corporation. The RealProducer is included under license from RealNetworks, Inc. RealProducer version 8.0. copyright 1995-2002, RealNetworks Inc. “RealProducer”, “RealVideo”, “RealServer”, and “Real” logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of RealNetworks, Inc. All rights reserved. SmartSound is a registered trademark of SmartSound Inc. Pro Logic is a registered trademark of Dolby Laboratories Inc. Windows Media is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. You agree not to remove any product identification or notices of the property restrictions from Pinnacle Systems' products or manuals.

No part of this manual may be copied or distributed, transmitted, transcribed, stored in a retrieval system, or translated into any human or computer language, in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, magnetic, manual, or otherwise, without the express written permission of Pinnacle Systems, Inc.

Pinnacle Systems, Inc. 280 North Bernardo Avenue Mountain View, CA 94943

Printed in the USA.

ii Studio 9

Table of contents

BEFORE YOU START..................................................XI

Equipment requirements......................................................................... xi

Abbreviations and conventions.............................................................xiii

On-line help...........................................................................................xv

CHAPTER 1: USING STUDIO ....................................... 1

Undo, Redo and Help .............................................................................. 2

Setting options.........................................................................................4

Edit mode .................................................................................................... 5

The Player................................................................................................ 6

Playback controls..................................................................................... 8

Further editing topics............................................................................. 11

CHAPTER 2: CAPTURING VIDEO.............................. 13

The Capture mode interface.................................................................... 14

The Diskometer ..................................................................................... 16

The Camcorder Controller..................................................................... 18

The capture process..................................................................................19

Capture hardware...................................................................................19

Capture step-by-step..............................................................................21

Scene detection......................................................................................23

Table of contents iii

Digital capture .......................................................................................... 25

SmartCapture: Preview-quality capture................................................. 26

Full-quality capture................................................................................28

Audio and video levels – digital ............................................................29

Analog capture..........................................................................................30

Capture quality options.......................................................................... 31

Audio and video levels – analog............................................................ 31

CHAPTER 3: THE ALBUM .......................................... 33

The Video Scenes section ......................................................................... 36

Opening a captured video file................................................................ 38

Viewing captured video......................................................................... 42

Selecting scenes and files ...................................................................... 43

Displaying scene and file information...................................................44

Comment view.......................................................................................45

Combining and subdividing scenes .......................................................46

Redetecting scenes................................................................................. 49

The Transitions section............................................................................50

The Titles section......................................................................................51

The Still Images section ...........................................................................52

The Sound Effects section........................................................................53

The Disc Menus section............................................................................ 54

CHAPTER 4: THE MOVIE WINDOW........................... 55

Movie Window views................................................................................57

Storyboard view.....................................................................................58

Timeline view........................................................................................58

Text view...............................................................................................62

The toolboxes ............................................................................................ 62

The Video toolbox.................................................................................64

The Audio toolbox................................................................................. 66

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CHAPTER 5: VIDEO CLIPS ........................................ 69

Video clip basics .......................................................................................70

Adding video clips to your movie .........................................................70

Working with multiple capture files......................................................71

Interface features ...................................................................................72

Trimming video clips................................................................................73

Trimming on the Timeline using handles.............................................. 74

Clip-trimming tips ................................................................................. 77

Trimming with the Clip properties tool................................................. 78

Resetting trimmed clips.........................................................................80

Splitting and combining clips .................................................................. 81

Advanced Timeline editing ......................................................................82

Insert editing..........................................................................................83

Split editing ...........................................................................................86

Using video effects .................................................................................... 90

Working with the effects list..................................................................91

Changing effect parameters...................................................................92

Fading effects in and out .......................................................................94

Previewing and rendering...................................................................... 94

Video effects – the basic set......................................................................95

Cleaning effects......................................................................................... 96

Auto color correct.................................................................................. 97

Noise reduction...................................................................................... 97

Stabilize .................................................................................................98

Time effects ............................................................................................... 99

Strobe.....................................................................................................99

Speed ................................................................................................... 100

Color effects ............................................................................................ 101

Black and white ................................................................................... 101

Color correction................................................................................... 101

Posterize ..............................................................................................102

Sepia .................................................................................................... 102

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Fun effects ...............................................................................................103

Lens flare.............................................................................................103

Noise.................................................................................................... 104

Water drop...........................................................................................104

Style effects..............................................................................................105

Blur......................................................................................................105

Emboss ................................................................................................106

Mosaic ................................................................................................. 107

Old film ...............................................................................................107

The SmartMovie music video tool.........................................................108

CHAPTER 6: TRANSITIONS..................................... 111

Transition types and their uses ............................................................112

Previewing transitions in your movie..................................................115

Audio transitions .................................................................................116

The Ripple Transition command ......................................................... 117

Trimming transitions ............................................................................. 118

Trimming with the Clip properties tool............................................... 118

CHAPTER 7: STILL IMAGES .................................... 121

Editing still images .................................................................................124

Trimming with the Clip properties tool............................................... 125

The Frame Grabber ............................................................................... 125

The Frame grabber tool ....................................................................... 126

CHAPTER 8: DISC MENUS....................................... 129

Disc authoring in Studio......................................................................131

Using menus from the Album..............................................................133

The DVD Player Control.....................................................................135

Editing menus on the Timeline............................................................ 136

Editing with the Clip properties tool ................................................... 138

The Disc menu tool.............................................................................. 144

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CHAPTER 9: THE TITLE EDITOR ............................ 145

Launching the Title Editor................................................................... 146

The Title Editor controls .......................................................................147

Title-type buttons................................................................................. 147

Object toolbox ..................................................................................... 148

Editing-mode selection buttons ........................................................... 151

Object layout buttons........................................................................... 153

Clipboard and delete buttons ............................................................... 155

Text-styling controls............................................................................ 155

The Title Editor Album .........................................................................157

The Looks Browser .............................................................................157

The Backgrounds section..................................................................... 160

The Pictures section............................................................................. 161

The Buttons section ............................................................................. 161

CHAPTER 10: SOUND EFFECTS AND MUSIC........ 165

The Timeline audio tracks ...................................................................167

The CD audio tool...............................................................................168

The SmartSound tool ........................................................................... 170

The Voice-over tool ............................................................................. 172

Trimming audio clips ............................................................................. 175

Trimming with the Clip properties tool............................................... 175

Audio volume and mixing...................................................................... 177

Anatomy of an audio clip .................................................................... 178

Adjusting audio on the Timeline ......................................................... 180

The Volume and balance tool.............................................................. 182

Audio effects............................................................................................187

Noise reduction.................................................................................... 188

Equalizer.............................................................................................. 190

Leveler.................................................................................................191

Reverb .................................................................................................191

CHAPTER 11: MAKING YOUR MOVIE..................... 193

Outputting to a camera or video recorder... .........................................195

Output your movie to videotape ..........................................................197

Save your movie as an AVI file........................................................... 199

Table of contents vii

Save your movie as an MPEG file....................................................... 202

Save as RealVideo or Windows Media ...............................................203

Share your movie via the Internet........................................................ 205

Output your movie to DVD, VCD or S-VCD......................................207

Copying an AVI file to tape.................................................................210

APPENDIX A: SETUP OPTIONS .............................. 211

Capture source settings........................................................................212

Capture format settings........................................................................ 216

Edit settings ......................................................................................... 221

CD and voice-over settings.................................................................. 225

Make tape settings ............................................................................... 226

Make AVI file settings ........................................................................228

Make MPEG file settings ....................................................................230

Make RealVideo file settings...............................................................232

Make Windows Media file settings ..................................................... 235

Make disc settings ...............................................................................236

APPENDIX B: TIPS AND TRICKS ............................ 239

Hardware ............................................................................................. 239

Software............................................................................................... 242

Increasing the frame rate ..................................................................... 244

Studio and computer animation...........................................................245

Smart Capture Tips (DV only) ............................................................245

APPENDIX C: TROUBLESHOOTING ....................... 247

Technical help on-line ............................................................................ 248

Studio crashes in Edit mode ................................................................ 251

Capture error occurs on starting capture.............................................. 256

Studio hangs when rendering...............................................................259

CD or DVD burner is not detected ......................................................262

Studio hangs on launch or does not launch..........................................263

HollywoodFX transitions are still watermarked after upgrading......... 264

“Cannot initialize the DV capture device” error appears in Capture mode

............................................................................................................. 265

Installation problems .............................................................................269

Operation problems ...............................................................................270

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APPENDIX D: VIDEOGRAPHY TIPS ........................ 277

Creating a shooting plan......................................................................278

Editing ................................................................................................. 279

Rules of thumb for video editing.........................................................282

Soundtrack production......................................................................... 284

Title .....................................................................................................286

APPENDIX E: GLOSSARY........................................ 287

APPENDIX F: LICENSE AGREEMENT .................... 303

APPENDIX G: KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS................ 307

INDEX ........................................................................ 311

Table of contents ix

Before you start

Thank you for purchasing Pinnacle Studio. We hope you enjoy using the software.

If you have not used Studio before, we recommend that you keep the manual handy for reference even if you don’t actually read it all the way through.

In order to ensure that your Studio experience gets off on the right foot, please review the three topics below before continuing to Chapter 1: Using Studio.

Equipment requirements

In addition to your Studio software, here is what you need to make a Studio editing system.

Computer

• Intel Pentium or AMD Athlon 800 MHz or higher

(1.5 GHz or higher recommended)

• Microsoft Windows 98 SE, Windows “Millennium”,

Windows 2000 or Windows XP (recommended)

• DirectX-compatible graphics card (ATI Radeon or

NVIDIA GeForce 2 or higher recommended)

Before you start xi

• DirectX-compatible sound card

• 256 MB of RAM (512 MB recommended)

• CD-ROM drive

• Speakers

• Mouse

• A microphone, if you want to record voice-overs

• 300 MB of free hard drive space to install software

• Optional CD burner for creating VideoCDs (VCDs)

or Super-VideoCDs (S-VCDs)

• Optional DVD burner for creating DVDs

The hard drive

Your hard drive must be capable of sustained reading and writing at 4 MB/sec. All SCSI and most UDMA drives are capable of this. The first time you capture at full quality, Studio will test your drive to make sure it is fast enough. Video in the DV format occupies

3.6 MB of hard drive space for every second of video, so four and a half minutes of DV video consume a full gigabyte of hard drive space.

If disk space is a concern with your DV captures, use SmartCapture to capture your video at preview quality (see “SmartCapture: Preview-quality capture” on page

26). This feature uses much less disk space. An entire tape can fit in as little as 360 MB.

Tip: We recommend using a separate hard drive dedicated to video capture. This avoids competition between Studio and other software, including Windows, for use of the drive during capture.

xii Studio 9

Video capture hardware

Studio can capture video from a variety of digital and analog sources. Please see “Capture hardware” on page

19.

Video equipment

Studio can output video to:

• Any DV or Digital8 camcorder or VCR. This

requires an OHCI-compliant IEEE-1394 (FireWire) port (as provided by Pinnacle Studio DV). The camcorder must be set up to record from DV Input.

• Any analog (8mm, Hi8, VHS, SVHS, VHS-C or

SVHS-C) camcorder or VCR. This requires Pinnacle Studio DC10plus, Studio AV, or another Pinnacle card with analog outputs. Output to analog camcorders or VCRs is also possible using a Pinnacle Studio DV or other OHCI-compliant 1394 port if your DV or Digital8 camcorder or VCR can pass a DV signal through to its analog outputs (see your camcorder manual and Chapter 11: Making your movie, for more information).

Abbreviations and conventions

This guide uses the following conventions to help organize the material.

Terminology

Studio: “Studio” refers to the editing software.

DV: The term “DV” refers to DV and Digital8

camcorders, VCRs, and tapes.

Before you start xiii

1394: The term “1394” refers to OHCI-compliant IEEE-1394, FireWire, DV or i.LINK interfaces, ports and cables.

Analog: The term “analog” refers to 8mm, Hi8, VHS, SVHS, VHS-C or SVHS-C camcorders, VCRs and tapes, and to Composite/RCA and S-Video cables and connectors.

Buttons, menus, dialog boxes and windows

Names of buttons, menus and related items are written in italics to distinguish them from the surrounding text, whereas window and dialog names are written with initial capital letters. For example:

Click the Edit menu button to open your menu in the Title Editor.

Choosing menu commands

The right arrowhead symbol (¾) denotes the path for hierarchical menu items. For example:

Select Toolbox ¾ Generate Background Music.

Keyboard conventions

Key names are spelled with an initial capital and are underlined. A plus sign denotes a key combination. For example:

Press Ctrl+A to select all the clips on the Timeline.

Mouse clicks

When a mouse click is required, the default is always a left-click unless otherwise specified:

Right-click and select Go to Title/Menu Editor.

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On-line help

Two kinds of immediate help are always available while you are working in Studio:

• On-line help: Click the help button in the Studio

main menu bar, or select the Help ¾ Help topics menu, or press F1 to open Studio’s on-line help file.

• Tool tips: To find out what a button or other Studio

control does, pause your mouse pointer over it. A “tool tip” appears explaining its function.

Before you start xv

CHAPTER 1:

Using Studio

Creating movies with Studio is a three-step process:

1. Capture: Import source video material to your PC hard drive. Possible sources include analog videotape (8mm, VHS etc.), digital videotape (DV, Digital8), and live video from a video camera, camcorder or webcam.

Capture mode is covered in Chapter 2: Capturing video.

2. Edit: Arrange your video material as desired by reordering scenes and discarding unwanted footage. Add visuals, such as transitions, titles and graphics, and supplementary audio, such as sound effects and background music. For DVD and VCD authoring, create interactive menus that give your audience a customized viewing experience.

Edit mode is the arena for most of your work in Studio. See “Edit mode” later in this chapter (page 5) for a fuller introduction.

3. Make movie: When your project is complete, generate a finished movie in your choice of format and storage medium: tape, VCD, S-VCD, DVD, AVI, MPEG, RealVideo or Windows Media.

Make Movie mode is covered in Chapter 11: Making your movie.

Chapter 1: Using Studio 1

Setting the mode

Select which step of the movie-making process you want to work on by clicking one of the three mode buttons at the top left of the Studio window:

When you switch modes, the Studio screen changes to display the controls needed for the new mode.

Undo, Redo and Help

The Undo, Redo and Help buttons are always to be found in the top right corner of the Studio window, no matter which of the three modes you are currently working in.

• Undo allows you to back out of any changes you

have made to your project during the current session, one step at a time.

• Redo reinstates the changes one by one if you undo

too far.

• The Help button launches Studio’s on-line help

system.

All other controls on the Studio screen are dedicated to tasks within the current mode.

2 Studio 9

Chapter 1: Using Studio 3

Setting options

Most options in Studio are set using two tabbed dialog boxes.

The first lets you control options related to Capture mode and Edit mode. It has four tabs:

The other dialog box is concerned with options relating to Make Movie mode. It has six tabs, one for each of the six movie output types:

Each panel of both dialog boxes can be opened individually with a corresponding command on the Setup menu (e.g. Setup ¾ Capture Source). Once either dialog box is open, however, all of its panels are available through the tabs.

For simplicity, we generally refer to the different options panels independently, as in “the Capture source options panel”.

Detailed explanations of the options in both dialog boxes are contained in Appendix A: Setup Options.

4 Studio 9



EDIT MODE

Studio opens in Edit mode each time it is launched, because that is the mode you use most often. The Edit mode display includes three main areas.

The Album stores resources you will use in your movies, including your captured video scenes.

The Movie Window is where you create your edited movie by arranging video and sound clips, and by applying transitions and effects.

The Player provides playback and previewing for whichever item is currently selected in Studio. That may be an Album resource – such as a video scene, title or sound effect – or your edited movie, complete with transitions, titles, effects and three audio tracks. The Player is covered below.

See Chapter 3: The Album and Chapter 4: The Movie Window for detailed information on those topics.

Chapter 1: Using Studio 5

The Player

The Player displays a preview of your edited movie, or of the item currently selected in the Album.

It consists of two main areas: a preview window and playback controls. The preview window displays video

images. The playback controls allow you to play the video, or go to an exact position within it. These controls come in two formats: standard and DVD.

Standard mode

The standard playback controls are similar to those on a camcorder or VCR. They are used for viewing ordinary video.

DVD mode

The DVD playback controls emulate the navigation controls on a DVD player or remote control. Use them for previewing your DVD, VCD or S-VCD disc productions, including menu interaction.

6 Studio 9

The preview window

This is a point of focus in Studio because you use it so often, especially for previewing your movie. It can also be used to display:

• Any type of Album content.

• Still images or titles from your movie.

• Changes to video effects in real time while you

adjust the parameter controls for the effects.

• Still frames from your video.

When viewing a still frame, you can advance by a single frame in either direction with the “jog” controls.

Note: When 16:9 (widescreen) video is previewed, the Player is proportioned somewhat differently than in our illustrations, but its general appearance is the same.

The DVD toggle button

Switch between the two playback modes with

the DVD toggle button at the bottom right-hand corner of the Player. This button is only available when your edited movie contains at least one menu.

Chapter 1: Using Studio 7

Playback controls

The Player presents either of two sets of playback controls depending on the playback mode you choose.

When you play your movie back as ordinary video, you will be using the standard playback controls. If your movie uses disc menu navigation, you can play it back as an optical disc with interactive on-screen menus by using the DVD playback controls. Both groups of controls are covered below.

The full-screen preview button: This button, just below the bottom right-hand corner of the preview window, switches to a full-screen preview. It is available in both playback modes. The full-screen display ends when your movie ends, or you doubleclick the screen or press the Esc key.

Standard playback controls

These buttons control playback in the Player.

Play / Pause: The Play button previews the movie from the current position. Once preview begins, Play becomes Pause. When playback is paused, the Album scene or Movie Window clip at which previewing stopped remains selected. The [Space] key can also be used to start and stop playback.

Fast reverse, Fast forward: These buttons let you preview your movie at two, four or ten times the normal speed, in either direction. Use them to scan for a particular piece of video you want to work with. Click the buttons repeatedly to loop through the speed factors.

8 Studio 9

Go to beginning: This button halts playback and skips back to the first frame of the material being previewed.

Jog buttons: This pair of controls lets you step your movie forward and backward by one frame at a time.

The Player scrubber

Use the Player scrubber to quickly traverse your captured video or edited movie in either direction. The scrubber position corresponds to the position of the current frame in the captured video file (not just the current scene) or in the edited movie (not just the current clip). Thus the scrubber bar always represents the entire length of the content being viewed.

As you move the scrubber, the preview window shows the current frame.

The ability of the preview to keep up with the scrubber depends on the speed of your computer. If you move the Player scrubber slowly, the preview display responds smoothly. As you increase the rate at which you move the scrubber, the preview will jump frames. The point at which it does so depends on your hardware. The smoothness of the preview also diminishes as the overall length of the material being scrubbed increases.

The counter

The counter displays the current playback position in hours, minutes, seconds and frames. You can directly modify the counter fields to select an

Chapter 1: Using Studio 9

exact frame to view or at which to start playback. Simply click on the number you wish to change and type a new value. After you click within the counter, you can also control it from the keyboard:

• Step through the fields: Tab, Shift+Tab, Left, Right

• Raise and lower field values: Up and Down. Hold

the key down to continuously change the value.

The master volume slider

This control sets the overall audio volume during preview playback. It is equivalent to turning up the master volume on your sound card using the system volume tool. It does not affect the volume of the final movie Studio creates in Make Movie mode.

The small loudspeaker icon at the right of the control serves as a master mute button during playback.

DVD playback controls

These controls include the four standard transport buttons detailed above (Play/Pause, Fast

reverse, Fast forward, Go to beginning) plus the DVD Player

Control, which is described under “The DVD Player

Control” on page 135.

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Further editing topics

Please see the following for details on specific editing topics:

• Chapter 5: Video clips

• Chapter 6: Transitions

• Chapter 7: Still images

• Chapter 8: Disc menus

• Chapter 9: The Title Editor

• Chapter 10: Sound effects and music

Chapter 1: Using Studio 11

CHAPTER 2:

Capturing video

Capture is the process of importing video from a video source such as a camcorder to a file on your PC’s hard drive. Clips from this “capture file” can then be used in Studio as ingredients of your edited movies. You can open capture files into the Album in Studio’s Edit mode (see Chapter 3: The Album).

Capture is the first step in using your video footage.

Studio is able to capture from both digital (DV, MicroMV) and analog video sources. See “Capture hardware” on page 19 for details on configuring Studio to capture from your equipment.

Switching to Capture mode

The very first step in capturing is to switch into Studio’s Capture mode by clicking the Capture button at the top of the screen.

Chapter 2: Capturing video 13



This opens the Capture mode interface, enabling you to set up and carry out video capture. The details of the interface are somewhat different for analog than for digital video sources.

Topics in this chapter

• “The Capture mode interface” (below) introduces the

controls and displays for both analog and digital captures.

• “The Capture Process” (page 19) covers setting up

for your hardware, gives step-by-step capturing instructions, and describes the automatic scene detection feature.

• “Digital capture” (page 25) and “Analog capture”

(page 30) cover topics specific to each type of source.

THE CAPTURE MODE INTERFACE

The tools and controls you see in Capture mode are different depending on whether your capture hardware is digital or analog.

Digital capture

If your video source is digital, your Capture mode screen will look like the illustration on the opposite page.

The Album, at the top left of the screen, displays icons representing the video scenes as they are captured. The Player, at top right, lets you view the incoming video

14 Studio 9

while cueing for capture, and monitor the capture itself. Readouts on the Player tell you the exact length of the captured video, and the number of frames dropped during the capture (normally zero).

The Camcorder Controller, at bottom left, provides a tape counter display and a set of transport controls for operating the playback device. Finally, the Diskometer, at bottom right, displays the capture space remaining on the drive. It also provides the Start Capture button and buttons for setting capture options.

The Diskometer and the Camcorder Controller are described in detail beginning on page 16.

Analog capture

Both the Album and the Player are used in analog as well as digital captures, so when you capture from an analog source the top half of the screen is the same as shown and described above for digital sources.

Chapter 2: Capturing video 15

Not the bottom half of the screen, however. It now features a second version of the Diskometer, with two fly-out panels for adjusting audio and video levels during capture. (The panels are described under “Audio and video levels – analog” on page 31.)

Digital vs. analog

To summarize, the digital and analog set-ups reflect two major differences in capability:

• The digital set-up lets you control the tape transport

of the camcorder or VCR using the Camcorder Controller.

• The analog set-up lets you modify audio and video

levels dynamically during capture.

The Diskometer

The Diskometer displays, both numerically and graphically, the amount of space available on your capture drive. It also indicates the approximate duration of video that can be accommodated, which depends on both the available space and the configured capture

16 Studio 9

quality. Capture quality settings are selected using the preset buttons that are displayed on the Diskometer for

some capture devices, or by entering custom settings. See “Capture source settings” (page 212) and “Capture format settings” (page 216) for information on capture settings.

The Diskometer when capturing from a digital source (L) and an analog source (R). Click the side tabs on the analog version to open fly-out panels for adjusting video and audio levels during capture.

The Start capture button on the Diskometer begins and ends the capture process. The caption changes to Stop capture while the operation is in progress.

The default save location for captured video is:

C:\My Documents\Pinnacle Studio\Captured Video

Setting the capture directory: To save captured video to a different location, click the file folder button . This displays the Select Folder And Default Name For Captured Video dialog. The folder you assign will be used to store captured video during this and future sessions. The file name you enter will be offered as the default file name on your next capture.

Chapter 2: Capturing video 17

The Camcorder Controller

This panel of transport controls is shown in Capture mode if you are capturing from a digital video source. (Analog devices must be cued and operated manually.)

The Camcorder Controller and a close-up view of the transport controls. The counter window above the control buttons displays the current position of the source tape, along with the current transport mode of the camcorder.

From left to right, the transport control buttons are:

Stop, Rewind / Review, Play, Fast forward / Cue and Pause.

The Frame reverse and Frame forward buttons (second row) let you locate the exact frame you want. These two buttons are available only when the device is in pause mode.

18 Studio 9



THE CAPTURE PROCESS

Studio lets you capture video from a variety of analog and digital hardware types. Choose the device you wish to use on the Capture source options panel. See “Capture hardware” (below) for more information.

Performing the actual capture is a straightforward stepby-step procedure (see page 21). As the capture proceeds, Studio automatically detects the natural breaks in the incoming video and divides the material into “scenes”. Upon detection, each scene is added to the Album, where it is represented by an icon of its first frame. Automatic scene detection is described starting on page 23.

Some capture options apply to digital captures only or to analog captures only. These are covered in their own sections, “Digital capture” (page 25) and “Analog capture” (page 30).

Capture hardware

Studio can capture digital and analog video from the following sources, depending on your hardware:

• A DV, MicroMV or Digital8 camcorder connected

to an OHCI-compatible IEEE-1394 (FireWire) port.

Chapter 2: Capturing video 19

• A camcorder or VCR with analog outputs connected

to a DirectShow-compatible capture board or external device.

• A USB video camera or webcam.

Pinnacle Systems offers a complete line of DV, analog, and combination capture boards and devices. For more information see your dealer or visit our web-site:

www.pinnaclesys.com

To select a capture device:

1. Click the Setup ¾ Capture Source menu command.

The Capture source options panel appears.

2. Select the devices you want to use from the Video

and Audio dropdown lists in the Capture devices area, and click OK.

See “Capture source settings” on page 212 for detailed information about the Capture source options panel.

Standard vs. widescreen capture

Studio can capture in both the standard (4:3) and the widescreen (16:9) frame aspect ratios. With digital hardware, the frame format is detected automatically. With analog hardware, you use the Aspect ratio

20 Studio 9

dropdown on the Capture source options panel to select the format that matches the source material. You can’t use this setting to change one format to another: it simply lets Studio know how to display the video at the correct aspect ratio.

Capture step-by-step

Here is a step-by-step outline of the capture process. The instructions apply to both digital and analog captures, with differences noted as required.

Further information relating to some of the steps can be found elsewhere in this chapter. Also see Appendix A: Setup Options (page 211) for detailed descriptions of the Capture source and Capture format options panels.

To capture video:

1. Verify that your equipment is properly connected.

For a digital (DV or MicroMV) capture, your camcorder or VCR must be connected to your PC’s 1394 port.

For an analog capture, connect the source video to the Composite or S-Video input of your capture hardware. Connect your source audio to the audio input of the capture hardware, if there is one; otherwise, connect the audio to the audio input of your PC’s sound card.

2. Click the Capture button at the top of the screen if

you are not already in Capture mode. The Capture mode interface is displayed (see page 14).

Chapter 2: Capturing video 21

3. Click the desired capture setting on the Diskometer.

If you need to make detailed adjustments, click the Diskometer’s Settings button, which opens the Capture format options panel (page 216).

For a DV capture, keep in mind that full-quality capture uses much more disk space than does preview quality. If you are planning to output your finished movie to disc (VCD, S-VCD or DVD), you may choose to make your full-quality capture in MPEG rather than DV format.

For an analog capture, keep in mind that the higher the quality setting, the larger will be your captured video file. See “Digital capture” (page 25) and “Analog capture” (page 30) for further explanation of these options.

4. Click the Start capture button on the Diskometer.

The Capture Video dialog box is displayed.

5. Type in a name for the video capture file you are

about to create, or accept the default name. You can optionally also enter a limiting duration for the capture.

If you are making multiple DV captures in preview quality from the same tape, use the file naming convention described on page 27. It will help streamline the Make Movie process later on.

Note: Windows 98 and Millennium have file size limitations. For FAT16 disks the limit is 2 GB. For FAT32 disks the limit is 4GB. Studio estimates how much video of the desired quality the largest allowable file can accommodate, and displays this as the maximum duration for the capture.

22 Studio 9

6. If you are capturing from an analog camcorder or

VCR, start playback now. This step is unnecessary with a digital-source capture, as Studio will control the playback equipment automatically when needed.

7. Click the Start capture button in the Capture Video

dialog box. The button caption changes to Stop capture.

Capture begins. The Player displays the incoming digitized video that is being saved to your hard drive (unless you have unchecked Capture preview on the Capture source options panel).

During capture, Studio performs automatic scene

detection based on the current setting in the Capture source options panel.

8. Click the Stop capture button to end capture at a

point you select.

Studio automatically stops capturing if your hard drive fills up or the maximum duration you entered is reached.

Scene detection

Automatic scene detection is a key feature of Studio. As video capture proceeds, Studio detects natural breaks in the video and divides it up into scenes. A new icon is created in the Video Scenes section of the Album for each scene detected.

Depending on which capture device you are using, automatic scene detection is carried out either in real time during capture, or as a separate step immediately after capture is completed.

Chapter 2: Capturing video 23

You can configure scene detection using the options under Scene detection during video capture on the

Capture source options panel (Setup ¾ Capture Source). Not all scene detection options are available

with every type of video source. Options that do not apply to your set-up are disabled in the dialog.

The four possible options are:

• Automatic based on shooting time and date: This

option is available only when you are capturing from a DV source. Studio monitors the time stamp data on the tape during capture, and starts a new scene whenever a discontinuity is found.

• Automatic based on video content: Studio detects

changes in the video content, and creates a new scene wherever there is a large change in the images. This feature might not work well if the lighting is not stable. To take an extreme example, a video shot in a nightclub with a strobe light would produce a scene each time the strobe flashed.

• Create new scene every X seconds: Studio creates

new scenes at an interval you choose. This can be useful for breaking up footage that contains long continuous shots.

• No automatic scene detection: Select this option if

you want to monitor the entire capture process and decide for yourself where scene breaks should occur. Press the [Space] key each time you want to insert a scene break during capture.

24 Studio 9



DIGITAL CAPTURE

This section covers aspects of capturing from a DV source deck (camcorder or VCR) and a 1394 port. To read about capturing from analog hardware, please see “Analog capture” on page 30.

Preview quality and full quality

When capturing in DV format from a DV device, Studio offers the choices of preview quality (SmartCapture) and full quality. At full quality, two types of encoding are available: DV and MPEG.

The two DV capture quality choices are covered in detail in the following pages. This section concludes with a note on adjusting audio and video levels in digital captures (page 29).

Note: If you are using a MicroMV camcorder connected to a 1394 port, the user interface in Capture mode is almost identical to that for DV equipment. However, most DV capture options and features are not available with MicroMV captures, including preview-quality capture and DV encoding. Captures from MicroMV are always encoded as MPEG-2.

Chapter 2: Capturing video 25

SmartCapture: Preview-quality capture

SmartCapture is a unique feature of Studio. It allows you to capture from DV videotape to a file of reducedquality video using minimal hard drive space. With SmartCapture, you can capture an entire tape onto your hard drive rather than having to pick and choose which portions to capture. You can work with this “previewquality” material throughout the editing of your movie.

When your movie is finished and ready for output, Studio will recapture any preview-quality clips at full quality, automatically controlling your source deck to locate and capture the footage. The reduced quality of the preview video therefore has no impact on the quality of your finished movie. Scenes captured at preview quality are denoted in the Album by a dotted border.

Continuous timecode

For the greatest convenience in using SmartCapture, your digital tape must have continuous DV timecode. Studio cannot capture in preview quality through breaks in the timecode. If your camcorder has a timecode-striping feature, stripe your tape before shooting. If it does not, the simplest way to avoid timecode gaps is to overlap your shots if you start and stop the camcorder during shooting. Before beginning a new shot, rewind a few frames so that there will not be a blank spot.

SmartCapture can still be used with tapes that do not have continuous timecode throughout, but a separate

26 Studio 9

capture file must be created for each segment of the tape. SmartCapture will stop capturing when a break in timecode is detected. To continue capturing, cue the tape to the start of the next video segment and click Start Capture again.

Naming convention

If you capture multiple segments from the same tape, we strongly recommend the following naming convention: For each capture file that originates from

the same tape, use a name that starts with the same word.

For example, if you have a tape that contains three different activities from your vacation, you might call the captures “vacation-picnic”, “vacation-sailing” and “vacation-soccer”. Because Studio processes the files in alphabetical order when recapturing, following this convention will greatly reduce the number of times you have to switch tapes during the Make Tape process.

Analog tapes and Digital8 camcorders

SmartCapture requires DV timecode. Analog tapes (Hi8 and 8mm) do not have DV timecode even when played in a Digital8 camcorder. As a result, it is not possible to use SmartCapture with analog tapes played in a Digital8 camcorder. To use your analog tapes with Studio, either capture them at full quality, or copy them to DV tape.

Chapter 2: Capturing video 27

Full-quality capture

You have two choices for the way the video data is encoded and compressed in full-quality captures. For most purposes, DV format is the logical choice, but if you are planning to output your finished movie to disc (VCD, S-VCD or DVD), MPEG format may be preferred. Because of the intensive computation required for MPEG encoding, however, MPEG capture is available only if your computer’s CPU has a clock speed of at least 2.2 GHz.

An MPEG movie requires much less disk space than the equivalent full-quality DV movie, although with SmartCapture this is not generally a concern.

DV is a high-resolution format with correspondingly high storage requirements.

Your camcorder compresses and stores video on the tape at 3.6 MB/s, at a quality equivalent to broadcast video. With full-quality capture, the video data is transferred directly from the camcorder tape to your PC hard drive with no changes or additional compression. Because the video quality is high, capturing at this setting does consume a lot of disk space, so you may want to pick and choose small segments to capture instead of the entire tape.

You can calculate the amount of disk space you will need by multiplying the length of your video in seconds

28 Studio 9

by 3.6, which gives the number of megabytes required. For example:

1 hour of video = 3600 seconds (60 x 60)

3600 seconds x 3.6 MB/s = 12,960 MB (12.7 GB)

Hence 1 hour of video uses 12.7 GB of storage.

To capture at full quality, your hard drive must be capable of sustained reading and writing at 4 MB per second. All SCSI and most UDMA drives are capable of this. The first time you initiate a full-quality capture, Studio will test your drive to make sure it is fast enough.

MPEG

DVD and S-VCD discs both use files in MPEG-2 format, an extension of the MPEG-1 format used for VCDs. MPEGs intended for use on the Internet will be at lower resolutions and in MPEG-1 format.

The Capture format options panel (Setup ¾ Capture Format) includes a variety of options to control the quality of MPEG captures. Refer to “Capture format settings” on page 216 for detailed information about MPEG quality options.

Your computer must have a CPU speed of at least 2.2 GHz in order to perform MPEG captures.

Audio and video levels – digital

With DV and MicroMV captures, you are using audio and video that have been encoded digitally during recording, right in the camera. When you transfer the

Chapter 2: Capturing video 29

footage through a 1394 port to your computer, the data remains in the compressed digital format throughout, so you cannot adjust the audio or video levels during the capture. This is in contrast to analog captures, where the audio and video can be adjusted as capturing takes place.

With digital captures, you defer any needed adjustment of audio and video levels until Edit mode, where Studio provides plug-in video effects for adjusting the visual balance of a clip, and audio effects to enhance the sound. These effects allow you to adjust individual clips rather than having to make global adjustments affecting all the video in a capture file.

For more information see “Analog capture” (below), “Using video effects” (page 90), and “Audio effects” (page 187).

ANALOG CAPTURE



The topics in this section relate to capture with analog equipment, such as:

• A camcorder or VCR with analog outputs connected

to a DirectShow-compatible capture board or external device.

• A USB video camera or webcam.

If you are using a DV or MicroMV camcorder connected to your computer via a 1394 port, please refer instead to “DV capture” on page 25.

30 Studio 9

Capture quality options

Studio offers three preset quality choices – Good, Better and Best – and a Custom option. The video

capture settings for each of the presets, including picture size, frame rate, compression characteristics and quality, depend on the capabilities of the capture hardware being used. Keep in mind that the higher the quality, the more disk space is required. Choose the Custom preset to configure your own video capture settings. For more information on video capture settings, see Appendix A: Setup Options (page 211).

Audio and video levels – analog

Studio provides fly-out panels for controlling video and audio levels during capture. This feature is especially useful when you need to compensate for differences in video captured from multiple sources.

Video (L) and audio (R) panels for setting levels during

analog capture.

Chapter 2: Capturing video 31

Although you can also adjust these levels with the appropriate Video effects in Edit mode, setting them correctly for capture can save you from having to worry about color correction later on.

Setting your audio options correctly as you capture will help in achieving consistent volume levels and quality.

Particular capture devices may offer fewer options than are shown and discussed here. For instance, with hardware that doesn’t support audio captures in stereo, a balance control will not appear on the audio panel.

Video

Choose the type of video you are going to digitize by clicking the appropriate Source button (Composite or S-Video). The five sliders allow you to control the brightness (video gain), contrast (black level), sharpness, hue and color saturation of the incoming video.

Note: The Hue slider does not appear when capturing from PAL equipment.

Audio

Use the Audio capture buttons to control whether Studio should capture the audio along with the video. Select the Off button if your source is video only. The sliders on the tray let you control the input level and stereo balance of the incoming audio.

32 Studio 9

CHAPTER 3:

The Album

The source materials you need for making a movie are stored in the various sections of the Album, each of which is accessed by its own tab as follows:

Video Scenes: This section contains your captured video footage. You can access and preview the capture files directly, or you can load one into the Album, where its scenes are represented by thumbnail icons. To use some of the scenes in your movie, just drag their icons into the Movie Window. See “The Video Scenes section”, page 36.

The Video Scenes section of the Album. Click the tabs down the left side of the Album to access the materials in the other sections.

Chapter 3: The Album 33

Transitions: This Album section contains fades, dissolves, slides, and other transition types, including the elaborate Hollywood FX transitions. To use a transition, position it next to or between video clips and graphics in the Movie Window. See “The Transitions section”, page 50.

Titles: This section contains editable titles, which you can use as overlays or as full-screen graphics. You can create your own titles from scratch, or use or adapt the supplied ones. Studio supports rolls, crawls, and many typographical effects. See “The Titles section”, page 51.

Still Images: This is a section of photographs, bitmaps and grabbed video frames. You can use these images full-screen or as overlays on the main video. Most standard image file formats are supported. See “The Still Images section”, page 52.

Sound effects: Studio comes ready with a wide range of high-quality sound effects. You can also use wav and mp3 files that you have recorded yourself or obtained from other sources. See “The Sound Effects section”, page 53.

Disc Menus: Studio has an extensive collection of chapter menus to use in DVD, VCD and S-VCD authoring. You can use these as they are, modify them, or create your own. See “The Disc Menus section”, page 54.

34 Studio 9

Using the Album

Each section of the Album contains as many pages as are necessary to hold the icons representing the items in that section. At the top right of each Album page, Studio shows the current page number and the total page count for the section. Click the arrows to move forward or back through the pages.

All types of Album content can be previewed simply by clicking on the icons. During preview, most items (but not transitions or sound effects) display a small progress bar along the bottom of the icon.

This chapter introduces each of the Album sections in turn, beginning with a detailed discussion of the allimportant Video Scenes section. Actually using the contents of the Album to create your edited movie will be the subject of chapters 4 through 10.

Source folders for Album content

The scene icons in the Video Scenes section come from a captured video file, while the Transitions section is filled from resource files associated with the Studio program.

The icons in each of the other four Album sections are different: they represent the files contained in a particular disk folder. Each of these sections – Titles, Images, Sound Effects and Disc Menus – has a default folder assigned to it, but you can select a different folder if desired.

Chapter 3: The Album 35



The icons in the Titles section represent files stored in

the currently-selected source folder on your hard drive.

The source folder for the section’s content is listed at the top of the left Album page, next to a small Folder button . To change the source of the current section, click this button, browse to another folder on your system, and select any file. The file you select will be highlighted in the repopulated Album section, but is not otherwise utilized.

THE VIDEO SCENES SECTION

This is where the editing process really begins –

in the Video Scenes section of the Album with your captured raw footage. In a typical production, your first step will probably be to drag some scenes from the Album down into the Movie Window (see Chapter 5: Video Clips).

In the Album, scenes are displayed in the order in which they were captured. This order cannot be changed, since it is determined by the underlying capture file, but scenes can be added to your movie in

36 Studio 9

any order you choose. Similarly, while you can’t trim (edit) Album scenes, you can use any desired portion of a scene when it appears as a clip in your movie.

Interface features

The Video Scenes section offers several special interface features:

• The icons of scenes captured at preview quality are

drawn with a dotted outline in the Album. Scenes captured at full quality do not have this outline.

• Scenes that have been added to the Movie Window

are distinguished in the Album by a green checkmark. The checkmark remains as long as any clip in the Movie Window originates with that scene.

• To see how a particular Album scene is used in your

current project, use the Album ¾ Find Scene in Project menu command. Studio highlights any clips

in the Movie Window that originate in the selected scene (or scenes). To go the other way, use the Find Scene in Album command, which is on the rightclick menu for Movie Window clips.

• Nearly all menu commands that apply to scenes are

available both on the main Album menu, and on the pop-up menu that appears when you right-click a selected scene. When this documentation calls for a menu command like Album ¾ Combine Scenes, remember that an equivalent command is usually available on the pop-up “context” menu as well.

Chapter 3: The Album 37

Summary of operations

Because of its central role, the Video Scenes section of the Album provides an extensive set of operations. These are covered below in the following topics:

• Opening a captured video file

• Viewing captured video

• Selecting scenes and files

• Displaying scene and file information

• Comment view

• Combining and subdividing scenes

• Redetecting scenes

Opening a captured video file

The default locations for your video files are the Windows default capture folder and the My videos folder. When you are viewing the folder contents page of the Video Scenes section, both of these locations always appear on the dropdown list at the top of the Album.

You can also choose other hard drive folders to access stored video files. Both the current and previous folders are also listed, if they are different from the two standard locations, making four different folders that may appear in the list at any one time.

Under Windows XP, the system capture folder is located in the Windows’ “all users” documents folder. The capture folder’s real name is My videos, but

38 Studio 9

Windows Explorer and Studio customarily call it by an alias, Shared videos. This distinguishes it from My videos in the user’s personal documents folder.

Under versions of Windows with no special shared video folder, the default capture folder is called:

C:\My Documents\Pinnacle Studio\Captured Video

Under Windows 98, the full pathname of the My Videos folder is:

C:\My Documents\My Videos

Opening a folder

The folder contents page is displayed whenever you choose a new folder. It lists both the subfolders and the digital video files within the folder you chose:

Three ways to open a folder:

• Select the folder name on the dropdown list on the

folder contents page.

• Select a folder listed on the folder contents page.

• Click the parent folder button

Chapter 3: The Album 39

Opening a file

When you open a video file, the file contents page is displayed, showing icons that represent the scenes in the file:

Three ways to open a digital video file:

• Select the file name on the dropdown list on the file

contents page.

• Select a file listed on the folder contents page.

• Click the browse for file button and use the Open

dialog to locate an avi or mpg file on your hard drive.

That file becomes the current capture file. Any other capture files in the selected folder can now be accessed via the dropdown list.

Scene detection and thumbnails

The Album now fills with the detected scenes from your captured video (see “Scene detection” on page 23). Each scene is denoted by a thumbnail frame – an icon of the scene’s first frame. It may be that the first frame doesn’t make a good icon for the scene, so Studio lets you pick a different one if desired.

40 Studio 9

To change thumbnails in the Album:

1. Select the scene to be changed.

2. Use the Player to find the frame you want used for

the thumbnail.

3. Click the Album ¾ Set Thumbnail menu command.

Video aspect ratios

Most digital video files provide format information that allows Studio to detect the frame aspect ratio of 4:3 or 16:9 automatically. If the file does not provide aspect ratio information, Studio defaults to the standard 4:3 format.

The Aspect Ratio 4:3 and Aspect Ratio 16:9 commands on the Album menu let you manually set whichever ratio you need. These commands also appear on the right-button context menu for video scenes in the Album.

Studio does not allow you to mix footage of different aspect ratios in the same movie. If you want to add 16:9 footage to a 4:3 movie, or 4:3 footage to a 16:9 movie, you must first use whichever Aspect Ratio command is needed to bring the Album scenes into conformity with the movie. The new clips will be squeezed or stretched as needed to match the movie.

Chapter 3: The Album 41

Viewing captured video

Individual or multiple scenes in the open captured video file can be viewed at any time.

To view captured video starting at a selected scene:

1. Click on the scene’s icon in the Album.

The Player displays the first frame of the selected scene.

2. Click the Play button in the Player.

The Player now plays the selected scenes and any subsequent ones. Progress is indicated in three ways.

• The scenes highlight successively as they are

played.

• The Player scrubber shows the current point of

play relative to the entire movie.

• Like most Album icons, scene thumbnails

display a progress bar during preview. As you continue to view your captured video, the progress bar moves from one thumbnail to the next.

42 Studio 9

Previewing digital video files

When a folder is open in the Album and the name of a digital video file is selected, you can use the Player to preview the video without actually opening the file into the Album.

You can even select multiple files for playback using standard selection techniques.

Selecting scenes and files

Studio offers a variety of ways to select scenes and other items in the Video Scenes section of the Album. Selected video scenes are indicated by a highlighted border. Selected folders and video files are shown with text highlighting.

Selected scenes have a highlighted border (center).

Selection techniques follow standard Windows conventions. Use any of the following, separately or in combination:

• Choose the Edit ¾ Select All menu command or

press Ctrl+A to select all the scenes (or files and

Chapter 3: The Album 43

folders) currently displaying in the Album, including those on other pages.

• Shift-click to select a range of neighboring items.

• Ctrl-click to add or remove individual items from the

selection.

• Starting with the mouse pointer over a blank area of

the Album page, click and drag to “marquee” an area, selecting all the items that intersect the area.

• Use the arrow keys to navigate the Album grid. Use

the arrows in combination with Shift to select items as you go.

Selected folders and video files have highlighted text.

Displaying scene and file information

As you move the mouse pointer over video scenes, the pointer changes to a grabber symbol. If you pause momentarily on the scene, the start time and length is displayed in a pop-up box. If

you leave the grabber on the scene, the display persists for several seconds. The start time shown is the timecode from the original source video, in minutes, seconds, and frames.

For information regarding video files when the Video Scenes section is in folder view mode, select Details view in the Album’s right button context

44 Studio 9

menu. The file name, resolution, aspect ratio, duration and frame rate are displayed. Switch back to a more compact listing with Icon view.

Comment view

In the default view for the Video Scenes section, known as Scene view, each scene is represented by a thumbnail frame icon. To see more information about each scene, use the Album ¾ Comment View menu command.

In comment view, editable captions are displayed for Album scenes. The usage of these captions is up to you: they might be search keywords, or scene names, or text comments describing the scene content. The default caption is generated from the scene’s sequence number and duration (e.g. “Scene 3, 7:21”).

If you click on a video scene, an in-place text field appears, allowing you to enter the custom name or comment.

Chapter 3: The Album 45

Selecting scenes by name

A related option lets you select video scenes by scanning for keywords in the comments. Use Album ¾ Select By Name to open this dialog box:

Enter a keyword into the text field and click OK to highlight all Album scenes whose caption contains the keyword. The default captions are not searched – only the ones you have customized.

Combining and subdividing scenes

After previewing your scenes, you might want to combine or subdivide some into larger or smaller units. Such adjustments are easily made.

To combine scenes in the Album:

1. Select the scenes to be combined.

2. Select Album ¾ Combine Scenes.

The selected scenes are combined into one.

46 Studio 9

Only selected adjacent scenes can be combined. Furthermore, they are joined in the order in which they appear in the Album, regardless of the order in which they were selected. (Album order proceeds across rows and then down the page.) To revert, press Ctrl+Z, or click the undo button.

If the scenes you selected were not all neighbors, each set of adjacent scenes is combined, but the different sets are not combined with each other.

Several selected scenes (black) are merged into two longer scenes. Having no neighbors, scene 4 is unaffected, even though it was part of the selection.

To subdivide scenes in the Album:

1. Select the scenes to be subdivided.

2. Select Album ¾ Subdivide Scenes.

The Subdivide Selected Scenes dialog box appears.

Chapter 3: The Album 47

3. Choose the length of the subdivided scenes by

typing in a value.

The smallest allowed subdivision is one second. Any video remaining after subdivision is added to the last scene.

4. Click OK.

A progress bar appears, the scene is subdivided, and new scenes are added to the Album. To revert, press Ctrl+Z, or click the undo button.

You can subdivide these scenes still further, if desired, down to the minimum duration of one second.

Three selected scenes are subdivided to a duration of five seconds. The vertical stripes indicate fivesecond divisions within each scene. The uneven clip timings at right occur because time left after subdivision is added to the final divided scene; that is also why scene 2 is unaffected.

48 Studio 9

Redetecting scenes

If you combine or subdivide scenes and later decide that you’d prefer to restore them to their original state, you may redetect any scene or selection of scenes. The detection results are identical to those obtained after capturing, provided the same scene detection technique is used.

If you have subdivided scenes, you must first recombine them. Even if you cannot exactly recall the initial state and so recombine more than is necessary, the detection process will restore the original scene sequence.

To redetect scenes:

1. If you need to recombine any scenes, first select the

subdivided scenes. then select Album ¾ Combine Scenes menu.

2. Select the scenes you wish to redetect.

3. From the Album menu, select either Detect Scenes

by Video Content or Detect Scenes by Shooting Time and Date.

A progress window appears as Studio detects the scenes and repopulates the Album.

Chapter 3: The Album 49



THE TRANSITIONS SECTION

The Transitions section of the Album provides a

large set of drag-and-drop clip transitions. To keep things manageable, the transitions are divided into groups. Use the dropdown list to select which group of transitions you want to view. All the transitions in the group are displayed, using as many Album pages as necessary.

Studio’s transitions collection includes 74 standard transitions, 52 Alpha Magic transitions, more than 100 unrestricted Hollywood FX 3-D transitions, and more than a further 100 demo transitions. The demo transitions are “watermarked”, so although you can try them out they are not usable in actual productions until you enable them by purchasing the appropriate upgrade on the Pinnacle web-site.

To learn about transitions, and how you can use them in your movies, see Chapter 6: Transitions.

Displaying the transition name

As you move the mouse pointer over the transition icons in the Album, the pointer changes to a grabber symbol (indicating that the transition can be dragged

50 Studio 9

from the Album to the Movie Window). If you pause momentarily on the icon, the name of the transition is displayed. The display persists for several seconds or until your mouse pointer moves off the transition.

Previewing transition effects

When you click on a transition icon, the Player demonstrates the transition using the convention that “A” represents the original clip and “B” the new clip. The demonstration cycles for as long as the icon remains selected.

To see a detailed view, stop the Player and use the jog buttons (Frame reverse and Frame forward) to step through the effect one frame at a time.

THE TITLES SECTION



This section of the Album contains a collection

of text titles in a variety of styles. They can be used in your movie as either full-screen or overlay titles. The difference is that in an overlay title the solid black background you see in the Album is replaced by other material – usually a video clip.

With Studio’s powerful built-in Title Editor, you can readily create your own titles when needed. However,

Chapter 3: The Album 51



you may find it easier still to start with one of the supplied titles and customize it in the Title Editor.

The Titles folder: The icons in the Titles section represent files in the folder named at the top of each left-hand page in the section. Titles that you have created or modified can be added to the section by saving them into this folder from the Title Editor. You can also select a different folder to be the source of the section (see “Source folders for Album content” on page 35).

For information on using titles in your movie, see Chapter 7: Still images.

THE STILL IMAGES SECTION

This section of the Album displays thumbnail

icons of image files, which may include grabbed video frames, photographs and bitmapped drawings. Most standard image file formats are supported.

The Still Images folder: The icons in the Still Images section represent files in the folder named at the top of each left-hand page in the section. Images can be added to the section by storing them in this folder. For instance, you can save grabbed video frames into the folder from the Frame grabber tool, or save a title from the Title Editor. You can also select a different folder to be the source of the section (see “Source folders for Album content” on page 35).

For information on using still images in your movie, see Chapter 7: Still images.

52 Studio 9



THE SOUND EFFECTS SECTION

Studio comes with a wide range of ready-to-use

sound effects. These wav files are installed into a number of folders, covering categories such as “animals”, “bells” and “cartoons”.

The Sound Effects folder: This section of the Album displays the sound files contained in one disk folder, named at the top of each left-hand page in the section. You can display the sounds in a different folder – not necessarily one of those installed by Studio – by selecting a different folder to be the source for the section (see “Source folders for Album content” on page 35).

Along with the many unrestricted sound effects supplied, you may also find a number of “watermarked” demo effects. After experimenting with these, you may wish to purchase a license allowing you to use them in your movies. Visit the Pinnacle web-site:

www.pinnaclesys.com

Besides wav (Windows “wave”) files, music files in mp3 format and avi animation files are also displayed

in this section of the Album, and may be drawn upon for supplemental audio in your productions.

Any sound clip can be previewed simply by clicking its name or icon.

For information on using sounds in your movie, see Chapter 10: Sound effects and music.

Chapter 3: The Album 53



THE DISC MENUS SECTION

This section of the Album contains a collection of

artist-designed menus for VCD, S-VCD and DVD authoring. Menus in Studio are really specialized titles: they can be created and edited in the Title Editor, and either saved from the editor into a disk folder or incorporated directly into your movie.

For information on using disc menus in your movie, see Chapter 8: Disc menus.

The Disc Menus folder: The icons in the Disc Menus section represent files in the folder named at the top of each left-hand page in the section. Menus can be added to the section by storing them in this folder. You can also select a different folder to be the source of the section (see “Source folders for Album content” on page 35).

The motion background symbol: Some of the menus supplied with Studio incorporate a background of moving video rather than a static picture, and you can also create such menus yourself. This “motion background” can help give a professional look to your finished disc.

Menus with motion backgrounds are indicated by a small symbol in the bottom right-hand corner of the Album icon.

Demo menus: In addition to the supplied menus, you will find a number of “watermarked” demo menus to try out. If you wish to purchase a license allowing you to use these menus in your movies, visit the Pinnacle web-site:

www.pinnaclesys.com

54 Studio 9

CHAPTER 4:

The Movie Window

The Movie Window, where you build your movie from the raw materials in the Album, occupies the bottom half of the screen in Studio’s Edit mode. To access the Movie Window, first switch to Edit mode if you are not already there:

The Movie Window title bar contains several important controls and displays. The toolbox buttons at the left of the title bar open the Video toolbox and the Audio toolbox, which are discussed on page 62.

To the right of the toolbox buttons is a text area where the project file name is displayed. Status and warning messages are also displayed in this area when required. Further still to the right are the Clip Split and Clip Delete buttons, while at the far right are three view selection buttons (see “Movie Window views” on page

57).

Chapter 4: The Movie Window 55

Split clip/scene button – the razorblade

Click this button to split the currently-selected clip in the Movie Window, or the currently-

selected scene in the Album.

No information is lost. If the item is an Album scene, it is split at the indicated point into two shorter scenes. If the item is a clip in the Movie Window, it is duplicated and automatically trimmed to the split point.

The razorblade button can be used in conjunction with the track-locking buttons in the Movie Window’s Timeline view to carry out special operations such as insert editing, and edits in which the audio leads or lags behind the video. See “Advanced Timeline editing” on page 82.

Splitting a clip: The placement of the edit line in the original clip determines the split point. When you apply the razorblade tool, Studio duplicates the clip and trims away the portion after the split point in the first copy and up to the split point in the second.

Delete Clip button – the trashcan

This button deletes the currently-selected content in any of the Movie Window views.

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Positioning: edit line, scrubbers

The current position is the frame showing in the Player. In the Movie Window’s Timeline view it is indicated by the edit line. The current position can be changed by moving either the Timeline scrubber (to which the edit line is attached) or the Player scrubber.

When the Clip properties tool is open, a third scrubber, the trim scrubber, is available for adjusting the current position within the clip during trimming.

MOVIE WINDOW VIEWS

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The Movie Window provides three different views of your project: Timeline, Storyboard and Text. Select the one you want to use by clicking the view selection buttons in the upper right corner of the Movie Window.

Chapter 4: The Movie Window 57

Storyboard view

Storyboard view shows the order of video scenes and transitions. It uses thumbnail icons for quickly structuring a movie. You can choose large or small thumbnails in the Edit options panel.

Timeline view

Timeline view shows the positions and durations of clips relative to the Timescale. This view also displays five tracks on which you can place various types of clip:

• Video, plus full-screen disc menus, titles

and graphics: The video track contains the primary visual material in your production. See

Chapter 5: Video clips, Chapter 8: Disc menus and Chapter 7: Still images for more information.

• Original (or “synchronous”) audio: The

original audio track contains the audio that was captured along with the video from your camera. You can manipulate the audio clips on this track to

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achieve various effects using insert-editing and splitediting techniques. See “Insert editing” (page 83) and “Split editing” (page 86) for more information.

• Title and graphic overlays: Images placed on

the overlay track will be rendered as overlays upon the main video, with transparent backgrounds. See Chapter 7: Still images and Chapter 8: Disc menus for more information.

• Sound effects and voice-overs: The audio

clips on this track are mixed with the original audio track and the background music track to create the final soundtrack for your movie. See Chapter 10: Sound effects and music for full information.

• Background music: The background music

for your movies can be created to any desired duration with the SmartSound tool (page 170) or imported with the CD audio tool (page 168). Your soundtrack can also make use of mp3 and other music files (see page 165).

• Disc menus, chapter marks and return-to-

menu links: This is a sixth track that appears above the video track whenever the movie has at least one disc menu. See Chapter 8: Disc menus for information.

Because many editing operations can be carried out only in Timeline view, you should choose it whenever extensive, detailed or advanced editing is required.

Chapter 4: The Movie Window 59

Track locking

The video track normally takes precedence over all other tracks for trimming or deleting. This has several consequences:

• When you trim a video clip, clips running

simultaneously on other tracks are also trimmed.

• When you delete a video clip, the time segment it

used is also removed from any parallel clips.

• Clips that fall entirely within a deleted video clip’s

span are also deleted.

These behaviors can be bypassed when necessary with a feature that allows you to “lock” any track independently of the others, thereby excluding it from editing and playback operations.

The padlock buttons along the right edge of the Movie Window, can be clicked to toggle locking for the corresponding track. Tracklocking gives Studio insert- edit and split-edit capability (see Chapter 5: Video clips).

Track muting

The three audio tracks can be individually muted with the mute buttons at the right edge of the Movie Window. These buttons have the same function as the mute buttons in the Volume and balance tool. (See page 182 for more information.)

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Placement feedback

Studio gives you several types of feedback about your actions as you place clips in the Timeline view.

The status line: The status line area on the left of the Movie Window title bar displays messages as you place clips and perform other actions.

Placement symbols: While you are dragging a clip into position on the Timeline, Studio provides feedback to tell you whether the current placement of the clip is valid. The mouse pointer shape and the colors of the vertical placement lines indicate what you can and cannot do.

For example, if you attempt to drag a sound onto the video track, the placement guidelines turn from green to red, the mouse pointer changes from “copy” to “unavailable”, and the status line tells you, “Only scenes, titles, photos and transitions on video track.”

Green placement lines with the “copy” pointer mean that an action is valid; red placement lines with the “unavailable” pointer ; show that it is not.

Chapter 4: The Movie Window 61

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Text view

The Movie Window Text view is a list showing the start and end times of clips, as well as their duration. In addition, custom names for clips are visible in this view.

THE TOOLBOXES

The toolboxes provide a convenient point-and-click interface for editing operations – adding clips to your movie, modifying existing clips and applying special effects. Studio provides separate toolboxes for video and for audio operations.

The toolboxes are available only in Edit mode. They are opened and closed with the buttons at the top left of the Movie Window.

Select the toolbox you want to open by moving your cursor over the icons. The individual buttons highlight,

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indicating which toolbox will open when you click. The Album is then replaced by the toolbox display, which contains two main areas:

• Tool selector buttons in a panel on the left. Clicking

one of these opens the corresponding tool.

• The currently-selected tool on the right. Double-

clicking a clip in the Movie Window also displays the corresponding tool (except for title and still image clips, which are opened directly in the Title Editor when you double-click).

All the tool-selector buttons, except the top one in each set, open specialized tools. The top button in both toolboxes is the Clip properties tool. It displays a tool appropriate for trimming and otherwise editing the type of clip currently selected in the Movie Window.

The Title Editor

One powerful tool that is not directly accessed through the toolboxes is the Title Editor, in which you can combine text, images and other graphic resources to make titles and disc menus for your Studio productions. Access the Title Editor through the Title and Disc menu tools, or with the Go to Title/Menu Editor command from the right-button context menu in the Movie Window. See Chapter 9: The Title Editor for full information.

Chapter 4: The Movie Window 63

The Video toolbox

The six tools in this toolbox modify or create visual clip types, including video clips, titles, still images and disc menus.

Clip properties: The Clip properties tool adjusts the start and end times of any type of clip. This is called “trimming”. The tool also allows you to type in a descriptive name for the clip. The tool also presents additional interface components appropriate to the type of clip being edited.

Titles and graphics: This tool lets you edit the name and duration of titles and other still images. The Edit Title button takes you to the Title Editor for changing the visual appearance of the image.

Disc menus: The Disc menu tool has a number of controls for editing the links between the buttons on disc menu and entry points into your movie called chapter marks, which are represented on the menu track in the Movie Window. The Edit Menu button opens the Title Editor, where you can modify the visual appearance of a menu.

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Frame grabber: This tool takes a snapshot of a single frame from your movie or from your current video source. You can use it in your movie, or save it for use in other applications. As with Capture mode itself, this tool presents a different interface if your current capture source is DV than if you are using a non-DV source.

SmartMovie: This tool automatically combines your source footage with the digital song file of your choice to create a music video in any of a variety of styles.

Video effects: Studio provides numerous plugin video effects with this tool. Each video clip or still image in your project can use effects, whether alone or in combination. Studio comes with a variety of effects out of the box, plus some “watermarked” demo effects that you can try. Information about obtaining the unwatermarked versions of the demo effects can be found on the Pinnacle web-site:

www.pinnaclesys.com

Chapter 4: The Movie Window 65

The Audio toolbox

The six tools in this set operate on or create audio clips – “original” audio, voice-overs, sound effects and other audio files, CD tracks and SmartSound background music.

Clip properties: The Clip properties tool lets you adjust (“trim”) the start and end times of any type of clip. You can also enter a descriptive name for the clip to replace the default name if desired. (Clip names are displayed when the Movie Window is in Text view.) The tool’s other controls vary depending on the type of clip.

Volume and balance: This tool gives you master volume controls for each of the three audio tracks: original audio (audio captured with video), sound effects and voice-overs and background music. It also enables you to mute any or all of the tracks, and to add real-time volume fades. Use the balance and surround control to position each track independently of the other two in a one-dimensional stereo or two-dimensional surround-sound space.

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Record voice-overs: To record a voice-over, simply click the Record button and begin speaking into your microphone.

Add CD audio: Use this tool to add tracks, in whole or in part, from an audio CD.

Background music: This tool lets you add background music using SmartSound, Studio’s powerful music generator. Choose a style, song, and version. Studio will create a musical soundtrack that matches the duration of your movie.

Audio effects: This tool lets you apply plug-in effects to any audio clip. The popular VST standard for audio plug-ins is supported, enabling you to augment your effects library with add-on and third party effects. The factory-supplied effects include a configurable noise reduction filter, graphic EQ, reverb and more. Some “watermarked” demo effects are also included for you to try out. Information about obtaining the unwatermarked versions of the demo effects can be found on the Pinnacle web-site:

www.pinnaclesys.com

Chapter 4: The Movie Window 67

CHAPTER 5:

Video clips

The cornerstone of most Studio video projects is the Album section containing your captured video scenes. To create your edited movie, you drag scenes from the Album into the Movie Window, where they are treated as editable video clips.

This chapter explains how to set the “in” and “out” (start and end) points for each clip. The Movie Window’s editing interface makes this “trimming” process simple, rapid and precise. The methods covered in this chapter for trimming video (“Trimming video clips”, page 73) can for the most part also be applied to the other types of clip (such as titles and sound effects) that are covered in later chapters.

A later section of the chapter covers more advanced editing techniques, including split edits and insert edits, that you can use to give your movies a more professional look. See “Advanced Timeline editing” on page 82.

Finally, we’ll look at using visual effects in Studio, and at some of the effects you can use in your movies - to correct a flaw, to communicate an idea, or just for fun. See “Video effects” on page 90.

Chapter 5: Video clips 69

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VIDEO CLIP BASICS

The first step in creating a movie is to introduce some video scenes from the Album into the Movie Window, where they become editable clips. At some point you will probably also add some transitions, titles, audio and other extras, but a set of video scenes is the starting point for just about any project.

This section explains how to add scenes to your movie, and how to work with scenes from multiple capture files. It also covers some interface features that provide useful feedback as you work.

Adding video clips to your movie

There are two ways to add a video clip to your movie:

Drag and drop: Drag a scene from the Video Scenes section of the Album and drop it into the Movie Window. This is normally the easiest and quickest way to put together a rough cut of your movie. You can drag multiple scenes simultaneously if you wish.

The clipboard: The standard clipboard operations (Cut, Copy and Paste) can be used with video clips in the Movie Window. The Copy operation works on Album scenes also.

When a scene or clip is pasted into the Movie Window, it is inserted at the first clip boundary starting at the edit line position. You can use the standard keyboard

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shortcuts for clipboard operations (Ctrl+X for cut, Ctrl+C for copy, Ctrl+V for paste), or select the desired operation from the right-button menu.

If the Movie Window is in Timeline view, drop the scene or clip onto the video track. The only exception would be in cases where you want only the audio portion of the scene, in which case you can drop it onto either of the lower two audio tracks instead.

Working with multiple capture files

For some projects you may want to incorporate scenes from multiple source tapes, or from different capture files made from one tape. To achieve this, load in each of the files in turn and drag whichever scenes you want from each file into your movie.

To use multiple capture files:

1. Drag scenes from the first capture file into the

Movie Window.

2. Using the dropdown list or the folder button in the

Video Scenes section of the Album, open the second capture file. Studio displays scenes from only the current file in the Album. See “Opening a captured video file” on page 38 for detailed information on this step.

3. Drag scenes from the second captured file into the

Movie Window. Continue in this manner until you have gone through all the files.

Because any given movie can be in only one of the standard 4:3 format and the widescreen 16:9 format,

Chapter 5: Video clips 71

Studio does not let you mix frame formats in the Movie Window. The first video clip you add to a movie determines the movie’s frame format, and later clips must conform to it. Use the Aspect ratio commands on the Album menu to convert scenes from one format to the other. (See “Video aspect ratios” on page 41 for more information.)

Interface features

Studio provides a variety of visual cues regarding the video clips in the Movie Window:

• Clips from video that was captured at preview

quality are shown with a white dotted outline. These clips will be automatically recaptured at full quality during the Make Movie process.

• When a clip is added to the Movie Window, a green

checkmark appears on the Album’s icon for the corresponding scene. The checkmark remains as long as any clip in the Movie Window belongs to that scene.

• To see the original location of a clip in your source

video, use the Find Scene in Album command on the right-click menu for Movie Window clips. Studio highlights the Album scene from which the selected clip is drawn. To go the other way, use the Album ¾ Find Scene in Project to show how a particular Album scene is used in your current project.

• When neighboring scenes from the Album are placed

in sequence in the Movie Window, the border between the clips is displayed as a dotted line. This

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is to help you keep track of your clips, and does not affect how they can be manipulated in the Movie Window.

• In Timeline mode, any special effects you have

applied to a clip are indicated by small icons along the bottom of the clip. These correspond to the effect groups shown on the Video effects tool browser. You can open the tool for parameter editing by doubleclicking any of the icons.

The star icon below this video clip shows that one or more of the effects in the “Fun effects” group has been applied.

TRIMMING VIDEO CLIPS

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In general, captured video scenes contain more material than you actually require for your movie. “Trimming” – the process of adjusting the in and out points of a clip to remove unwanted footage – is a fundamental editing operation.

Chapter 5: Video clips 73

No data is lost by trimming: Studio sets new start and end points for the clip in the Movie Window, but the source of the clip - the original Album scene – remains intact. This means you can always reset clips to their original state, or select different trim points.

Studio offers two ways to trim any clip (video scenes, transitions, titles, still images, audio clips and disc menus):

• Directly on the Timeline (see “Trimming on the

Timeline using handles” below).

• Using the Clip properties tool (see “Trimming with

the Clip properties tool” on page 78).

A video clip can be trimmed to any desired in and out points within the limits of the original scene.

Trimming on the Timeline using handles

The quickest way to trim is by dragging the edges of clips directly on the Timeline. Watch the Player as you trim, so you can find the frame on which you want to begin or end.

Let’s first consider the simplest trimming case, in a movie with only one clip. Then we’ll turn to the more usual situation of trimming a single clip that is surrounded by other clips.

To trim a single clip on the Timeline:

1. Delete all but one clip from the Timeline. If the

Timeline is empty, drag a scene in from the Album.

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2. Expand the Timescale to make fine adjustments

easier.

Position the mouse pointer anywhere on the Timeline except directly over the edit line. The pointer becomes a clock symbol. Click-drag it to the right to expand the Timescale.

This illustration shows maximum expansion, where each tick mark represents a single frame:

3. Position your mouse pointer over the right edge of

the clip. The pointer becomes a left-pointing arrow.

4. Click-drag to the left while keeping an eye on the

Player, which updates continuously to show the last frame in the trimmed clip.

As you shorten the clip, the arrow cursor becomes two-directional, indicating that the clip edge can be dragged both left and right. You can reduce the clip to as little as a single frame, or increase it up to the end of the source scene.

5. Release the mouse button. The clip is now trimmed.

Chapter 5: Video clips 75

Multiple clips

The secret to trimming a clip when multiple clips are on the Timeline is that you must first select the clip to be trimmed by clicking on it with the mouse.

To trim with multiple clips on the Timeline:

1. Set up the Timeline with two short clips.

2. Expand the Timescale by right-clicking in the ruler.

Choose 30 seconds from the pop-up menu.

3. Click the second clip. The video track should now

look something like this:

You can trim the right-hand edge of the clip just as in the single-clip example above. As you do so, the last frame of the clip is displayed in the Player. As long as the second clip remains selected, you can continue to trim more video by dragging the edge to the left, or restore some of the trimmed video by dragging the edge to the right.

4. With the second clip still selected, move your

mouse pointer over the left edge of clip until the pointer changes to a right arrow.

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5. Drag the left edge of the second scene to the right.

As you drag, the first frame of the clip is displayed in the Player. As long as the clip remains selected, you can continue to trim more video by dragging the edge to the right, or restore some of the trimmed video by dragging the edge to the left.

6. Release the mouse button. The clip you trimmed

snaps back against the right edge of the first clip.

Clip-trimming tips

If you are having difficulty manipulating the edges of clips during trimming, try the following:

• Verify that the clip you wish to trim is selected, and

that it is the only one selected.

• Expand the Timescale until it is easier to make fine

adjustments.

• Avoid expanding the Timescale too far, which

makes clips appear very long. If that happens, undo until the scale is the way you want it; or reduce the scale by dragging it towards the left; or select an appropriate value from the Timescale’s context menu.

Chapter 5: Video clips 77

Trimming with the Clip properties tool

Although it is possible to trim video clips

directly on the Timeline with full frame accuracy, rapid, precise trimming is often easier to achieve with the Clip properties tool. To access this tool, select the clip you want to change, then use the Toolbox ¾ Modify Clip Properties menu command, or click one of the toolbox buttons at the top left of the Movie Window. (Clicking the same button a second time will close the tool.)

In the case of video clips – in fact, any clips other than titles and still images – you can also open and close the Clip properties tool by double-clicking the clip in any Movie Window view.

The Clip properties tool can be used to modify any kind of clip. It offers an appropriate set of controls for each type.

The Name text field: For a video clip, most of the clip property controls are for trimming. The only exception is the Name text field, which lets you assign a custom name to the clip to replace the default one assigned by Studio.

The Name field is provided on the Clip properties tool for all clip types. Clip names are used by the Movie Window’s Text view, and can also be viewed as fly-by labels when your mouse moves over clips in the Storyboard view.

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Preview areas: Separate preview areas show the in and out frames of the trimmed clip, together with a counter

and jog buttons. The layout of each preview area is similar to that of the Player during normal editing.

Setting playback position: A scrubber control across the bottom of the tool lets you set the playback position anywhere within the clip. You can also set the playback position using the counter and jog buttons located between the two preview areas.

Using the counters: The positions reported by all three counters are relative to the beginning of the clip, which is position 0:00:00.0. As with the counter on the Player, you can adjust the counters in the Clip properties tool by clicking in one of the four fields (hours, minutes, seconds, frames) to select it, then using the jog buttons. When none of the fields is explicitly selected, the jog buttons apply to the frames field.

Transport controls: While the Clip properties tool is in use, the transport controls in the center area substitute for those that normally appear on the Player. These special transport controls include a Loop play/Pause button that can be used to cycle repeatedly through the trimmed portion of the clip while the trim points are being adjusted.

Chapter 5: Video clips 79

Setting the trim points: The left bracket button beside the counter in the left preview area, and the right bracket button beside the counter in the right preview area, set their respective trim points to the current position.

You can also adjust either trim point by:

• Entering a value directly into its counter

• Adjusting a counter field with the jog buttons

• Dragging the corresponding trim caliper

The Duration text field: This field shows the length of the trimmed clip in hours, minutes, seconds and frames. If you modify the value, either by editing the numbers directly or by clicking the associated jog buttons, the effect is to change the out point of the clip. Of course, you cannot reduce the duration to less than a frame, or increase it beyond the limits of the original video scene.

Usage tip: If you want to switch from trimming one clip on the video track to trimming another, just click on the new clip while the Clip properties tool remains open, or drag the Timeline scrubber to the new clip.

Resetting trimmed clips

If you change your mind about a particular trim operation (or group of operations) after previewing, either use the Undo button (or Ctrl+Z) or manually reset the trimmed clip using one of these methods:

• Drag the clip’s right edge directly on the Timeline

until it stretches no further,

• In the Clip properties tool, drag the trim calipers to

the ends of the clip.

80 Studio 9



SPLITTING AND COMBINING CLIPS

If you want to insert one clip on the video track into the middle of another clip, split the latter into two parts then insert the new item. “Splitting” a clip actually results in it being duplicated; both clips are then automatically trimmed so that the first ends at the split point and the second begins there.

To split a clip in Timeline view:

1. Choose the split point.

You may use any method that adjusts the current position, such as moving the Timeline scrubber, clicking Play and then Pause, or editing the counter value in the Player.

2. Either right-click within the clip you wish to split

and select Split Clip from the pop-up menu; or, make certain the edit line is positioned where you wish to split the clip, and click the Split clip/scene (razorblade) button (see page 56). The clip is split at the current position.

To restore a split clip:

• Use the Undo button (or press Ctrl+Z). Even if you

have performed other actions since you split the clip, the multilevel undo allows you to step back as far as needed. Or,

• If undoing is not desirable because of intervening

actions that you don’t want to discard, you can replace both halves of the split clip with the original from the Album. Or,

• Delete one half of the split clip, and trim out the

other.

Chapter 5: Video clips 81



To combine clips in the Movie Window:

Select the clips you wish to combine, then right-click and choose Combine Clips.

The operation is allowed only if the combination of clips will also be a valid clip – that is, a continuous excerpt of the source video. On the Timeline, clips that can be combined meet along a dotted edge.

ADVANCED TIMELINE EDITING

During most editing operations, Studio automatically keeps the clips on the various Timeline tracks synchronized. For instance, when you insert a scene from the Album onto the video track, the relative positions of all clips to the right of the insertion remain unchanged.

Sometimes, though, you might like to override the default synchronization. You might want to insert a new video clip into your project without displacing any clips of other types. You might want to edit video separately from its accompanying original audio – a valuable technique with several variations, discussed below.

Such special edits are possible using the track lock buttons along the right edge of the Movie Window in Timeline view. Each of the five standard tracks (all except the menu track) provides a lock button. See “Track locking” on page 60 for more information on track locking.

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A locked track is grayed out in the Timeline view, indicating that the clips on the locked track cannot be selected or edited in any of the three views; nor are they affected by editing operations on unlocked tracks.

Apart from the menu track, any combination of tracks can be locked.

Locking the overlays track prevents the duration of an overlay from being changed even when you trim audio and video clips on other tracks at the same time index.

If the track is unlocked, trimming the video clip above it automatically trims the overlay or title.

Insert editing

In ordinary Timeline editing, a video clip and the original audio that was captured with it are treated as a unit. Their special relationship is symbolized in the Movie Window by the dotted line connecting the video

Chapter 5: Video clips 83

track indicator with the original audio track indicator, showing that the latter is dependent on the former.

The track lock buttons make it possible to deal with the two tracks independently for operations like insert editing, which typically means replacing part of a clip on the video track while the original audio track continues uninterrupted.

For instance, in a sequence that shows someone recounting a story, you might wish to insert a shot of an audience member smiling (or sleeping!) without breaking away from the main audio.

To perform an insert edit on the video track:

1. In the Timeline view of the Movie Window, click

the original audio track’s padlock button to lock the track.

The lock button is highlighted in red, and the track itself is grayed to show that its contents will not be affected by editing operations.

2. Clear space on the video track for the video clip

you want to insert. Position the Timeline scrubber at the point you want the insertion to start and use the Split clip/scene button. Now move to the point where the insertion should end and again split the clip. Finally, delete the portion of video that will be replaced by the insertion.

Because the audio track is still intact, having been locked, the video to the right of the insertion point does not move leftwards to fill the gap you have made in the Timeline, for the video and audio would then no longer be synchronized. If you were to preview your video now, you would see a black screen as the gap portion played back, but the soundtrack would be normal.

84 Studio 9

Pinnacle STUDIO 9 User Manual

Specifications and Main Features

Frequently Asked Questions

User Manual