Changing the play time in story board mode

Ravi-Shankar wrote on 1/14/2024, 2:25 PM

I am having an issue with trying to change the play time in storyboard mode. I have a large number of images which need to be displayed for a specific period of time. I need to have control down to increments of a tenth of a second. Given that I'm working in 25 fps, this should be possible. When I open the images in story board mode, I can change the duration of the objects (or multiple objects if I shift click them) by clicking on the duration label. When I move the slider the duration moves in what appears to be random increments. For example if you see the image. If I move the duration slider down from 6 seconds, the next one might be 5.23 seconds and the one after that 5.03 seconds etc. If I try entering the value in the time box manually, it will not save the new timing unless it's one of the random timings mentioned earlier. Am I missing something? Many thanks in advance for any help!

The final video is here, so you can get an idea of what I'm aiming for:

Comments

browj2 wrote on 1/14/2024, 3:49 PM

@Ravi-Shankar

Hi,

Which version of Movie Studio (or Movie Edit Pro) are you using? I tested with MMS2024 Platinum.

The values are hh:mm:ss:frames, not fractions of a second. The last value should not be greater than 24 as 25 = 1 second. So 5 seconds:25frames will be changed to 6seconds:00frames. You can put in a higher value, but it will be changed to seconds:frames (max. 24 frames).

After selecting multiple images, opening the Object Duration window, changing the value (which is in hh:mm:ss:frames, not fractions of a second), clicking on OK, you should get another window asking to "Change all selected" or Change currently selected object." Did you click on the first one?

Works for me. I changed 3 from 4s:00frames to 5s:14frames, and when I checked each, they were all 5:14.

John CB

johnebaker wrote on 1/14/2024, 4:17 PM

@Ravi-Shankar

. . . . If I move the duration slider down from 6 seconds, the next one might be 5.23 seconds and the one after that 5.03 seconds . . . .

The durations units are measured in minutes:seconds:frames usually abbreviated to mm:ss:ff so the above are 5secs 23 frames and 5secs 3 frames so if you want a decimal time you have to convert this to mm:ss:ff

where ff = frame rate x decimal portion of the time required and can only be a whole number of frames eg:

5.23 s = 5s 5.75 frames - round this up to 5s 6 frames

5.03s = 5s 0.75 frames - round this up to 5s 1 frame

The shortest duration interval you can have is 1 frame = 0.04secs at 25fps

Change to Timeline mode, assuming you want all the images the same length:

Select all the images
Right click one of the selected images and select Change photo length
In the length box, the time digits should already be selected. Type in the duration you require eg using the above examples, type in 0508 and 0501 respectively no gaps, no need to select anything - the digits will move across the entry box in the correct order from right to left.
Click Apply to all.

HTH

John EB
Forum Moderator

Ravi-Shankar wrote on 1/14/2024, 5:27 PM

Thank you everyone! This makes complete sense. I had no idea the last pair of digits represented frames!