Photo and Graphic Designer 9 - Feathering with overlay animation

johnebaker wrote on 7/7/2019, 11:59 AM

Hi

We need more information on your computer and program versions - see this topic for details that are required.

Also how are you creating the overlay using Photo Designer?

John EB

JMM wrote on 7/7/2019, 12:56 PM

Ok sorry about that, signature updated

I am using vector objects created in Xara and animating them, and as I say the object that is feathered is not appearing; all the other objects (including ones that are moving) appear as they should when the animation is viewed in Movie Edit Pro. If I remove the feathering on the object it does appear

browj2 wrote on 7/7/2019, 1:27 PM

@JMM

Hi,

Unfortunately, MEP seems to limit itself to the Flash animation restrictions from Xara. As per the latest manual for Xara DPX, "The Flash format does not support some of the advanced effects that Xara Designer Pro X offers, for example complex graduated transparency, feathering and most of the advanced color fill types."

A possible workaround is to export the animation with transparency to AVI uncompressed and import that into MEP instead of using the resulting Xara animation object in MEP, or, if just a single image, then export to png with transparency and import that into MEP. The feathering will show up as the AVI format in Xara does not seem to be restricted by the Flash limitations. Just don't export as a Flash file.

Asking Magix/Xara to fix this has been on my list for quite a while, just haven't asked yet.

@johnebaker

Hi John EB,

This is actually a MEP problem as it is using MEP with a Xara animated/static graphic (in MEP, right-click a video object, Video Effects, Create overlay graphics/animations) and the problem seems to be with MEP. I think that it would be more appropriate under the MEP tab.

John CB

JMM wrote on 7/7/2019, 1:49 PM

@JMM

Hi,

Unfortunately, MEP seems to limit itself to the Flash animation restrictions from Xara. As per the latest manual for Xara DPX, "The Flash format does not support some of the advanced effects that Xara Designer Pro X offers, for example complex graduated transparency, feathering and most of the advanced color fill types."

A possible workaround is to export the animation with transparency to AVI uncompressed and import that into MEP instead of using the resulting Xara animation object in MEP, or, if just a single image, then export to png with transparency and import that into MEP. The feathering will show up as the AVI format in Xara does not seem to be restricted by the Flash limitations. Just don't export as a Flash file.

Asking Magix/Xara to fix this has been on my list for quite a while, just haven't asked yet.

Ok that is what I feared, I think I will have to use another effect then (I have to use the overlay instead of AVI export as I need to get the timings for animation frames exactly right, and it would be too time consuming to do that by re-rendering the animation every time).

Thanks for the quick responses guys

johnebaker wrote on 7/7/2019, 2:05 PM

@browj2

I have moved the topic back to MEP.

@JMM

Hi

. . . . I think I will have to use another effect then (I have to use the overlay instead of AVI export as I need to get the timings for animation frames exactly right . . . .

That depends on what the overlay is and is doing in MEP - there may be an easier way to achieve what you want in MEP - a short video example of what you are trying to achieve would help.

John EB

JMM wrote on 7/7/2019, 3:33 PM

Ok here is an example of what I have done in the past; I need to match the beats of the music to the animation. The issue I had in the past is the moving yellow marker starts to go out of time which means I had to chop up the AVI exported animation so that it goes back in time, but that ends up looking messy. MEP makes this process much better for me as I can playback the video, see when the yellow marker goes out of time then go back into Graphic Designer and change the animation frame lengths where needed. I would be happy to hear if there is an even easier way of doing this though!

browj2 wrote on 7/7/2019, 6:25 PM

@JMM

Hi,

If I understand correctly, all you want is to give the guitar tablature image a feathered edge, correct? Everything else is ok?

I can understand your wanting to get the overlay timing right. Your method with Xara is the best way that I know of.

Workaround: after getting the guitar tablature Xar object on the timeline, move it down 1 track and import a black image (from Templates, Image objects, Test images, Black), onto the empty space between the background and the Xar object, resize it to be slightly larger than the Xar object (give it some temporary transparency to see what you're doing), and then with the black object selected, go to Effects, View effects, Sharpness, and give it some artistic blur (not much). This will feather-edge the black object.

See below:

Below, I made the black object yellow so that you can clearly see the effect:

Glad to see someone, other than me, making use of the interface with Xara.

John CB

johnebaker wrote on 7/8/2019, 6:21 AM

@JMM

. . . . I have to use the overlay instead of AVI export as I need to get the timings for animation frames exactly right, and it would be too time consuming to do that by re-rendering the animation every time . . . .

An alternative method would be to use images of the tablature grid and animate the 'cursor' as shown below

In the example above are 3 images

tablature grid - track 2 - created in any image editing program and a feathered edge applied to it
tablature text - track 3 this was done as an image , however you could also use titles in MEP, positioning as required
cursor - track 4, in this example it is just a yellow image resized to give a narrow cursor - this is animated using keyframes to match the video. Start with one image and animate then duplicate and paste as many times as required - the individual keyframes can then be adjusted if slightly out of sync.

This has that several advantages:

animation syncing is done in MEP
the grid once created can be used as for other projects
you can create a 'master project' with the necessary elements and use this as the starting point for other projects (also ensures consistency of layout/positioning)

This is an example of the animation

HTH

John EB

JMM wrote on 7/8/2019, 2:00 PM

@JMM

Hi,

If I understand correctly, all you want is to give the guitar tablature image a feathered edge, correct? Everything else is ok?

I can understand your wanting to get the overlay timing right. Your method with Xara is the best way that I know of.

Workaround: after getting the guitar tablature Xar object on the timeline, move it down 1 track and import a black image (from Templates, Image objects, Test images, Black), onto the empty space between the background and the Xar object, resize it to be slightly larger than the Xar object (give it some temporary transparency to see what you're doing), and then with the black object selected, go to Effects, View effects, Sharpness, and give it some artistic blur (not much). This will feather-edge the black object.

See below:

Below, I made the black object yellow so that you can clearly see the effect:

Glad to see someone, other than me, making use of the interface with Xara.

John CB

Thanks for that, I have tried this and after some thought have decided to use a border instead of the feathering effect as it will overall be easier for me and looks ok.

@JMM

. . . . I have to use the overlay instead of AVI export as I need to get the timings for animation frames exactly right, and it would be too time consuming to do that by re-rendering the animation every time . . . .

An alternative method would be to use images of the tablature grid and animate the 'cursor' as shown below

In the example above are 3 images

tablature grid - track 2 - created in any image editing program and a feathered edge applied to it

tablature text - track 3 this was done as an image , however you could also use titles in MEP, positioning as required

cursor - track 4, in this example it is just a yellow image resized to give a narrow cursor - this is animated using keyframes to match the video. Start with one image and animate then duplicate and paste as many times as required - the individual keyframes can then be adjusted if slightly out of sync.

This has that several advantages:

animation syncing is done in MEP

the grid once created can be used as for other projects

you can create a 'master project' with the necessary elements and use this as the starting point for other projects (also ensures consistency of layout/positioning)

This is an example of the animation

HTH

John EB

Thanks, that is useful to know that the animation can be done in MEP, but I think it will still be easier for me to animate in Graphic designer as I am able to import the grid background as a saved default and create the frames quite efficiently.