Bug effecting last update to MEP MMS and VPX

CubeAce wrote on 4/29/2022, 10:47 AM

So it is already happening. No more selection for Movie Edit Pro, Just Movie Studio.

OK. I found a bug in the timeline editor. It is easy to check for.

I was looking for possible explanations to this post where pro res files were not showing correctly in the timeline.

As it turns out I don't think it is related to Pro Res files but the timeline editor itself as I think it is a fault there that is causing the Pro res files not to display properly.

The fault is the + and - controls to alter the vertical size of a track / frame, etc. if you want to look up close. The horizontal + and - buttons are OK with one exception. In the past if you kept pressing the + symbols, eventually the enlargement would stop with a warning you had reached the limit of expansion. That no longer happens. The horizontal + does stop expanding but shows half of the previous frame and half of the frame you are trying to increase in size. You do not get a whole frame. Even if you put the timeline editor an another screen and expand it.

This image is taken using both screens.

The right side is half the frame I was trying to look at. It is a Pro Res 422 file. You can see the frame is showing. (It is Star Trek style Star warp view) But I only get the left hand side, not the right hand side as well.

That is because I have also used the + button on the vertical control. Unlike the horizontal control it never stops. no warning either.

This is more clearly seen if I use a normal MP4 file.

At this point I could go on expanding the vertical scaling but as you see I'm not up to just being able to see the top left quarter of a whole image which looks like this in the monitor.

Now I've shrunk the timeline editor back to normal within MEP 2022 and you can see what has happened. If I continued shrinking both the vertical and horizontal controls eventually I would see what Derek was reporting in his Topic.

Please check on your own copies of MEP 2022 VPX 13 and Movie Studio 2022 to see if you can replicate this behaviour before I try reporting all this as a bug.

Ray.

Comments

Former user wrote on 4/30/2022, 7:51 PM

@CubeAce Thought i'd have a play with this but i know nothing about ProRes, i don't use it,

but i rendered a file with Vegas,, ProRes & ProRes HQ

Both show the audio in Vegas, (the orig is first in the timeline)

but added to MEP no audio, at first the image was fine but did a bit of + & - zooming like in your post & the timeline images turned grey & have stayed that way , 🤷‍♂️🤷‍♂️

Just sharing & like i say i don't use ProRes.

johnebaker wrote on 5/1/2022, 4:17 AM

@CubeAce

Hi Ray

What is the framerate of the Prores file?

John EB

CubeAce wrote on 5/1/2022, 9:43 AM

@Former user @johnebaker

Hi Gid.

Thank you for going above and beyond. The questions and answers have now got a lot more complex.

The fact you could import a Pro Res HQ file using at least 247Mb/s into the timeline and show is more than my system is capable of. Any such file I try to import into the timeline shows with the greyed out view with bars on import. So some of the problem may be down to the power of the graphics card as the program and version is the same.

That was a shock and something I had to try to do for myself. I can't produce those files with sound as I only have Boris Particle Illusion to work with that can produce those files. What I'm trying to find out is why some Pro Res rendered files work while others don't. It is a bug in the program or a new hardware deficiency caused by the program now being rewritten and using more processing power or vram or something else?

Still no real idea on that one yet but after some nine hours of trying out different export settings I am beginning to get results that work with MEP 2022 and my computer specs. This is purely so I can produce overlays and effects to blend into normal video better if I ever need to and to try to find out more about the problems in the other topic started by Derek Norman.

I am also wondering as his video files are png whether exporting video from New Blue Pro Titler 7 could be more efficient or usable if that program exports video as Pro Res 422 png.

New Blue Pro Titler 7 used within MEP / VPX / MS2022 brings those programs to a crawl or halt if used. However if you open New Blue Pro Titler 7 as a standalone program and export a video for use within any of those programs the exports are not slowed down at all and working with New Blue Pro Titler 7 as a standalone program it is tons more responsive and much faster to work with and render.

Hi John.

The frame rate or resolution of such files after much experimentation seem to make no additional problems beyond that one would expect from mixing resolutions and frame rates.

What make a lot more difference is the export options for the codecs themselves and the layers / blending modes used within the programs.

In the above video (and please, none of it makes visual sense so don't ask) there are two files that work well for overlaying onto a background video. One from New Blue Titler 7 and one from Boris Particle Illusion. Please excuse the speed of some of the clips. The NBT7 clip that works is the first clip and the Boris effect clip that works really well is the last clip. Other clips may have other uses for masking if I can figure out how to use them.

As I noted earlier I think New Blue Titler 7 exports to Pro Res 422 using PNG although it could be a normal mov file but like the other Pro Res files it shows no thumbnail in windows or MEP.

Resolutions and frame rates can be changed and saved in both NBT7 and BPI. Apart from changing the resolution or frame rate the main thing that has to be done is to remove any background image you won't need for the export if you are going to use it for an overlay in NBT7.

For Boris Particle Illusion it is a bit more complicated.

Make sure you make a note of all the settings. One wrong one and it won't work as well.

Then when importing into MEP use the normal Chroma Key editor and use the black rendering option to fine tune and then add the brightness contrast control and adjust the gamma control to brighten. A balance between the two plugins may be needed depending on the desired look.

All this faffing around was not really needed before the last update as far as I'm aware. I will check eventually with VPX 11 when I get time. I've had enough for today.

Ray.

johnebaker wrote on 5/1/2022, 11:53 AM

@CubeAce

. . . . . The frame rate or resolution of such files after much experimentation seem to make no additional problems . . . .

The issue you originally posted, I have previously seen when you put 29.97 fps video into a PAL format project, hence the question of framerate.

. . . . New Blue Titler 7 exports to Pro Res 422 using PNG . . . .

NB Titler Pro does use the PNG encoded format.

Prores video will not show thumbnails in Windows Explorer as it does not have a codec for the video format or the embedded preview image where available.

There are many 'add-ons' which will do this however many of them depend on the K-Lite codec pack being installed 😨👎

. . . . For Boris Particle Illusion it is a bit more complicated. . . . .

I noticed you are exporting as h.264/AVC - these can have issues where the 'transparent' parts are not 100% eg black fringing is visible when using Chromakey Black.

I was testing with Prores 4444 YUVA exports - this is the MediaInfo data of one of the files.

General
Complete name : W:\MAGIX\DVD_BD_Projects\Test Projects\Particle Illusion\ParticleIllusion-test.mov
Format : MPEG-4
Format profile : QuickTime
Codec ID : qt 2005.03 (qt )
File size : 456 MiB
Duration : 12 s 0 ms
Overall bit rate mode : Variable
Overall bit rate : 319 Mb/s
Encoded date : UTC 2022-04-29 18:51:43
Tagged date : UTC 2022-04-29 18:51:59

Video
ID : 1
Format : ProRes
Format version : Version 1
Format profile : 4444
Codec ID : ap4h
Duration : 12 s 0 ms
Bit rate mode : Variable
Bit rate : 319 Mb/s
Width : 1 920 pixels
Height : 1 080 pixels
Display aspect ratio : 16:9
Frame rate mode : Constant
Frame rate : 25.000 FPS
Color space : YUVA
Chroma subsampling : 4:4:4
Scan type : Progressive
Bits/(Pixel*Frame) : 6.152
Stream size : 456 MiB (100%)
Writing library : bofx
Encoded date : UTC 2022-04-29 18:51:43
Tagged date : UTC 2022-04-29 18:51:59
Color primaries : BT.709
Transfer characteristics : BT.709
Matrix coefficients : BT.709

Other
ID : 2
Type : Time code
Format : QuickTime TC
Duration : 12 s 0 ms
Bit rate mode : Constant
Frame rate : 25.000 FPS
Time code of first frame : 00:00:00:00
Time code of last frame : 00:00:11:24
Time code, striped : Yes
Title : Tape
Encoded date : UTC 2022-04-29 18:51:43
Tagged date : UTC 2022-04-29 18:51:43

and this is the result - no Chromakey necessary

HTH

John EB

CubeAce wrote on 5/1/2022, 1:02 PM

@johnebaker

Hi John.

We have seen so many posts in the past where Pro Res files with a 444 profile were not working that it didn't even occur to me to try 444.

Could you do a snapshot of the export settings please for me to try out?

Yes you do have to be careful using the black chroma key option and it doesn't always give convincing results.

This is beginning to go slightly off topic with why have certain file types stopped working but at least there may be alternative options coming from this.

Out of interest I have also been looking at other forums and editing packages and effects forums and when I see the list of 'known faults' on other forums where there is no solution or workaround I'm beginning to wonder how anyone manages to get anything done. 😉

Ray.

CubeAce wrote on 5/1/2022, 5:06 PM

@johnebaker

Hi John.

Skip the last request. I figured out the settings from your MediaInfo data.

Those files still don't show correctly in the timeline but work.

It's amazing what doubling the frame rate and quadrupling the frame size does for the file size 😏.

Ray.

Former user wrote on 5/1/2022, 8:43 PM

@CubeAce Hi, I use the default settings for render from PI, I don't really know enough to understand what i'm doing when i experiment changing the settings, but the default seems to work ok for me

This PI render settings, i haven't changed anything from it opening

the file it produces

in MEP there's a bit of black around the edge of the fire

turning up HDR Gamma gets rid of some of that

The PI clip i put before that was rendered with the same settings & needs nothing doing to it

CubeAce wrote on 5/2/2022, 2:22 AM

@Former user @johnebaker

Hi Gid.

My copy of Boris PI I've had for over 2 years now and it stopped working for a long time after initially trying it out once. It stopped working, wouldn't load for over a year and then one day suddenly came to life again. I'd only started playing with it in recent months and as I said to John, with all the problems I saw on the site with people and Pro res files I decided to export files with an MP4 encoding. I have only just tried Pro res 444. Had no idea it was a default setting. Playing with it though now has increased my understanding of how to manipulate the particles within the program and the adjustments so not a complete waste of time as I can now wander away from the base presets of the individual effects themselves.

I have now tried the same project in VPX 12 and there are no problems with the program displaying all the various file types in the timeline or problems with using any Chroma key settings. This was also all working in MEP 2022 and I assume VPX 13 until the last update. So something has broken.

Ray.

johnebaker wrote on 5/2/2022, 4:10 AM

@Former user, @CubeAce

. . . . in MEP there's a bit of black around the edge of the fire . . . .

That may be because you have used the RGB + Premultiplied alpha - try RGB + Straight Alpha in the Channels option.

At 4K UHD 50fps All Intra the file sizes are massive.

John EB