How to improve Movie Edit Pro: Suggestions for the developers

Galaxy wrote on 6/21/2017, 1:59 PM

Movie Edit Pro is a very useful program, but it has some deficiencies and annoyances that will prevent me from buying any new versions or upgrades. Here's a list:

On the timeline, when I copy and paste an object, the cursor jumps to another location. There is no benefit in this behavior, and it's confusing.
On undo, the cursor jumps to the start of the timeline. That's very frustrating.
Undo is not available for all operations, so when I press Ctrl-Z, nothing happens. It's confusing.
If I move an object on the timeline, and then undo, then Ctrl Y returns an error: "Restore is no longer possible."
The Timestretch feature is hard to control with my mouse. I wish numeric input were possible.
Audio object volume is hard to control. I wish numeric input were possible.
Keyframe operation is inconsistent and inefficient, so I avoid using it.
Coloring objects requires too many mouse clicks, so I avoid coloring objects.
In the Title tab / Manual, I wish the text input box were expandable, so that I could see more of the text I am entering or editing.
I wish I could attach markers to objects, so if there is a glitch in the audio, I could keep track of its location, and fix it later.
I wish I could apply a timestretch operation to several objects at once.
I would like to be able to scrub the audio.
I would like to be able to play an audio track at double speed, for finding certain sections quickly.
I would like to be able to paste a copied object onto a specific track.
I would like movies to render faster.

My MEP Version is 15.0.0.107.

Thanks.

Back to post

Comments

emmrecs wrote on 10/11/2017, 11:23 AM

Hi.

As for my avatar, if you're not sure if it is appropriate, you should probably look at a lot of other avatars. The world has progressed a lot :)

I'm not interested in other avatars, simply in yours in this forum. Hence, I repeat my request. By profession (though now retired) I am a "muso" and I'm afraid I don't consider it "a joke". The language it contains is not appropriate in this forum.

As to your comment on fx; I understand where you are coming from but I have never found it a big problem to simply look at that list and, where necessary, click on the effect in the Effects tab and reopen it with the settings you are currently using in that clip.

Jeff
Forum Moderator

johnebaker wrote on 10/11/2017, 3:30 PM

@producer_ben

. . . . As for my avatar, if you're not sure if it is appropriate, you should probably look at a lot of other avatars. The world has progressed a lot :)

My Avatar is a muso joke. Used a lot. . . .

As Jeff has said other avatars elsewhere are irrelevant, you have been asked to change yours for this forum.

The image is not appropriate for this forum, it is offensive, not at all funny, and inappropriate given that there are junior members in the forum. As such the avatar comes under rule 6 of the community rules.

John EB

Forum Moderator

Scenestealer wrote on 10/11/2017, 4:13 PM

Definitions of Progress:-

1.move forward or onward in space or time.

2.develop towards an improved or more advanced condition.

1. Yes, 2. Definitely Not!

If you have the Effects tab open in the Media Pool and your clip is highlighted, you will see a list of all the effects and their individual components listed there in the Key Framing timeline. You can temporarily disable or delete each effect / component or add and remove KF's in this area.

Another simple way, to avoid zooming the TL view, is to select the clip and hit ( - key) "copy video effects" and there will be a list of FX applied.

Peter

Moderator

producer_ben wrote on 10/11/2017, 7:55 PM

Hi Peter

I'm inclined to agree with you on the second alternative definition haha. I appreciate your help on this. I do use the copy effects a lot, a useful feature.

In my version of MEP Premium 2017, all i have are "tiles" for effects etc. If i drop an effect on to a clip i can adjust the parameter. Great.

If i highlight a clip, nothing appears in the media pool on mine.

pmikep wrote on 10/11/2017, 8:16 PM

As for my avatar, if you're not sure if it is appropriate, you should probably look at a lot of other avatars. The world has progressed a lot.

You presume that progress in the world implies better. As an old man who saw what the world was like, the world is getting worse. I pray that the moderators will act.

producer_ben wrote on 10/11/2017, 8:30 PM

@producer_ben

. . . . As for my avatar, if you're not sure if it is appropriate, you should probably look at a lot of other avatars. The world has progressed a lot :)

My Avatar is a muso joke. Used a lot. . . .

As Jeff has said other avatars elsewhere are irrelevant, you have been asked to change yours for this forum.

The image is not appropriate for this forum, it is offensive, not at all funny, and inappropriate given that there are junior members in the forum. As such the avatar comes under rule 6 of the community rules.

John EB

Forum Moderator

Hi @johnebaker,

Now it was suggested as they "weren't sure". As for not being funny, it's subjective as is everything.

As for offensive? What is so inappropriate about a guitar fx pedal? Turd is everyday common slang.

Fairplay if there was phecal matter, nudity, swearing, religious or even political connotations such as, oh I don't know, say an eagle. I mean non repuplicans may find the Eagle as offensive right?

As for secition 6, i feel personally this falls under "Harassing other members " particularly of those in a position of "power". I refer you in this case to section one of the community rules.

There isn't anything offensive in my profile picture and feel the moderators have taken this thread off topic .A moderator may have not have a sense of humour and take everything personally, as such it forms their opinion, but that doesn't categorically mean that because it contradicts their personal opinion it comes under "offesive".

If we're getting on the "offended" boat, i could say I'm offended by tones of arrogance displayed in all mod replies here, but such is life. We're all human. A guitar effects pedal isn't offensive, the word turd isn't offensive and I have never been asked to change it. The original mod was "unsure".

I'm not here to cause a fuss or drama. I'm here because i need assistance at times, as do all of us.

producer_ben wrote on 10/11/2017, 8:35 PM

As for my avatar, if you're not sure if it is appropriate, you should probably look at a lot of other avatars. The world has progressed a lot.

You presume that progress in the world implies better. As an old man who saw what the world was like, the world is getting worse. I pray that the moderators will act.

Haha 🤣

I didn't necessarily imply that it was better. My word, a guitar effects pedel with turd pollisher on it is deemed offensive by someone so the whole world need cower away, perfusely apologise and change.

I find the "standard avatar" offensive. As do i find everything i don't agree with 🤣

browj2 wrote on 10/11/2017, 10:40 PM

@producer_ben

Your avatar was obviously intended to raise eyebrows, and did. Just change it to something less juvenile.

"In my version of MEP Premium 2017, all i have are "tiles" for effects etc. If i drop an effect on to a clip i can adjust the parameter. Great.

If i highlight a clip, nothing appears in the media pool on mine."

In all versions of MEP, including yours, there are Magix effects, presets - like the ones that your are referring to, and third party plugins.

Select the object that has effects and them simply go to Effects tab, Click on the Brightness/Contrast tile under Video effects to see normal Magix effects along with the lower window listing any applied effects and a keyframing area. The shortcut is Alt+Shift+H to get the Brightness/Contrast effects window. Depending the effect that you have, you have to open the corresponding effect by clicking on the corresponding tile.

I suggest that you start reading the manual.

By the way, in English, the pronoun "I" is always capitalized.

John CB

Scenestealer wrote on 10/11/2017, 11:37 PM

@producer_ben

Fairplay if there was phecal matter....

Come on! That sticker on the Effects pedal looks suspiciously like Faecal matter......but that's something different I guess.

johnebaker wrote on 10/12/2017, 5:16 AM

. . . . I'm not here to cause a fuss or drama. I'm here because i need assistance at times, as do all of us. . . . .

That is what everyone here is for and you will get help, however the avatar is obviously causing an issue and as you want no fuss or drama here is a direct instruction - change the avatar.

John EB

Forum Moderator

producer_ben wrote on 10/12/2017, 7:56 AM

@producer_ben

Your avatar was obviously intended to raise eyebrows, and did. Just change it to something less juvenile.

"In my version of MEP Premium 2017, all i have are "tiles" for effects etc. If i drop an effect on to a clip i can adjust the parameter. Great.

If i highlight a clip, nothing appears in the media pool on mine."

In all versions of MEP, including yours, there are Magix effects, presets - like the ones that your are referring to, and third party plugins.

Select the object that has effects and them simply go to Effects tab, Click on the Brightness/Contrast tile under Video effects to see normal Magix effects along with the lower window listing any applied effects and a keyframing area. The shortcut is Alt+Shift+H to get the Brightness/Contrast effects window. Depending the effect that you have, you have to open the corresponding effect by clicking on the corresponding tile.

I suggest that you start reading the manual.

By the way, in English, the pronoun "I" is always capitalized.

John CB

Hey @browj2,

My Avatar/picture wasn't intended to raises eyebrows at all, far from it in fact. I wouldn't go as far as to say the picture is juvenile. There are users here from many different countires and backgrounds, humour varies from all global areas and from person to person. There's nothing offensive, although part of me wants to put something offesive up to give an example of what is globally deemed "offensive"

Back on topic though, thanks for your reply. I have tried as you've directed and in previous magix versions I could get by this way, but in the 2017 MEP Premium I have, it doesn't appear to work like that.

If I select a clip that is using an efect or more than one effect and then go into the effects tab, it doesn't bring up the effects that are in use for that clip. It defaults to the first effects "tile" that is selected in the effects window browser. So for example, the first in my list is brightness and contrast, but the effect on the clip is motion picture grid. By selecting the clip with the motion picture grid added, using the previous version methods and the method you also described, the adjustments for that effect don't appear unless i manually search through the effects tiles for the effect used. if there is more than one effect used, this is just rediculous.

producer_ben wrote on 10/12/2017, 8:01 AM

@producer_ben

Fairplay if there was phecal matter....

Come on! That sticker on the Effects pedal looks suspiciously like Faecal matter......but that's something different I guess.

There is a "cartoon" generic type drawing on the pedal of a turd/poop whatever you wish to call it. There is in no way faecal matter. The "drawing" is in the same style as used in the emoji pop up window found in all messenger apps and these are availble to users of any age with a messeging app. :)

producer_ben wrote on 10/12/2017, 8:25 AM

Hi

. . . . I'm not here to cause a fuss or drama. I'm here because i need assistance at times, as do all of us. . . . .

That is what everyone here is for and you will get help, however the avatar is obviously causing an issue and as you want no fuss or drama here is a direct instruction - change the avatar.

John EB

Forum Moderator

Hi johnebaker,

Thanks for confirming I will get help and assistance, its good to know. However the avatar/picture is not an issue. It is not "offensive", however one mod is turning it into an issue and thus it completely breaches section one of the community rules. To then have other mods "jump on the wagon" it then breaches the last paragraph in section 6 of the community rules.

Maybe a feature request should be that the forum has a unique set of Avatars that can be used and uploading of images and other graphics, disabled. That way it keeps even the most delicate of people "happy".

As it stands, the picture really isn't offensive. I've kept calm throughout all this and if I was here to just cause trouble I would've been extremely corse with replies and not shown any due care orr attention with laguage when it came to posting or replying. I've gone above and beyond to keep things calm from this end and if anything after all that has been said I should be the one coming out as offended by the replies and responses from the mods here.

Just because someone choses to take offence, it doesn't make them right. I feel there is an extreme abuse of power here from some mods.

MAGIX_Redaktion wrote on 10/12/2017, 9:04 AM

Hello @producer_ben,

The moderator was asking nicely and polite for you to change your avatar. You didn't move an inch from your position. Think about how peacefully the thread would have continued, if you would have changed the avatar. That didn't happen. Therefore you ignored community rule 6:

6. Directives – Noncompliance

Please follow instructions provided by our editors and moderators. We want to keep the quality of discussions at a consistently high level and prevent content which is offensive to users, MAGIX employees and moderators.

Now I have to step in and ask you again, please, change it. If you don't, I will take further actions (even though I really would like not to 🙁).

I want to keep this thread open for the software discussion. Nevertheless, I will close it, if you keep debating your avatar.

@Galaxy I'm sorry that this topic has taken over your thread. We appreciate your list of improvements and I will forward this list to the responsible team.😉

Regardless all of that, I wanna emphasis what @johnebaker said, we are always happy to help!

Edit: Sadly, @producer_ben has not been very cooperative. My working day is over. This is why, I will write you back tomorrow. In the meantime, I will give you a little timeout.

Best regards,
Mathias

Community Manager

browj2 wrote on 10/12/2017, 11:33 AM

Are we back to the problem?

Back on topic though, thanks for your reply. I have tried as you've directed and in previous magix versions I could get by this way, but in the 2017 MEP Premium I have, it doesn't appear to work like that.

If I select a clip that is using an efect or more than one effect and then go into the effects tab, it doesn't bring up the effects that are in use for that clip. It defaults to the first effects "tile" that is selected in the effects window browser. So for example, the first in my list is brightness and contrast, but the effect on the clip is motion picture grid. By selecting the clip with the motion picture grid added, using the previous version methods and the method you also described, the adjustments for that effect don't appear unless i manually search through the effects tiles for the effect used. if there is more than one effect used, this is just rediculous.

The Effects tab brings up all effects, not just those that are on the particular object, as you noted. If it only brought up those particular effects, then you would not be able to add any effects because there wouldn't be any, and then you would complain about that. Also, the screens are made to show one parameter screen at a time.

In order to modify the effects listed, yes, you have to navigate to them one way or another. Before, there were no tiles but just a listing. Now there are tiles but they have pretty much the same names. However, the easy way is to simply double-click on the effect and the correct screen will open. So, in the lower part of the Media pool with the effects listed, double-clicking on HDR will open the Brightness/Contrast screen. Double-clicking on Sharpen will open the Sharpness screen. Double-clicking on Blurbender Pro (a third party plugin that I bought) will open it, etc. Thus you do not have to navigate to the correct effect screen by selecting the correct tile, just double-click on the listed effect. Therefore, not ridiculous, very simple.

However, I believe that I found a bug. Double-clicking on "Auto color" or "Color correction" does not open the effect. Can someone please confirm this? I didn't try all effects, but I did try many, and they worked by double-clicking.

The shortcut that I gave you opens the Brightness/Contrast effect. Obviously there would be other shortcuts for some of the other main effects. These are listed in the manual, which you should read. The shortcuts are simply a faster way to get somewhere or something done. The idea of going to the Effects tab and opening the Brightness/Contrast screen in one quick shortcut was just so that you would see the bottom effects window/keyframing area, and then you could double-click the one you want or adjust from there.

John CB

johnebaker wrote on 10/12/2017, 12:36 PM

@browj2

. . . . Double-clicking on "Auto color" or "Color correction" does not open the effect. . . . .

Auto color does not work, however for the Color correction you have to double click the sub items of the effect as shown below

HTH

John EB

browj2 wrote on 10/12/2017, 12:43 PM

@johnebaker

Hi John EB,

Thanks for confirming.

@producer_ben

I forgot to mention, instead of using a shortcut to get to the effects tab and open a Magix effect, like Brightness/Contrast, simply double-click on the object on the timeline. By default, the effects screen opens to Brightness/Contrast the first time in a session, with the effects listing at the bottom, or it opens to the last Magix effect used during the session.

John CB

johnebaker wrote on 10/12/2017, 1:02 PM

@browj2

After further testing, it would appear that the Auto color is not working at all, ie I am seeing no changes.

I retro tested on previous versions using the same image throughout and got the following:

Auto color works for MEP MX and 2013, however double clicking does not re-open the dialog.

MEP 2014 through to Premium and VPX there is no change when applying the Auto color effect.

I cannot test VPX 4 and MEP 17, as Windows 10 1703 has finally 'done them in'.

HTH

John EB

browj2 wrote on 10/12/2017, 3:42 PM

@johnebaker

And here I thought that the colour of my videos and photos was perfect. I noticed occasionally that sometimes nothing seemed to change on the objects using Auto color, but other times did. However, it works for me in MEP2016 Premium, 2018 Plus and VPX8 (patch 15.0.4.176). However, I'm using Compatibility mode on my desktop. It works on my Surface Pro in standard mode, but I noticed that on one clip it didn't and on another from a different source, it did. I'll have to keep watch on it.

Did you try different sourced video clips?

John CB

johnebaker wrote on 10/12/2017, 4:40 PM

@browj2

Have tried two different sources for video and images (jpg) also Standard mode and Compatibility mode and get intermittent and inconsistent results, does not work at all in Standard mode and, with Compatibilty mode, sometimes it works, others not for MEP 2016, 2018 and VPX.

In MEP 2013 I also found this interesting 'spot mode' (or bug) for Auto color - do not see this happening in 2014 to 2018 or VPX .

John EB

Scenestealer wrote on 10/12/2017, 5:18 PM

@johnebaker

In MEP 2013 I also found this interesting 'spot mode' (or bug) for Auto color

That is because by drawing a marquee you have activated Red Eye removal. Note the check mark appear in your video.

After further testing, it would appear that the Auto color is not working at all, ie I am seeing no changes.

Sometimes Auto colour and Auto contrast do nothing but I have always thought this was because it decides the picture is correctly balanced. If there is a full range of colour and luminance values present then how would it decide?

@browj2

Good tip on the double clicking to get the correct effect window up. I knew there had to be a way and I thought I had tried that but maybe I was clicking Auto colour...

That the good thing about these forum questions - they pique your curiosity and you often learn something you didn't know that you can share with others.

Peter

browj2 wrote on 10/12/2017, 6:13 PM

Hi,

Yes, we have learned many things this way. The right-clicking on things that I never thought would have a menu was certainly a good one.

I just noticed that VPX seems to be different from MEP in the double-clicking on an object. VPX remembers the last effect window opened and goes there, whereas MEP goes to Brightness/Contrast in a new session.

John CB

johnebaker wrote on 10/13/2017, 2:57 AM

@Scenestealer

. . . . That is because by drawing a marquee you have activated Red Eye removal. Note the check mark appear in your video. . . . .

Dooooh, I missed that 😟 - thanks Peter

Interesting that in MEP 2014 onwards and VPX drawing a marquee does not automatically activate red eye removal - you have to click the Manual button first!

@browj2

. . . . I just noticed that VPX seems to be different from MEP in the double-clicking on an object. VPX remembers the last effect window opened and goes there, whereas MEP goes to Brightness/Contrast in a new session.. . . . .

Where are you clicking on the object in VPX - I only see the same behaviour as you in MEP?

Found another odd behaviour - add an image or clip to the timeline with nothing above or below and then add Chromakey Alpha - I get the following:

MEP 2018 - image/video changes to monochrome, invert the Alpha direction arrow and you get a negative monochrome image.

VPX - image goes black no matter which direction the Alpha arrow.

John EB

browj2 wrote on 10/13/2017, 11:49 PM

Hi John EB,

I haven't tested the Chromakey behaviour yet.

As for double-clicking on an object and the Effects tab/screen that shows up upon opening in VPX, I found the following in the ini file:

lastActiveTab=IDC_BUTTON_SM_SIZEPOS_SUB_PAGE
lastActiveDirectory=cl::IDC_DIALOG_SM_SIZEPOS_SUB_PAGE{effectID0 = "6"&&effectID1 = "7"&&effectID2 = "9"&&effectID3 = "10"},IDC_DIALOG_EFFECT_VIEW_CONTROL_BUTTONS,IDC_DIALOG_EFFECT_VIEW_DLG,IDC_DIALOG_PREV_NEXT,LAYOUTSET=1

In this case, Size/Position was the last effects screen open before exiting VPX and when I loaded it again and double-clicked on an object, with or without effects, the Size/Pos screen opened.

John CB