@johnebaker

Hi John,

After paddling around in the kayak for 4 hours drowning worms on Thursday, we relaxed yesterday. I installed MEP2019 (updated to 204) without downloading everything, particularly the Design Elements, menu files for DVD's, music, and movie templates. The file sizes look to be about the same as for 2018. Did you notice anything new in any of these?

1. Titles

For the titles, the Magix pages states:

"Professional title animations 

They're finally here. No other feature has been requested as frequently by the Movie Edit Pro community as new title templates. And now they're here: custom titles. Individually animated. Letter by letter. Programmed to impress."

The gif looks interesting with "Turn forward," "Neon lights &???,"Color Turn," and "Shade Titles." The wording "Professional title animations" makes it look like a new feature, as does "...custom titles. Individually animated. Letter by letter." Without some new feature like making 3DMaker available as per VPX, I can't see how these could be done. I downloaded the title templates and didn't find any new templates that were not with 2018, so the statement, "new title templates" doesn't hold either, unless I missed something.

2. Chromakey

As for: "Chroma key for everyone!

For movies from another world. An expedition to Everest, ending with you at the summit? The new chroma keying feature makes it all possible — and incredibly easy."

I don't see anything new in this version over what was in 2018. Do you?

This feature also looks somewhat like that announced for VPX that I could never figure out. Was it the Mask Generator feature?

It would be nice if Magix would give us more details.

3. Track handling

"COMPLETE! Perfect track handling

Your movie — just like you imagined. Experience the freedom of being able to rearrange, delete and completely reorder your tracks any way you want, whenever you want. Even retrospectively!"

I can't find a way to reorder the tracks.

4. Burning - Chapter export

This looks promising but I can't try it out:

"NEW! Chapter export

Export with shortcuts.  Only need to touch up part of your movie? Save time and energy by exporting individual chapters as you edit them, instead of your entire movie."

5. Manual

I downloaded the manual - it's for early 2018 and contains nothing mentioned in the advert as new.

There are many complaints on the French forum about 2018 being removed and 2019 installation not completing or crashing, leaving them without a working program. The other main comments were generally about having to download several GB of material that looks to be the same as what was there before, plus no discernable new features. The "New! Plug-ins dialogs" is not a new feature, just a correction to the near unusable interface that was there previously.

In my case, it was a new install of Premium, so I still have 2018 Plus.

Judging from what I have seen so far, this version is premature.

John CB

@browj2

Hi John

OT: . . . . drowning worms . . . .

I used to teach them to swim 😆 !

Back to your questions:

1. Titles - "Professional title animations 

No sign of them anywhere - I can only assume Marketing were ahead of themselves or it did not make the cut off date for release.

2. Chromakey

No sign of any changes, I do not think it is the Mask Generator as this was launched a while ago

3. Track handling - I can't find a way to reorder the tracks.

It is done by it is Cut and Paste - select track to move and cut it using drop down option, select track where to be pasted above, select paste from drop down, not as slick as move up/down would be however saves repeated clicking to move track up/down. Ctrl-X and Ctrl-V do not work with this.

Updated 23/08/2018 - image added

4. Burning - Chapter export

This one is well hidden, one single word on another video of the new features gave away where it is - File, Batch conversion . . . the dialogs are:

Advanced button allows you to specify where to export to

5. Manual

Not updated yet - is missing new features.

Other new features:

Active destination - has some quirks and bugs:

To insert media from the media pool at the cursor on an occupied track must have Mouse mode set to Single track ripple, if set to Automatic only works on empty track or after last object on an occupied track even if there is space for the object prior to others.

Copy and Paste to destination works as expected, however occasionally if there is insufficient space the object is pasted in and creates a cross-fade transition when Mouse mode set to Automatic.

There is a bug - when changing track ripple mode get odd effects with extra object(s) inserted/duplicated.

Video effects - General options - these are quick access to effects such as Blur, Saturation, Sand etc, however how to edit them is not obvious! Clicking on the Keyframe effect item - opens appropriate effect dialog.

HTH

John EB

@johnebaker

Hi John,

Recovering today from yesterday's walk - hot, rough terrain. It took a couple of hours to download a few days of videos shot with my GoPro. It seems that I have many clips of when it was not supposed to be recording, and missing clips when I told it start recording. It doesn't always obey my commands, it seems.

Thanks for your review.

3. It's the little down arrow in the track header that I didn't notice. I kept right-clicking and using the commands there. With V/A on 2 tracks, it takes 2 cut/paste - one for Video, one for Audio.

6. Active Destination - I was going to mention this but it was time for the walk. I was trying Copy/Paste with no success; clipboard is empty. I didn't think that the import commands had been modified for this. Very interesting feature! How did you get copy/paste to work?

7. Video Effects - General Options - I had never bothered with these before. Are there any differences from the previous version? I took a quick look and the only thing I see different is "negative.jpg," a small icon in the folder "C:\ProgramData\MAGIX\Movie Edit Pro Plus\2018\VideoEffects\Standard\Icons."

When I installed 2019, somehow I ended up installing Magix PC Check & Tuning. When I start MEP, I get popup windows:

I select Activate and get:

I haven't done any testing to see how this impacts MEP or VPX on my laptop, however, playback of the small test project in MEP2019 was smooth, even with some effects and a Xara overlay. I must try the same project in MEP2018 and VPX, with and without this High Speed Mode activated.

John CB

Just noticed that, once again, right-clicking on the audio part of a video clip does not bring up the possibility of editing it in an external editor. This is still very annoying.

I did a mixdown and sent it to the external editor - ME3. The first time there was sound but no waveform. Second time, it worked.

I tried with Audio & Music Lab and the file doesn't come back like it used to. I get an error after exiting. Same with ACL. Can someone who has VSCL try this out to see if it brings back the modified audio correctly?

EDIT: This now seems to be the case with VPX on my laptop. I'll have to try it on my desktop. These programs should all work with VPX and MEP - they have in the past.

UPDATE: I just tried with Samplitude Pro X3 as the external editor and it worked perfectly. Exiting Sam brought back the modified file to VPX. Tried with MEP2019 and it worked perfectly. So there is a problem with AML and ACL.

John CB

@browj2

Hi John

. . . . It seems that I have many clips of when it was not supposed to be recording, and missing clips when I told it start recording . . . .

Been there - had some recordings of very strange conversations on the trams in Melbourne !!!

3. . . . . it takes 2 cut/paste - one for Video, one for Audio. . . . .

I don't usually have Video and Audio on separate tracks - interesting that is still maintains the grouping if you leave one or the other where it was, or move it to another track position anywhere in the track order.

6. Active Destination - I was going to mention this but it was time for the walk. I was trying Copy/Paste with no success; clipboard is empty. . . . .

I used Ctrl+C and Ctrl+V, Edit, Copy Objects and Paste objects also works.

. . . . When I installed 2019, somehow I ended up installing Magix PC Check & Tuning. . . . .

You must have clicked through the dialog where you can set it not to install. I do not use it.

. . . . Video Effects - General Options . . . .Are there any differences from the previous version? . . . .

I never noticed this in 2018, like you it is something I don't use so cannot tell.

. . . . Audio & Music Lab and the file doesn't come back like it used to. I get an error after exiting. Same with ACL. . . . .

Same with VSCL no change returned and if you try to edit the clip again you get an error message the audio is being used by another program.

HTH

John EB

@johnebaker

Hi John,

Thanks for checking VSCL. Does this also happen with VPX?

Do you get an error like the one that I posted?

I also get the message that the audio is being used by another program, always have when the program didn't work.

I reinstalled and updated AML the other day, hoping to get rid of this error, without success. I also installed and updated ACL the other day. The first problem was the error about the Intel ICD OpenGL driver. I had to run the file from Ralf for each program, once for the first install, again for the patch. Still no success.

EDIT: I just tested AML with VPX7. Using the same video object, right-clicking on the audio part gives me the selection to Edit audio externally. Doing so mixes down the object audio, opens it in AML where I modify it. Clicking on the upper right X to exit, asks if I want to save, yes, automatically updates the object file, closes, and the modified object is successfully updated in VPX7. No errors. So, VPX10 and MEP2019 share the same problems handling external audio editing and AML/ACL/VSCL.

John CB

@browj2

Hi

. . . . Thanks for checking VSCL. Does this also happen with VPX? . . .

No - VSCL launches, loads the audio, however on closing does not hand back the modified audio and is still locking the audio track from further editing.

I also have to manually mix down the audio manually I do not get auto mixdown as in VPX7

HTH

John EB

@johnebaker

Hi John,

I don't get the errors that you mentioned about NB OFX effects on the Surface Pro 4.

For HitFilm, there is an update - 113 MB - didn't know the size until downloading started. Only update seems to be End-User License and Application App updated to be GPDR compliant.

Is there anything specific that I can try?

John CB

Is anyone else having problems with Chapters not working correctly on burnt Blu Ray disks in this release? E.g. a project with one Chapter marker at the start and six other Chapter markers works correctly when previewing the DVD menu within MEP, but on the burnt disk the second and the third jump to a point many seconds later than the correct position (in one case 17 seconds later!). The one at the start works correctly as do all the others. It's a consistent fault, although with some projects it affects only one Chapter. Most odd.

@browj2

Hi John

I have just updated to .205 and updated Hitfilm.

I get no preview with any of the Hitfilm effects effect applied - just a static frame in the preview monitor of where the timeline cursor is located with the effect applied, irrespective of video mode, HWA on/off, proxies/no proxies, pre-render or not - only the audio plays - the same applies when exporting to file.

HTH

John EB

@johnebaker

Hi John,

I will likely have the same problem on my desktop, as it seemed more susceptible to problems with these plugins causing a black screen. Won't be home for another 2 or 3 weeks, it seems.

I came across another problem, raised on the French forum. proDAD Heroglyph - that was licensed to work with VPX6, but has worked fine with all VPX since, including 10, as well as MEP including 2018, causes MEP2019 to restart, even by just cancelling. I tried Script, and when it exits to MEP, MEP2019 (205) restarts.

@SevCardy

Hi,

I can't test this one right now. Up to John EB.

John CB

@SevCardy, @SevCardy

Hi

I can't test this one either - my PC has just died this morning, and my laptop does not have BD writer.

John EB

@SevCardy

Hi

PC is back up and running after fitting new power pack!

Chapters issue - no problems here - tested with 2 different length projects adding 6 chapters in each at varying time intervals, all chapters played from correct location in both discs on PC and BD player.

Is any of the video on timeline of variable framerate, eg from a Smart phone, Ipad, etc.

You will need to analyse the original files with MediaInfo looking for the following line in Video section of the report: Frame rate mode: Variable

If there is this may be the cause of the mistimings.

HTH

John EB

@browj2 and @johnebaker

Thanks for replying. I can report that I have solved the problem, after much experimentation involving the production of a stack of expensive Blu Ray beer mats!

I tried everything, including copying all the video and audio tracks to an empty project and recreating all the Chapter markers - all to no avail. The first one or two chapters were always in the wrong place (and, frustratingly, always in the same wrong place) when the disks were played, but correct on the project timeline. Then in desperation I switched from the Main Concept codec back to the default codec for burning disks and Hey Presto, the Chapters then are in the correct places.

So it is the Main Concept codec that is causing the problem. I never knowingly had a problem with it in the past though.

@browj2

Hi John

Unfortunately I cannot confirm your findings at the moment, I am back on my old PC, and it is slow - the newer one finally gave up the ghost on Saturday - motherboard was the issue and was what took out the old power pack - awaiting new components.

. . . . . after much experimentation involving the production of a stack of expensive Blu Ray beer mats! . . . .

I use BD-RE discs, they save a lot of money.

John EB

Does anyone know if the Batch Converter support DirectShow or VFW Encoders, like Grass Valley HQX or Cineform Encoder for Windows?

I've tried many lower end editors and they all decode correctly, but don't let you select the encoder for output. That's necessary for editing HEVC media. The performance isn't worth the small file sizes, so I like transcoding them to an intermediate format - that way I never need proxies and can render more effects in real time at high preview quality and resolution.

I'd like to know before purchasing, and generally don't like running trials on my machine due to the runtime libraries they tend to drag along with them - among other things (registry bloat, etc. when I decide not to keep them/purchase).

@Former user

Hi

Movie Edit Pro Plus and Premium (2019) supports HEVC out of the box.

There a couple of conditions though

1. an Intel processor with an iGPU supporting H.265 encoding is required - this will be used for hardware acceleration of encoding. If you have Intel processor iGPU which cannot support H.265 then software encoding is used and this is slow!
    
2. Currently there is no support for the use of a NVidia graphics card using the NVENC encoder, for that you would need to use Video Pro X(see note below) or Vegas Pro

Note: VPX support for HWA via NVENC/NVidia graphics card is for H.265 (HEVC) only

HTH

John EB

Where has the 'fades' drop down menu disappeared? I want to access fades and have invested in the new premium version but cannot even access some simples fades, what gives? Can someone help me please.

@JamesRC

Hi,

Fades are called Transitions. Look under the Templates tab; Transitions should be right at the top.

I assume that you downloaded and installed all of the extra content - Help, Install extra content. There is a lot.

John CB