Garbage Matte Across Multiple Clips

None of my search terms turned up anything--although they came close.

In an effort to make those "Audio Test" videos of mine smaller, I took the original DV footage and cut a stanza or two out of the music. We don't need three minutes of Boogie-Woogie to illustrate where the bouncing-ball audio meters should be.

FCP 5.0.4, Tiger, QT7.

I actually got the musical rhythm to line up within reason and the music/video is 1:40 now. Then, because most of the video frame doesn't do squat except make the compressor work harder, I applied the 4-point Gargbage Matte to all the clips left in the video. Broad expances of black should compress beautifully.

I can't do that can I? Oh, the Matte filter will apply to the whole timeline, but the control must be executed clip by clip. Can you make it stop doing that? Really. I guarantee it will be exactly the same matte shape and size for the whole 1:40.

Koz

Just take the whole sequence and drop it into a new sequence to make a nest. Then apply the filter to the nest.

Even better would be to crop the file in Quicktime, so the useless black areas aren't even there. This is from an earlier thread and I still can;t recall where I got it.

I went looking for a link to a tutorial I once read on this and for the life of me I can't find it. Here's the bits I remember. Keep in mind that some bits are possibly wrong, and maybe someone else can pick me up on them.

Export a freeze frame of your QT to photoshop.
Draw a matte around your picture. Yes, a matte. It will be removed in QT.
Can't remember if you need to make this matte pure black or pure white. One or the other. Maybe make both, if someone else doesn't know.
Delete the picture, leaving only the matte.
Save this picture. Not sure if the format is important. I'm guessing a png, tiff or similar would be OK.
Open QT
Go to Get Movie Properties from the Movie menu.
Select Video Track. Then next to this choose Mask.
Click the Set button and navigate to your matte picture.
This should crop your picture down to the correct ratio.
Save as a Self-Contained Movie.

I've done it beofre myself, so I can guarantee it can be done, I just can't guarantee my memory of how it's done. Try Google.

Oh - found it. Quicktime mask

Should put this in the FAQ. Although it's not really frequently asked..

<<<Although it's not really frequently asked..>>>

No. One should never associate anything I do with "normal" or "frequent."

OK. I'll figure out what "nesting" means later (remember, Not An Editor).

While I'm impressed with the elegance and utility of the QuickTime Crop solution, it may be solving a problem I don't have. The final step in using these video tools requires that you dump them back onto a DV or Uncompressed timeline and render with little or no graphic or sound damage.

See second paragraph.

[www.kozco.com]

Koz

By the way, the next posting up from this one:

[Creating Tape Breakup--on the Time Line]

Is the same video. I exported the whole thing as a self-contained video and tried to mask that.

Most people dig themself a hole when they try to cut their first 120 minute HiDef Feature Film. It takes an engineer to create unique mutilation in the first 40 seconds of a DV clip.

Koz

Say you have a sequence - sequence one. You open this in the browser and get a timeline called sequence one and you edit clips on to this timeline. Then you close this sequence.

Then you make a new sequence, sequence two. Open this to get a new timeline. Then drag sequence one from the browser as if it were a clip and drop it on the sequence two timeline.

This is known as nesting. The stuff in sequence one is (technically) a nest. That means you can treat it just like a clip, and drop filters on it to effect everything inside it.

To open a nest in the viewer window to make adjustments to the filters, click it once in the timeline to select it, then press return.

<<<Then you close this sequence. >>>

I assume I do that with the little golf ball in the upper left of the timeline?

<<<Then you make a new sequence, sequence two.>>>

This is where your Project Settings kill you, isn't it? This doesn't work unless everything matches.

<<<The stuff in sequence one is (technically) a nest. >>>

Sequence 2 is the nest, yes? Sequence 1 is the original timeline with the clips and edit points.

<<<drop filters on it>>>

So I did. It is a little magic to get the four point control panel to appear in the Viewer. I ended up doing it with the right-click menus (we got rid of the Mac Mouse really early).

Something else happened that was surprising. I did an H.264 export using this technique and the compressor blasted through the work--even in multi-pass-- in record time. It also produced excellent video and a really small file size way smaller than I was getting with the unnested work.

I do wonder why it did that. Why would a nest compress exceptionally well and in a stunningly short time even though it contains exactly the same show that failed earlier?

I still have to re-import the H.264 file and make sure that part works. Then I'll post the new file.

And then, do it all over again with the DigiBeta movie....

Thank You.

Koz

Of course, this was the 'hard way' method. Here's the easy way

1. Save and close the project.
2. Go to the vending machine and buy chocolate. I'd recommend something a bit above average, but budget constraints are important.
3. Go down the hall to the room where the FCP editors are.
4. Ask for a few minutes help. Make sure to brandish the chocolate and add "I have chocolate'.

<<<3. Go down the hall to the room where the FCP editors are. >>>

Not much of a trip. We're all within yards of each other.

I don't think our Lead Final Cut editor would recognize a nest if you put birds in it. I am now the nesting expert and I'm not even seeing anybody.

We have world class Inferno, Flame, Smoke, and Avid editors, animators, compositers, lighters, trackers, etc, but we're a little behind on Final Cut.

"Welcome to Final Cut Beginning Editing. Your instructor is 12 time zones and 6 months away."

How New Milinnium. Milleniem.

How New Age.

Koz

Tsk. Terrible. So, you wanna buy a good (used) FCP editor? I'm determined to get a first class plane trip to somewhere before I die.

We're also an independent special effects company, so we're not rolling in Euros.

We may be able to swing Perth.

Koz