HD Video Editing with Blender 73
Posthis writes "While the VSE sequence module has been part of Blender for a while, the upcoming version v2.46 comes with some new powerful video editing features, like Proxy editing, optimized FFmpeg support, and more. Not many use Blender strictly as a video editor because it's not very straight-forward, but given the fact that it now deals with HDV and 24p footage much more comfortably compared to other OSS video editors, it makes it a sound contender. This new tutorial shows the basics of how to use it as a video editor and put your masterpiece together."
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"Quitters never win and winners never quit. But those who never quit and never win are idiots."
WOW! (Score:1)
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Now if only I could find ... (Score:3, Insightful)
... a video input/output card for Linux that supports component [wikipedia.org] (YPbPr [wikipedia.org]) video.
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Looking around quickly, I see a couple of capture cards that support s-video in - that's a component format.
I'm not quite sure why you would focus on that though - if you're doing amateur stuff composite is fine and if you need higher quality you can just go digital earlier.
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I agree with your point about just going digital, though. For capture, sure, there might be some analog sources you might want to grab from, but there's no point in going to analog output these days. Professionals still dream about keeping everything in their pipelines digital; at the end of the day, they still hav
S-Video is not component. (Score:3, Informative)
S-Video [wikipedia.org] is not real component. S-Video still has NTSC subcarrier modulation. Its only benefit over composite is that the subcarrier is not mixed with the luminance, making it unnecessary to filter them apart later. That reduces the artifacts of NTSC, but it does not eliminate them. Component is all baseband; there is no modulated subcarrier.
Additionally, S-Video only supports the NTSC format, which is 480i59.94. Component can support all the video formats used by ATSC and DVB video transmission stand
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Who cares if there's a single universal input/output connector? All you need if you're actually trying to accomplish something is to connect *your specific setup* together.
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Who cares if there's a single universal input/output connector? All you need if you're actually trying to accomplish something is to connect *your specific setup* together.
I care. But that is because right now various digital sources have different kinds of digital video output connections. Some have Firewire. Some have HDMI. Some have SDI. The video world went into this with too little planning.
But for the time being, *my specific setup* has analog component. It looks like HDMI would be the first digital source. So you know of a card that handles HDMI input (HDCP is not needed ... this is not about ripping protected content) and works in Linux?
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Pressing Select does exactly nothing.
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Erm. That's bollocks. There are more countries and standards in the world than America you know.
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Uh, HDMI? Isn't that kinda the obvious answer?
Pratically every monitor has support for it (since DVI is just HDMI with a different connector and all you need is the right cable) and more and more cameras/camcord
Re:Now if only I could find ... (Score:4, Informative)
... a video input/output card for Linux that supports component [wikipedia.org] (YPbPr [wikipedia.org]) video.
Deltacast [deltacast.tv]
AJA [aja.com]
Bluefish444 [bluefish444.com]
They are high quality professional grade cards and the price range is also high.
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At least Deltacast indicates Linux support. I can't find any indication for the others. Thanks!
Re:Now if only I could find ... (Score:4, Informative)
and Bluefish444 has Linux SDK available to registered OEM customers: bluefish444 OEM [bluefish444.com]
We are about to try those for use in our product in Q4/08 (hopefully)... If anyone knows other possibilities we would like to know!
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No linux support though, which is unfortunate
But it's very very very cheap (~$330 online for the pro, ~$235 for the hdmi-only version)
Didn't post in reply to your parent post as he was looking for something that was linux native, but, if you're working for an OEM, your company might be able to convince blackmagic to finally provide linux support.. They've been tethering on the edge for a while..
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The hardware is cost-competitive with most of the other products on the market, but, probably at the expense of increased support costs
There's Sknet [sknet-web.co.jp] with their Monster X [sknet-web.co.jp]
And, Canopus Japan [canopus.co.jp] has a notable HDRECs [canopus.co.jp] product.
And, also earthsoft [earthsoft.jp] who I know has done some OEM work for Sony in their high defintion PVRs
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I'll have to take a look at those too!
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Anyone know of a cheap TBC, or software that will do the same job?
ttyl
Farrell
With that UI.. (Score:2, Troll)
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Personally, I wish I could use it as a word processor. I already use it for flowcharts.
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Personally, I wish I could use it as a word processor. I already use it for flowcharts.
LetterRip
Re:With that UI.. (Score:5, Funny)
I'm usually pretty quick to defend the Blender UI, I'm one of those people who understands how quick and powerful it really is, but this time I have to agree.
Any tutorial on video editing in Blender should be akin to a tutorial on cleaning teeth which starts with:
Otherwise, it's lying or incomplete.
Excellent! (Score:3, Interesting)
Kino does SD great over firewire (my camcorder can downsample), but borks out (gray output) when I try it with HD. I've googled and sourceforged but cannot seem to find anything that will do it. I know my PC is fast enough because I used to do it with Premiere Elements.
Re:Excellent! (Score:4, Informative)
The real question is... (Score:3, Insightful)
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Re:The real question is... (Score:5, Informative)
For the 3D part? Probably. But the video editing was (surprisingly) a snap. Just follow Eugenia's instructions and you'll be up and running in no time flat!
If you don't believe me, check this out. After seeing this story, I downloaded the latest Blender and got cracking. A short time later I had this video uploaded to YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UUzVi_f5kyE [youtube.com]
All the source videos were fairly large clips that Blender handled without issue. With only a smidge of practice, I was able to clip them to size and add transitions. So I'm pretty happy with the result. Especially since I have absolutely NO video editing experience. If I had a bit more time with this tool, I imagine I could whip up a pretty good promotional video.
I didn't bother with the audio tracks on my first run-through, but it doesn't appear to be too difficult to include them. The one issue I'm concerned about is if there is support for a decent mixer. (e.g. Could I play background music, then at some point fade it to a less audible level, play the original speech/effects, then adjust the BG music back to full volume?) Worst case, that's probably something I could work out in an audio editing program, but it would be a major pain.
I can't complain, though, given what I paid for Blender. (i.e. Nothing!) It's possibly the best FREE video editing tool I have ever seen. Which probably says more about the lack of such tools than about the brilliance of Blender, but I'm still happy.
Feel free to give it a go yourself. If you need some footage to mess around with, the stuff I used can be found here: http://blog.wiicade.com/?p=177 [wiicade.com]
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Shill.
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This is actually what he said
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Re:The real question is... (Score:4, Informative)
As for other audio options, go to the panel at the bottom and click the last toolbar icon, the one that reads "Sound block buttons".
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For the 3D part? Probably.
And even for the 3D part, it's really not bad. I think most of the complaints you hear are from people who have spent a lot of time working with another 3D package and expect Blender to be a close clone of their favorite package. For example, you've learnt a small part of the app in a short amount of time, and I'm sure that with the same motivation, you could learn the other parts the same way, a little bit at a time. Another comment above compared Blender to Emacs, which I think is a great analogy. It wa
There's a difference between using an learning (Score:2)
It depends a lot on the type of application, but making something easy to learn should not make it harder for the power user. This is particularly true for applications like blender where learning the application is only a small part of learning the skills required for doing the job.
My son got a reasonable grip on blender after a couple of hours of fiddling around. He had used 3D stu
Learning Blender (Score:1)
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http://www.blender.org/community/user-community/
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http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/BSoD [blender.org]
BSOD stands for "Blender Summer of Documentation". It was a Blender/Google Summer of Code/Documentation thing they did a few years ago. It produced the best documentation that Blender has to date.
Try starting with this one:
http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/BSoD/Introduction_to_Modeling [blender.org]
Yes, the UI sucks. (Score:5, Interesting)
I've used Blender extensively. I've even used the Game Kit and extended Blender in Python.
Even after you know it, the UI still sucks. There's not enough feedback, it's too modal, the tools for aligning objects are weak, the keyboard shortcuts manual is over forty pages, and things that aren't implemented just silently don't work. Other than that...
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Yeah, except this is an article about using it as a video editing and compositing tool, so we're not comparing it to Maya and the like. We should be comparing it to Premiere and Final Cut Pro. Does being powerful mean it must be difficult to figure out? I don't think so. Adobe Premiere took me about half an hour to figure out, behaves pretty much like film junkies would expect a video editing tool to work (with terminology like "razor tool"
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Looking at the tutorial, it seems like you CAN use Blender to edit and compose videos, but it seems like choosing a Leatherman to do surgery because it has a scalpel and tweezers and a screwdriver all in one tool.
You are looking at this from the wrong perspective - if you are using Blender for Compositing/3D animation/Visual FX/Color Grading etc. Then you can jump into video editing with similar tools and workflow. Plumiferos ended up using Blender for video editing after considering commercial packages and other open source packages because of it being easier to keep the consistent work flow.
After 2.50 a skin that allows Blender to be used by individuals familar with other video editing packages without having to
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Now, that's not to say I would ever want to do video editing in B
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I see you haven't used 3DSMax yet.
3D kits are difficult to handle. Quit wining. (Score:5, Insightful)
3D kits are difficult to handle. Period. That goes for Maya, Softimage, Lightwave, 3DSMax, Houdini and Blender. That even goes for Cinema 4D, allthough they claim to be the easiest to use in the pro legue.
Pro-level 3D with pro-level tools is a non-trivial task, and trying out every feature in each of these packages and learning to use it takes well over a year, a stack of books and porbably even some hands on training by a professional. Somebody who is good at operating a 3D kit usually knows nothing else about computers. These software behemoths are like Emacs with the brakes removed - allmost an operating system by themselves.
That you need a stack of tutorials to get going with a full-range 3D package is the *norm*, not an exception. Blender has some unusual UI concepts (most of which make perfect sense and actually are and allways were innovative) but it is definitely not any more difficult to handle than Lightwave or 3DSMax. Take that from someone who has a full commercial license of Lightwave 8 *and* has been using Blender since 1.8.
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Re:3D kits are difficult to handle. Quit wining. (Score:4, Interesting)
Finally somebody says it. 3D graphics have been a hobby of mine for the past 10 years, so I've played with quite a few trials of various editing packages. NONE, I repeat, NONE of them are "pick-up and learn" tools. The sheer amount of information you work with when modeling in 3D makes any sort of editor horribly complex (or horribly simplified).
I like to think of Blender as "GIMP for 3D" because people like to complain about the UI. It seems complex, but once you get to know it you see how incredibly flexible it is. After several years of using an old Maya license, I actually prefer Blender because I can customize panes and save views into what my "ideal" 3D package would look like. There are also quite a few tools and scripts I can't live without (brush vertex selecting, anyone?).
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My current workflow is either model in Sketchup then build the scene and render in either Blender or 3DSMax or
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Funny how creating a powerful, intuitive, user-friendly GUI for OSs is what catapulted computers from being nifty novelties into being essential productivity tools from the top to the bottom of society in every sphere, from social to economic. Funnier still is how many bozos are too stupid to realize this, still think command-line interfaces are where the cool kids hang out, etc. It's ridiculous.
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These software behemoths are like Emacs with the brakes removed - allmost an operating system by themselves.
Funny how creating a powerful, intuitive, user-friendly GUI for OSs is what catapulted computers from being nifty novelties into being essential productivity tools from the top to the bottom of society in every sphere, from social to economic. Funnier still is how many bozos are too stupid to realize this, still think command-line interfaces are where the cool kids hang out, etc. It's ridiculous. Get. Your. Farking. Interface. Sorted.
Compared to the challenge of creating the tools themselves, the task is trivial; but it takes the skillset of a designer, not a math jock or code monkey.
Let's get this straight:
It doesn't just take a designer. It takes a designer who understands what the program is and what it's supposed to do, and how people are going to work with it and (if you really want to pander to the audience) what they expect, what they're used to. In short, it's a harder problem than you acknowledge.
And, in general, for an interface to be easy to use it must be limited. Too many options means users complaining that your app is too complicated, or too cluttered with buttons and