User manual PINNACLE STUDIO 9 - PROFESSIONAL QUALITY MOVIE-MAKING

Studio 9 Professional Quality Movie-Making Special thanks to Mike Iampietro, William Chien, Richard Edgley, Ivan Maltz, Jon McGowan, Keith Thomson, Jörg Weselmann, and Chris Zamara. Documentation: Nick Sullivan Copyright © 2003 Pinnacle Systems, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Pinnacle Systems is a registered trademark, and Pinnacle Studio, SmartCapture, SmartMovie, Hollywood FX, RTFx and VST are trademarks, of Pinnacle Systems, Inc. QDesign MPEG-1 Layer 2 Fast Encoder/Decoder copyright © 19962002 by QDesign Corporation. The RealProducer is included under license from RealNetworks, Inc. RealProducer version 8.0. copyright 1995-2002, RealNetworks Inc. "RealProducer", "RealVideo", "RealServer", and "Real" logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of RealNetworks, Inc. All rights reserved. SmartSound is a registered trademark of SmartSound Inc. Pro Logic is a registered trademark of Dolby Laboratories Inc. Windows Media is a trademark of Microsoft Corporation. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. You agree not to remove any product identification or notices of the property restrictions from Pinnacle Systems' products or manuals. No part of this manual may be copied or distributed, transmitted, transcribed, stored in a retrieval system, or translated into any human or computer language, in any form by any means, electronic, mechanical, magnetic, manual, or otherwise, without the express written permission of Pinnacle Systems, Inc. Pinnacle Systems, Inc. 280 North Bernardo Avenue Mountain View, CA 94943 Printed in the USA. ii Studio 9 Table of contents BEFORE YOU START ..................................................XI Equipment requirements.........................................................................xi Abbreviations and conventions.............................................................xiii On-line help ........................................................................................... xv CHAPTER 1: USING STUDIO ....................................... 1 Undo, Redo and Help .............................................................................. 2 Setting options ......................................................................................... 4 Edit mode .................................................................................................... 5 The Player................................................................................................ 6 Playback controls..................................................................................... 8 Further editing topics............................................................................. 11 CHAPTER 2: CAPTURING VIDEO.............................. 13 The Capture mode interface.................................................................... 14 The Diskometer ..................................................................................... 16 The Camcorder Controller..................................................................... 18 The capture process.................................................................................. 19 Capture hardware................................................................................... 19 Capture step-by-step .............................................................................. 21 Scene detection...................................................................................... 23 Table of contents iii Digital capture .......................................................................................... 25 SmartCapture: Preview-quality capture................................................. 26 Full-quality capture................................................................................ 28 Audio and video levels ­ digital ............................................................ 29 Analog capture.......................................................................................... 30 Capture quality options.......................................................................... 31 Audio and video levels ­ analog............................................................ 31 CHAPTER 3: THE ALBUM .......................................... 33 The Video Scenes section ......................................................................... 36 Opening a captured video file................................................................ 38 Viewing captured video......................................................................... 42 Selecting scenes and files ...................................................................... 43 Displaying scene and file information ................................................... 44 Comment view....................................................................................... 45 Combining and subdividing scenes ....................................................... 46 Redetecting scenes................................................................................. 49 The Transitions section ............................................................................ 50 The Titles section...................................................................................... 51 The Still Images section ........................................................................... 52 The Sound Effects section........................................................................ 53 The Disc Menus section............................................................................ 54 CHAPTER 4: THE MOVIE WINDOW........................... 55 Movie Window views................................................................................ 57 Storyboard view..................................................................................... 58 Timeline view........................................................................................ 58 Text view ............................................................................................... 62 The toolboxes ............................................................................................ 62 The Video toolbox ................................................................................. 64 The Audio toolbox................................................................................. 66 iv Studio 9 CHAPTER 5: VIDEO CLIPS ........................................ 69 Video clip basics ....................................................................................... 70 Adding video clips to your movie ......................................................... 70 Working with multiple capture files ...................................................... 71 Interface features ................................................................................... 72 Trimming video clips................................................................................ 73 Trimming on the Timeline using handles .............................................. 74 Clip-trimming tips ................................................................................. 77 Trimming with the Clip properties tool................................................. 78 Resetting trimmed clips ......................................................................... 80 Splitting and combining clips .................................................................. 81 Advanced Timeline editing ...................................................................... 82 Insert editing.......................................................................................... 83 Split editing ........................................................................................... 86 Using video effects .................................................................................... 90 Working with the effects list.................................................................. 91 Changing effect parameters ................................................................... 92 Fading effects in and out ....................................................................... 94 Previewing and rendering...................................................................... 94 Video effects ­ the basic set...................................................................... 95 Cleaning effects......................................................................................... 96 Auto color correct.................................................................................. 97 Noise reduction...................................................................................... 97 Stabilize ................................................................................................. 98 Time effects ............................................................................................... 99 Strobe..................................................................................................... 99 Speed ................................................................................................... 100 Color effects ............................................................................................ 101 Black and white ................................................................................... 101 Color correction................................................................................... 101 Posterize .............................................................................................. 102 Sepia .................................................................................................... 102 Table of contents v Fun effects ............................................................................................... 103 Lens flare ............................................................................................. 103 Noise.................................................................................................... 104 Water drop ........................................................................................... 104 Style effects.............................................................................................. 105 Blur...................................................................................................... 105 Emboss ................................................................................................ 106 Mosaic ................................................................................................. 107 Old film ............................................................................................... 107 The SmartMovie music video tool......................................................... 108 CHAPTER 6: TRANSITIONS..................................... 111 Transition types and their uses ............................................................ 112 Previewing transitions in your movie .................................................. 115 Audio transitions ................................................................................. 116 The Ripple Transition command ......................................................... 117 Trimming transitions ............................................................................. 118 Trimming with the Clip properties tool............................................... 118 CHAPTER 7: STILL IMAGES .................................... 121 Editing still images ................................................................................. 124 Trimming with the Clip properties tool............................................... 125 The Frame Grabber ............................................................................... 125 The Frame grabber tool ....................................................................... 126 CHAPTER 8: DISC MENUS....................................... 129 Disc authoring in Studio ...................................................................... 131 Using menus from the Album.............................................................. 133 The DVD Player Control..................................................................... 135 Editing menus on the Timeline............................................................ 136 Editing with the Clip properties tool ................................................... 138 The Disc menu tool.............................................................................. 144 vi Studio 9 CHAPTER 9: THE TITLE EDITOR ............................ 145 Launching the Title Editor................................................................... 146 The Title Editor controls ....................................................................... 147 Title-type buttons................................................................................. 147 Object toolbox ..................................................................................... 148 Editing-mode selection buttons ........................................................... 151 Object layout buttons........................................................................... 153 Clipboard and delete buttons ............................................................... 155 Text-styling controls............................................................................ 155 The Title Editor Album ......................................................................... 157 The Looks Browser ............................................................................. 157 The Backgrounds section..................................................................... 160 The Pictures section............................................................................. 161 The Buttons section ............................................................................. 161 CHAPTER 10: SOUND EFFECTS AND MUSIC........ 165 The Timeline audio tracks ................................................................... 167 The CD audio tool ............................................................................... 168 The SmartSound tool ........................................................................... 170 The Voice-over tool ............................................................................. 172 Trimming audio clips ............................................................................. 175 Trimming with the Clip properties tool............................................... 175 Audio volume and mixing...................................................................... 177 Anatomy of an audio clip .................................................................... 178 Adjusting audio on the Timeline ......................................................... 180 The Volume and balance tool .............................................................. 182 Audio effects............................................................................................ 187 Noise reduction.................................................................................... 188 Equalizer.............................................................................................. 190 Leveler................................................................................................. 191 Reverb ................................................................................................. 191 CHAPTER 11: MAKING YOUR MOVIE..................... 193 Outputting to a camera or video recorder... ......................................... 195 Output your movie to videotape .......................................................... 197 Save your movie as an AVI file........................................................... 199 Table of contents vii Save your movie as an MPEG file....................................................... 202 Save as RealVideo or Windows Media ............................................... 203 Share your movie via the Internet........................................................ 205 Output your movie to DVD, VCD or S-VCD...................................... 207 Copying an AVI file to tape................................................................. 210 APPENDIX A: SETUP OPTIONS .............................. 211 Capture source settings........................................................................ 212 Capture format settings........................................................................ 216 Edit settings ......................................................................................... 221 CD and voice-over settings.................................................................. 225 Make tape settings ............................................................................... 226 Make AVI file settings ........................................................................ 228 Make MPEG file settings .................................................................... 230 Make RealVideo file settings............................................................... 232 Make Windows Media file settings ..................................................... 235 Make disc settings ............................................................................... 236 APPENDIX B: TIPS AND TRICKS ............................ 239 Hardware ............................................................................................. 239 Software............................................................................................... 242 Increasing the frame rate ..................................................................... 244 Studio and computer animation ........................................................... 245 Smart Capture Tips (DV only) ............................................................ 245 APPENDIX C: TROUBLESHOOTING ....................... 247 Technical help on-line ............................................................................ 248 Studio crashes in Edit mode ................................................................ 251 Capture error occurs on starting capture.............................................. 256 Studio hangs when rendering............................................................... 259 CD or DVD burner is not detected ...................................................... 262 Studio hangs on launch or does not launch.......................................... 263 HollywoodFX transitions are still watermarked after upgrading......... 264 "Cannot initialize the DV capture device" error appears in Capture mode ............................................................................................................. 265 Installation problems ............................................................................. 269 Operation problems ............................................................................... 270 viii Studio 9 APPENDIX D: VIDEOGRAPHY TIPS ........................ 277 Creating a shooting plan ...................................................................... 278 Editing ................................................................................................. 279 Rules of thumb for video editing ......................................................... 282 Soundtrack production......................................................................... 284 Title ..................................................................................................... 286 APPENDIX E: GLOSSARY........................................ 287 APPENDIX F: LICENSE AGREEMENT .................... 303 APPENDIX G: KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS................ 307 INDEX ........................................................................ 311 Table of contents ix Before you start Thank you for purchasing Pinnacle Studio. We hope you enjoy using the software. If you have not used Studio before, we recommend that you keep the manual handy for reference even if you don't actually read it all the way through. In order to ensure that your Studio experience gets off on the right foot, please review the three topics below before continuing to Chapter 1: Using Studio. Equipment requirements In addition to your Studio software, here is what you need to make a Studio editing system. Computer · Intel Pentium or AMD Athlon 800 MHz or higher (1.5 GHz or higher recommended) · Microsoft Windows 98 SE, Windows "Millennium", Windows 2000 or Windows XP (recommended) · DirectX-compatible graphics card (ATI Radeon or NVIDIA GeForce 2 or higher recommended) Before you start xi · DirectX-compatible sound card · 256 MB of RAM (512 MB recommended) · CD-ROM drive · Speakers · Mouse · A microphone, if you want to record voice-overs · 300 MB of free hard drive space to install software · Optional CD burner for creating VideoCDs (VCDs) or Super-VideoCDs (S-VCDs) · Optional DVD burner for creating DVDs The hard drive Your hard drive must be capable of sustained reading and writing at 4 MB/sec. All SCSI and most UDMA drives are capable of this. The first time you capture at full quality, Studio will test your drive to make sure it is fast enough. Video in the DV format occupies 3.6 MB of hard drive space for every second of video, so four and a half minutes of DV video consume a full gigabyte of hard drive space. If disk space is a concern with your DV captures, use SmartCapture to capture your video at preview quality (see "SmartCapture: Preview-quality capture" on page 26). This feature uses much less disk space. An entire tape can fit in as little as 360 MB. Tip: We recommend using a separate hard drive dedicated to video capture. This avoids competition between Studio and other software, including Windows, for use of the drive during capture. xii Studio 9 Video capture hardware Studio can capture video from a variety of digital and analog sources. Please see "Capture hardware" on page 19. Video equipment Studio can output video to: · Any DV or Digital8 camcorder or VCR. This requires an OHCI-compliant IEEE-1394 (FireWire) port (as provided by Pinnacle Studio DV). The camcorder must be set up to record from DV Input. · Any analog (8mm, Hi8, VHS, SVHS, VHS-C or SVHS-C) camcorder or VCR. This requires Pinnacle Studio DC10plus, Studio AV, or another Pinnacle card with analog outputs. Output to analog camcorders or VCRs is also possible using a Pinnacle Studio DV or other OHCI-compliant 1394 port if your DV or Digital8 camcorder or VCR can pass a DV signal through to its analog outputs (see your camcorder manual and Chapter 11: Making your movie, for more information). Abbreviations and conventions This guide uses the following conventions to help organize the material. Terminology Studio: "Studio" refers to the editing software. DV: The term "DV" refers to DV and Digital8 camcorders, VCRs, and tapes. Before you start xiii 1394: The term "1394" refers to OHCI-compliant IEEE-1394, FireWire, DV or i.LINK interfaces, ports and cables. Analog: The term "analog" refers to 8mm, Hi8, VHS, SVHS, VHS-C or SVHS-C camcorders, VCRs and tapes, and to Composite/RCA and S-Video cables and connectors. Buttons, menus, dialog boxes and windows Names of buttons, menus and related items are written in italics to distinguish them from the surrounding text, whereas window and dialog names are written with initial capital letters. For example: Click the Edit menu button to open your menu in the Title Editor. Choosing menu commands The right arrowhead symbol ( ) denotes the path for hierarchical menu items. For example: Select Toolbox Generate Background Music. Keyboard conventions Key names are spelled with an initial capital and are underlined. A plus sign denotes a key combination. For example: Press Ctrl+A to select all the clips on the Timeline. Mouse clicks When a mouse click is required, the default is always a left-click unless otherwise specified: Right-click and select Go to Title/Menu Editor. xiv Studio 9 On-line help Two kinds of immediate help are always available while you are working in Studio: · On-line help: Click the help button in the Studio main menu bar, or select the Help Help topics menu, or press F1 to open Studio's on-line help file. control does, pause your mouse pointer over it. A "tool tip" appears explaining its function. · Tool tips: To find out what a button or other Studio Before you start xv CHAPTER 1: Using Studio Creating movies with Studio is a three-step process: 1. Capture: Import source video material to your PC hard drive. Possible sources include analog videotape (8mm, VHS etc.), digital videotape (DV, Digital8), and live video from a video camera, camcorder or webcam. Capture mode is covered in Chapter 2: Capturing video. 2. Edit: Arrange your video material as desired by reordering scenes and discarding unwanted footage. Add visuals, such as transitions, titles and graphics, and supplementary audio, such as sound effects and background music. For DVD and VCD authoring, create interactive menus that give your audience a customized viewing experience. Edit mode is the arena for most of your work in Studio. See "Edit mode" later in this chapter (page 5) for a fuller introduction. 3. Make movie: When your project is complete, generate a finished movie in your choice of format and storage medium: tape, VCD, S-VCD, DVD, AVI, MPEG, RealVideo or Windows Media. Make Movie mode is covered in Chapter 11: Making your movie. Chapter 1: Using Studio 1 Setting the mode Select which step of the movie-making process you want to work on by clicking one of the three mode buttons at the top left of the Studio window: When you switch modes, the Studio screen changes to display the controls needed for the new mode. Undo, Redo and Help The Undo, Redo and Help buttons are always to be found in the top right corner of the Studio window, no matter which of the three modes you are currently working in. · Undo allows you to back out of any changes you have made to your project during the current session, one step at a time. · Redo reinstates the changes one by one if you undo too far. · The Help button launches Studio's on-line help system. All other controls on the Studio screen are dedicated to tasks within the current mode. 2 Studio 9 Chapter 1: Using Studio 3 Setting options Most options in Studio are set using two tabbed dialog boxes. The first lets you control options related to Capture mode and Edit mode. It has four tabs: The other dialog box is concerned with options relating to Make Movie mode. It has six tabs, one for each of the six movie output types: Each panel of both dialog boxes can be opened individually with a corresponding command on the Setup menu (e.g. Setup Capture Source). Once either dialog box is open, however, all of its panels are available through the tabs. For simplicity, we generally refer to the different options panels independently, as in "the Capture source options panel". Detailed explanations of the options in both dialog boxes are contained in Appendix A: Setup Options. 4 Studio 9