How to merge sequences into single movie file ?

marbelan

Hi,

I created my project which consisted of 3 sequences. Each of the sequence consisted of many clips. For some reason my exported video was only the first sequence.

I assumed that clips make sequence, sequences make final movie. It would be convenient to work that way but it seems VideoPad does not.

My question is: how to merge sequences into single movie file ?

Marcin

[deleted]

Hi Marbelan

Although I don't use sequences much I believe it works like this...

You add your clips/images to the media list first and decide to work a few at a time (i.e you decide to create sequences)

Add the required clips to the main video track (the sequence line) and edit as required. Once you are satisfied with this first part of your film you click the + character to the right of the "Sequence 1" tab and VP will collect and save your work as Sequence 1. and clear the sequence line. Your created sequence will now appear in the media list under the sequence tab as though it was a clip in its own right.

If you now go back to your media list (clips or images) you can load a second selection of clips to the sequence line. Edit these as required and once again click the + character to extend the number of sequences made. You will now have "Sequence 2 saved to the media list %etc and the promt line above the main sequence track will reflect this.

Carry on in this way to create your sequences.

After clicking the + on completing your last set of clips the sequence line will be empty.

Now if you open the media list under the "Sequence" tab you will find all of your sequences listed and the main sequence tracks will have reverted to their original appearance and be empty.

You can now add your sequences to the main video track exactly as if they were single clips. I am not making any comment as to how long it might take to assemble your sequence line.... :unsure: but when finished it should save to your PC/DVD etc in the same way as any project using the Export Video tab............

HOWEVER,,,,,I have noticed when trying out this procedure using images instead of film clips that after adding them to the sequence track the second sequence created previews OK in the LH pane but did NOT thumbnail or play on the sequence line..it just left a chequred frame so this MAY stop your recording after the first sequence as you seem to have noticed . The third sequence did load and play and so did a 4th sequence.

So this may be a bug.

Even after dragging and dropping the second sequence to an empty video track failed to make it play . So I am not sure what is happening here. There may be something wrong when sequence 2 is created.

Nat

[deleted]

Hi Marbelan

I have repeated the sequence making scenario using 9 mpeg 4 files (with sound) totalling 187 megs.

I loaded all 9 clips to the media list, and after all had got their thumbnails, added the first three as a group to the sequence line using the menu option. This took some time to complete. <_< .

Once the green bar and soundtracks were complete I checked it played OK and clicked the + character to the right of the Sequence 1 tab on the left to create the first sequence. The sequence track cleared.

The same process was carried out with the next three clips. This took even longer. :huh: (some 7mins30 seconds)

This time however No thumbnails appeared under the right hand preview pane. Just chequered frames. (Why?)

The sequence apparently played though, and previewed OK.

One again the + character right of the Sequence 2 tab was clicked to add the sequence and clear the video track.

I then added the third set of clips and repeated the procedure to create a third sequence. This took 3 mins 30 seconds and this time thumbnails did appear under the preview screen.

After clicking the + character once again to create the sequence and clear the timeline, I opened the Sequence media list to find the three sequences present (+ the next prospective sequence as a clapperboard icon )

I now added all three sequences to the empty time line in the normal way as though they were clips by selecting them all and then choosing the "Place on sequence" option from the menu. It appears this created sequence 4.

This last sequence, sequence 4, is the result of merging the other 3. Which is one answer to your question. .."How do you merge sequences into a single movie file?

Note: No soundtrack appeared on Audiotrack 1 for the combined sequences under the main timeline but nevertheless it played in the preview which also played OK. (So where has it gone..the track was expanded?)

The fully assembled 3 sequences (sequence 4) had a playing time of 2 mins 20 seconds and were saved to the PC as HD 720 avi. This took about 25 minutes.

All nine clips played OK in the final saved avi and nothing was missed out. So I am not sure why you only had one sequence.

Is it possible that you just reloaded sequence 1...?

Personally I find this version (3.10) of VP far too slow to make editing anything complex fun, and even in this exercise there were some odd things happening. (chequered frames and missing soundtracks as well as slow rendering of the thumbnails and sound tracks. There were even missing thumbnails and images when the files used were all jpgs as well as blank sequences.

Nat

borate

Video editing is resource intensive, so results will vary with O/S (32/64) hardware and RAM. 3:10 produced the following results, using a reasonably capable system - Win 7 (64), Asus 2600K CPU, 8G RAM, NVidia 650 video card.

1. Cleared cache

2. Loaded 3 clips - an AVI (:12), WMV (:15) and MOV (:44) into sequence 1. Thumbnails propagated in less than 10 seconds.

3. + to the right of SEQ 1 and loaded same clips into sequence 2. Thumbs displayed instantaneously.

4. + to the right of SEQ 2 and loaded same clips into sequence 3. Thumbs instantaneous.

5. + to the right of SEQ 3 and loaded SEQ'S 1, 2, 3. Thumbs propagated in 15 seconds

6. Produced HD 720 to an AVI file. Creation time: 4:55. Movie length: about 3:30.

No checkerboard thumbs windows observed, but on one of three tests there was a gap during one clip

[deleted]

Hi Borate

Your system seems to handle this quite well.. :angry: Grrrrrrrr...

I am using a Packard Bell 32 bit Vista system (SP2) with Intel core duo CPU 4500 running at 2.2 GHz.and 2 Gigs of RAM

The graphics card is NVIDIA Geforce 8600 GS, 2048 Megs DDR2, and it does struggle somewhat with this VP version. One reason why I still prefer editing with 2.41.

However, in this case, I think that as you loaded the SAME clips into each sequence, the instantaneous appearance of the thumbnails was due to the fact that the cache already contained them and therefore there was no need to regenerate them a second or third time. In my test I used 9 different 1280 x 720 H264 MPEG4 clips added three at a time with a total size of about 190 Megs, and I also started with an empty cache so I could look at number of files created.

The first three clips took a couple of minutes to fully complete...i.e. until all the thumbnails, soundtracks etc. were finished. The next three took ages...7 mins. Longer than the playing time of the entire 9 clips! Well, you can't work like that!

To compare things, I Loaded the 9 files directly to the timeline....It took 11 minutes (from an empty cache).

The cache held 74 files totalling 101 Megs.

With version 2.41, starting with an empty cache the same 9 clips loaded directly onto the timeline in 40 seconds !

The cache contained 63 files totalling 30 Megs.

No matter how you look at it 3.10 is SLOW!

Nat

borate

Nat,

No doubt future VP versions will better leverage GPU capabilities to enhance performance. That 3.x is more full featured than the 2.x series may account for some speed differences.

NCH doesn't list system specifics, beyond basic O/S requirements. (At least I haven't found them.) They should. Documentation, overall, is weak.

Here are the minimum specs for another somewhat more sophisticated editor. That said, these requirements seem reasonable in general for the file types listed...

Operating System

Microsoft Windows XP Home Edition, Professional (32 bit with Service Pack 3)

Microsoft Windows Vista Home Basic, Home Premium, Business, Ultimate (32 bit and 64 bit)

Microsoft Windows 7 Home Basic, Home Premium, Professional, Ultimate (32 bit and 64 bit)

Microsoft Windows 8 (32 bit and 64 bit)

Screen Resolution

1024 x 768, 16-bit color or above.

CPU Processor

AVI Capture/Produce: Profiles: Pentium 4 3.0 Ghz or AMD Athlon 64 X2.

DVD Quality (MPEG-2) Profiles: Pentium 4 3.0 Ghz or AMD Athlon 64 X2.

High Quality MPEG-4 and Streaming WMV, QuickTime) Profiles: Pentium 4 3.0 Ghz or AMD Athlon 64 X2.

Full-HD quality H.264 and MPEG2 Profiles: Intel Corei5/7 or AMD Phenom II X4.

AVCHD* and BD* burning Profiles: Pentium Core 2 Duo E6400, or AMD Phenom II X2.

2K/4K/3D* video editing profile: Intel Corei7 or AMD Phenom II X4 with 64 bit OS 6 GB RAM.

Graphics Card

128 MB VGA VRAM or higher (1 GB or higher VRAM and OpenCL capable are recommended).

Memory

512 MB required.

3 GB DDR2 or above recommended for 32 bit OS.

6 GB DDR2 or above recommended for 64 bit OS.

Hard Disk Space

10 GB (20 GB recommended) for DVD production.

60 GB (100 GB recommended) for Blu-ray Disc/AVCHD production*.

marbelan

Nationalsolo wrote:

This last sequence, sequence 4, is the result of merging the other 3. Which is one answer to your question. .."How do you merge sequences into a single movie file?

It really is. I made a final third sequence by adding first and second. Then I made some changes in sequence 2 and surprisingly the changes also showed in sequence 3 ! Finally, having last sequence active I exported it to a movie file and the result was exactly as I wanted.

So, it seems that VP works that way: clips make sequence, sequences make final sequence, final sequence makes movie. A bit weird but works.

Thank you Nationalsolo.

Regards,

Marbelan

SpaceMonkeyIVXX

Nationalsolo wrote:

THANK YOU MAAAN ! THANK YOU,thank you thank youuu x))))

Hi Marbelan

Although I don't use sequences much I believe it works like this...

You add your clips/images to the media list first and decide to work a few at a time (i.e you decide to create sequences)

Add the required clips to the main video track (the sequence line) and edit as required. Once you are satisfied with this first part of your film you click the + character to the right of the "Sequence 1" tab and VP will collect and save your work as Sequence 1. and clear the sequence line. Your created sequence will now appear in the media list under the sequence tab as though it was a clip in its own right.

If you now go back to your media list (clips or images) you can load a second selection of clips to the sequence line. Edit these as required and once again click the + character to extend the number of sequences made. You will now have "Sequence 2 saved to the media list %etc and the promt line above the main sequence track will reflect this.

Carry on in this way to create your sequences.

After clicking the + on completing your last set of clips the sequence line will be empty.

Now if you open the media list under the "Sequence" tab you will find all of your sequences listed and the main sequence tracks will have reverted to their original appearance and be empty.

You can now add your sequences to the main video track exactly as if they were single clips. I am not making any comment as to how long it might take to assemble your sequence line.... but when finished it should save to your PC/DVD etc in the same way as any project using the Export Video tab............

HOWEVER,,,,,I have noticed when trying out this procedure using images instead of film clips that after adding them to the sequence track the second sequence created previews OK in the LH pane but did NOT thumbnail or play on the sequence line..it just left a chequred frame so this MAY stop your recording after the first sequence as you seem to have noticed . The third sequence did load and play and so did a 4th sequence.

So this may be a bug.

Even after dragging and dropping the second sequence to an empty video track failed to make it play . So I am not sure what is happening here. There may be something wrong when sequence 2 is created.

Nat

[deleted]

Hi Space Monkey IVXX

This relates a REALY OLD POST.......but I am glad you found it useful. :-) VP has changed a LOT since the original post (2013) and most relevant bugs (if they existed) have been ironed out. Also some points from so long ago may not now be relevant. In this case it was a question on how to do something so it probably hasn't changed.

Nat