Video Editing 3D transitions made with blender

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1

hi, my name is Marcos Caballero, a Animator/Editor.
I have been using blender for a while, and i ´m surprissed about how behind the editing systems in linux are.
I recentrly knew a young project, wich promesses a lot, calle pen Movie Editor, and seems to be more USER friendly than cinelerra.

recently i suggested to try to work as Adobe Production Studio or FinalCut Studio, integrating aplications, so I suggested NOT TO DO A TITLER, just OPEN INKSCAPE, and you will get a GREAT titler, want to make advanced audio editing? open from the timeline AUDACITY, so you will be working like Premiere-audacity or finalcut-soundtrack. the póst:
http://openmovieeditor.sourceforge.net/board/viewtopic.php?id=136

the most promising stuff are the 3D transitions, i mean it´s actually simulate a Hollywood FX or a borisFX or even a canops soft explode, wich installs a Transition, in the NLE, and when applied, opens a window showing many 3D transitions to apply, and I suggested to make thos transitions in blender, so you write the feature once, and users will make templates, just like happends in pinnacle or canopus systems. and many linux video editing tools could use this TRANSITION PACKAGE.

Unfortunately, I´m no coder so ´m very limited, and I don´t want to deliver to the OpenM.E. developer 50 transitions or 60, automated in a blend file, selectable as SCENES, and rendereable EXTERNALLY to BLENDER. I know this is not a CLEAN solution to the transitions, but me as an user, would love to help grow this little app.

this is my post:
http://openmovieeditor.sourceforge.net/board/viewtopic.php?id=400

http://www.freewebs.com/anubis4d/imagenes/3d.JPG
3d.JPG878×667

http://www.freewebs.com/anubis4d/imagenes/blender.transition.jpg

the thing i want to do is, make a script /temp/render.PY, wich someday could be created for the NLE software, and run:

blender -p render -b transitions.blend

once the render is over, te video app, changer INTERNALLY that part of the clip for the render.

what I need to do is:
-indicate the render OUTPUT, Pal/720x576/inout/shadows/etc.
-change from the.py file the texture map for CLIP A and clip B, wich are videos, so blender must ask from that file in/out frame number to render ONLY that part.

the blender user could open this blendfile and add more scenes, that means more transitions.

can anyone help me on this? I don´t know nothing of python or programming.

Marquitux
anubis4d@hotmail.com

2

Did you know that you can render with Blender by using the terminal? Use “blender -h” to see the parameters. It is possible to execute programs using Python. Perhaps this gets you started.

3

thanks! the idea is to make everything user-transparent, I mean, if I can get this, perhaps a NLE could call this transition and make a HIDDEN RENDER, the user don´t have to know , just select a custom animated icon, and the NLE tell blender to render it just showing a “BLENDER-RENDERING” in the preview, while it is being made. those who like to GO FURTHER, open blender, add a new SCENE, and create more transitions, so the library could grow exponentially, independently from the application developer (in this case, it is just one, so I don´t want to overwhelm him, just suggest EASY and FAST TO IMPLEMENT STUFF, YET POWERFULL STUFF). I think the blender animators (like myself) can help here. I WANT TO MAKE TRANSITIONS, asn share them.If not, what are we waiting? JASHAKA to achieve something like this?
actually JASHAKA uses .3DS files, not blenderfiles, so are they ignoring the opensource world on purpose or what?

I know that I can get some python script running, but I don´t know anything about it, but perhaps you can help me here, so if there is a way to do it relatively simple, I could do 20 or 30 transitions, and ASK HIM (to the Open Movie Editor developer), to implement this, and i can take care of that artwork. Many fiends want to help me here, all blender users, and some of them Professional Editors.

Me as user, want to help to give something back, but I just can do artwork,animations, etc, not code :frowning: but that´s not reason for not helping, especially with some TINY soft like OpenME, but powerfull, there is much of blender way of thinking there.

Can anyone write or help me to write a MINI SCRIPT, to specify EXTERNALLY those parameters? RENDER-FORMATS-SIZE, and maybe 2 video texturemaps with IN and OUT frames.

Marquitux

4

I just found out (should have read blender -h more carefully) that you can make Blender to run a Python script on execute by using “blender -P script.py” command switch. Your project should be possible by using this feature.

<edit>You can find an example of how to set the render size at http://video.blendertestbuilds.de/download.blender.org/ED/DVD1/production/lib/scripts/dr_seed.py .</edit>

5

thank you bebraw! I will be asking you more about this of course, but this is a GREAT starting point.

6

here is a sample transition (WIP), just likle the hollywood Fx package.

a fiend Alex, is taking care fo the script, i think that blender could easilly use those transitions in SEQUENCER, I mean, blender can load the external file´s scenes to play with clips don´t you think?
the idea is that users (like myself) have te creative control in the editing, so making a blendfile to work as a transition´s template (which i will start to create), could help to ease editor´s life.

marquitux

7

here are some sample transitions:
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=7193DA3C5782F4D1

marquitux

8

Nice work. That’s looking cool. :slight_smile:

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thanks bebraw, would someone like to do some transitions?
this stuff could easily be adapted to work with sequencer

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you can see the whole idea explained here:
http://www.openmovieeditor.org/board/viewtopic.php?id=400

http://www.freewebs.com/anubis4d/ome/alex.script.jpg
alex.script.jpg653×846

Marquitux
video-mardelplata.blogspot.com

11

cool stuff !
they should make blender part of their project instead of calling it externally each time… right ?

I hope they’ll be able to implement your stuff, great work ! :smiley:

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I think that this feature (if someone could work it out), would become blender into a great editing tool, YES could be implemented INSIDE blender, would be GREAT, if some coder read this, feel free to find a way to do it.

At the same time, WE, the USERS should have some TRANSITION BANK, organized where everyone can contribute. I will make a blog or something so you can download this blendfile, with some instructions about the “scene names”, so blender or any other external app can browse it numerically.

Who would like to do transitions? I will make more.
sign up please :slight_smile: qe can make a lot in a short time.

Marquitux
PD: an editor/friend told me: you can´t convince me to edit in linux, but if i can do the same in linux FASTER, I will jump into linux in a second.
The 3D transition is a MUST in the linux NLEs, the editor wants PRESETED options.

13

WO FANTASTIC!

I often use the blender nodes for filtering video - would that be possible with this system? I mean often I don’t even use the 3D function, working entirely with images created in other programs…

14

actually in video editing apps, you have 2 kind of Fx, the filters (effects wich applies all along the clip), and the transitions, wich only goes at the beggining an at the end, just a couple of seconds, so a cool 3D transition in the rigth moment, would be GREAT, I know many editors which has old editing computers (win98), and maybe this could bring some life to those machines (no think about the renderfarmig options, this feature could be fast also).

I contacted ALEX (the guy who did the script), and we will manage to create a blog together so you can send your transitions and download the blendfile to play.

Marquitux
anubis4d@gmail.com

15

the project GVFX is oficially started

16

hi people, a little explanation about the project:

or just go to:


and donwload the last blendfile.

thanks
marquitux

17

I’m still not sure how this is useful?

Canned effects?

All I saw when I downloaded the blend file was a couple of TV sets.

As a video editor, I rarely use built in transitions, they add an “amature” look to you work. There are, of course, times when you want that look. Like for selling cars or furniture blowouts. Even the most expensive packages like Borris FX still are just a hundred ways to say I’m cheezy.

18

Also being a video editor, I must agree with Atom.
I never use the built in transitions except the three standard ones (Cross Dissolve, Dip to Colour and sometimes Push Slide), because it just does not look professional (and I guess I never edited furniture blowout ads :wink: ).

At least I think it should not be inside Blender, which would just make the code bigger. To have it as a plugin should be sufficient, I think. Then just the people who want to use it can do so.

MD

19

I agree that many editors won´t use it ALL THE TIME, but I think is great to have it anyway, because you can CHANGE everything there (If boris FX, Softxplode, and hollywood FX exists is because many people use it).
I agree with you, this should be a plugin, for the sequencer I mean.
But unfortunately i am not a coder :frowning: I just can animate and have crazy ideas.

thanks.
Marquitux

20

http://gvfx.blogspot.com

Alex has released the first version of the script, soon the video editing apps will be able to include as an transition/FX package

marquitux