Sony Vegas Timeline-Structure Export & Repair via EDL

Here I look at the advantage/point of Sony Vegas’s options for exporting the project/timeline/sequence structure.

Rebuild Project:

  • Question: Can one export (in some form, possibly partial) a Project (sequence/timeline) from Sony Vegas 10 that can then be imported to other NLEs or versions of Sony Vegas ?
    •  A couple or so years ago (Vegas 9) I determined it was not practical to exchange between Vegas and FCP.  But time has passed, attention has shifted away from FCP to other NLEs (chiefly Adobe Production CS5.5) , and for various reasons, earlier versions of Vegas are more attractive to me than the latest batches.
  • Part-Answer:
    •  Yes for [File > SaveAs > EDL] / [File > Open (Same kind of EDL File) ]
    • Can open even in previous versions of Vegas.
    • But not everything gets reinstated – e.g. Project settings, Text, Pan/Crop.

Repair:

  • Can repair a project by doing this.
    • In my case, a video pan was “snatching”, not smooth.
    • The process of Opening a Vegas-EDL [.txt] re-created “peaks” sidecar files [.sfk] for each media file.
    • Somehow, the pan played more smoothly after this (possibly due to this or some other effect of the “new project”

Sony Vegas Timeline-Structure Export Options:

  • EDL
    • Vegas-EDL: [File > Export]
      • Generates a [.txt] file.
      • Goes beyond anything standard, contains Vegas-specific info, like a flattened combination of the data in [View > Edit Details], [View > Project Media] and more.
        • Being Vegas-specific, I guess it’s primarily intended for reading-back into other instances and possibly versions of Vegas than that it was exported from.
      • Experiments:
        •  Export from Vegas 10e.
          • Open in same version (10e) of Vegas:
            • How: [File > Open]
            • Did:
              • Create the same timeline, multiple tracks.
              • Rebuild the waveform/peaks files etc
            • Did not:
              • Set the project properties – those remained at their defaults.
              • Define the text-generating events – just left placeholder “Media Offline” events.
                • Vegas 10 intermittent stability issue:
                  • I clicked on one and Vegas 10e crashed (due to either it or my system?)
                  • Re-opened Vegas 10e, tried again and it did not crash.
              • Pan/Crop within a static image (photo)
          • Open in earlier versions of Vegas:
            • Yes, with same result as above.
    • There is also a supplied script for exporting to EDL, but whenever I run it, it says “Error, object required”
  • XML
    • I cannot find any way to export XML (SonyVegas-XML, that would presumably be, even in principle).
    • Seems that others can’t either:
      • http://forums.creativecow.net/thread/24/910957
        • Q: Can i import/export an XML file to/from Sony Vegas?. Is there anyway to convert an After Effects project to Vegas?.
        • A: Other than rendering it out and importing it into Vegas as a single file… No. There is no way.
      • http://forums.creativecow.net/thread/24/865887
        • Q: I have a project that is a Final Cut Pro project that I want to transfer to my home system. Does vegas have XML support? I would like to take my captured footage (on a firewire drive currently) and create a vegas timeline.
        • A: Won’t guarantee how well it will work but you could try Tools – Scripting – Import XML.  Your better bet would be to use AAF.

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 15th, 2012 at 14:52 and is filed under EDL, Sony Vegas. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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