[done] Trim Camera (was: Crop Camera/Player)

[Sinc747]

Mike,

You mentioned in another thread that it might make more sense to crop the camera rather than crop the PiP. If you can do that, can you also crop the player?

By cropping the player, a user could run tiny-weeny videos as a PiP or as a short/wide PiP across the bottom of the screen. In broadcasting sports, this would allow for custom commercials to be broadcast even during the course of a soccer match ala Fox Soccer Channel.

BTW, the overlay feature works very well as a score bug. I simply made a series of PNG files with various score combinations in a light color set in a darker background. Much better than using the "text" feature in Ustream since the overlay becomes part of the stream and is saved in Ustream. The Ustream "text" is not saved with the video on Ustream.

Keep up the great work!

Tom
PirateSoccer.tv

[josiahbryan]

I agree, It would be nice to crop both camera and player in different situations! I'd like to cast my vote for this as well. Thanks!

[oldfran24]

Hi Mike,

I hope the crop features of Camera/Player in PIP can be added in Vidblaster. As there is need to present the Anchor shot(camera) and data(Player) in the same framing. Cropping can help to reduce to size of Anchor shot and produce better framing. And if Border can be added for the cropped camera/player, that would be great!

Thanks a lot!

Francis

[Mike]

How and where is cropping done in tv studios?

[Sinc747]

TV has the ability to do a video overlay. Having a cam or player that could be cropped and used as an effect could have a similar appearance.

There are no time outs in soccer so to be able to run a video in the bottom third would be huge!

Tom

[Mike]

But my question is, if I step into a tv control room, how would I crop an image. Would I do it at the source, would I use some effects generator, or what? Surely a pro on this forum can walk me through it?

[oldfran24]

Hi Mike,

In TV Studio, there is a DVE effect to resize the source and cropping the height and width of the source. If there is an alpha channel of the source, and the cropping done in the alpha channel. It seems the to work to crop camera/player.

Francis

[Spino]

I think that it would be a good feature the crop of the camera player. I connected the output of a Pc to vidblaster (through a capture card 720x576 PAL) and I have a black frame around the video so if I could crop it I'd have the video at full screen.

[blockjocks]

Mike,

It would be fantastic to be able to crop video inputs using Vidblaster. This would allow me to broadcast ultrasound procedures and crop out the edges of the ultrasound screen image that I do not need to stream. Like many others, my search for ideal live streaming software resulted in two finalists: Vidblaster and Wirecast. And although Vidblaster seems to be more stable with a more "works out of the box" feel, there are four features of Wirecast that have kept me using it over Vidblaster. (1) ability to crop video inputs; (2) ability to chroma-key; (3) support for alpha channels which allows animated PNG graphics to be overlayed rather than just still PNG's; (4) ability to animate during transitions, i.e. if input "A" and input "B" are in one shot, and I transition to input "B" full screen, input B enlarges in real time to fill the screen. This feature is much like HLN's programmming, and is a very cool feature.

I know chroma-key and alpha channels have already been requested features. More specific to this forum topic though, please see my Youtube link demonstrating how cropping of video inputs works with Wirecast. Hopefully, this will help give you an idea of how to implement this feature into Vidblaster.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwSYpwVFdGI

I have followed your forum with interest for months, and I am very impressed with your software. I look forward to future developments. If the above four features were made available, there would be nothing stopping me from converting from Wirecast.

Thanks,

Brandon Winchester, MD
Assistant Professor of Anesthesiology
Duke University School of Medicine

[Spino]

Mike,

It would be fantastic to be able to crop video inputs using Vidblaster. This would allow me to broadcast ultrasound procedures and crop out the edges of the ultrasound screen image that I do not need to stream. Like many others, my search for ideal live streaming software resulted in two finalists: Vidblaster and Wirecast. And although Vidblaster seems to be more stable with a more "works out of the box" feel, there are four features of Wirecast that have kept me using it over Vidblaster. (1) ability to crop video inputs; (2) ability to chroma-key; (3) support for alpha channels which allows animated PNG graphics to be overlayed rather than just still PNG's; (4) ability to animate during transitions, i.e. if input "A" and input "B" are in one shot, and I transition to input "B" full screen, input B enlarges in real time to fill the screen. This feature is much like HLN's programmming, and is a very cool feature.

I know chroma-key and alpha channels have already been requested features. More specific to this forum topic though, please see my Youtube link demonstrating how cropping of video inputs works with Wirecast. Hopefully, this will help give you an idea of how to implement this feature into Vidblaster.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwSYpwVFdGI

I have followed your forum with interest for months, and I am very impressed with your software. I look forward to future developments. If the above four features were made available, there would be nothing stopping me from converting from Wirecast.

Thanks,

Brandon Winchester, MD
Assistant Professor of Anesthesiology
Duke University School of Medicine


I think that vidblaster is more close to a "real" video control room than wirecast and it can broadcast directly to ustream (wirecast has this feature but it doesn't work at the moment). Anyway I'd appreciate those features you explained.

[Sinc747]

Still think this is a good idea!

[agilpwc]

I also would still really like to see this implemented. Make a feature of the studio version to make it worth your time to implement.

[Mike]

Thanks Eric, good idea.

Question: in a real tv control room if you crop a camera image so that its aspect ratio is no longer what I should be, how is this video signal then treated further down the chain? Or would this not be possible?

I have been thinking about this feature several times, but the moment cropping can cause cahnges in the aspect ratio, I do not know how to handle these frames anymore. I may have to only allow cropping without changing the aspect ratio, which means I may have to add it to the video effect module too.

[Mike]

I may be going off topic here, but I think what Tom's asking should go to VE after all as I realize I do not want to change the aspect ratio of source.

That said, I need to remove some black borders around a video signal, the "overscan". Someone looking for this will find this thread, so I'm putting this here. What would be the correct naming for a feature that removes this overscan:

1. Remove Overscan (would use the standard percentages and work automatically)

2. Crop (most likely with a horizontal and vertical pixel size, or would percentage be more common?)

3. Trim (same)?

[weconverse]

Being an amateur I can't say what the professional lingo would suggest. Given that, I think "crop" should be referred to what one can do in the VE module. Remove overscan, the way you suggest, sounds right.

[Mike]

I've googled a bit and could not find the answer, but I think cropping is used when the aspect ratio changes (i.e. you take a random piece out of an image). So that would leave either trimming or removing.

[Nailhead]

Field monitors have an overscan/underscan feature. By turning on underscan, you've trimmed the borders down, thereby removing the overscan. However, I've seen this feature worded different ways.

It could be an Overscan on/off switch, or an Underscan on/off switch.

You see there are two modes. Either you are in Overscan mode, or Underscan mode.

Cropping would imply that the aspect ratio will change, so I think that would not properly explain the feature. I think trimming would imply shrinking the viewable area beyond the overscan area.

That's my 2 cents.

[Mike]

Thanks Eric, and welcome to the licensed club :) I know these words are used for monitors, but I am not sure if it would be applicable to a camera input? I would have to enable overscanning to get rid of the underscan from the camera (or the videograbber in this case). Sounds confusing.

Curious.. Has anyone ever had the need to trim the video signal for other than overscan reasons? And if so, did you need full control of all sides, or just a horizontal and/or vertical trim?

[weconverse]

Some of the cheap shit I'm using, for example one of the VGA-video converters. introduce one or two lines of junk on top of the image. Not sure of that would be called overscan.

Anyway, I think an alternative to cropping would be to replace the lines (perphaps specified in terms of pixels) that are "overscanned" with black, instead of cropping. That would make it possible to keep the aspect ratio, although it might lock ugly if the camera is used in a VE module.

[Echo7]

By putting the "cropping" in the VE module..would give control to all cameras as well as integrate the other effects. This would. since Broadcast Video uses mechanical means, give we Computer VB Broadcasters the same cropping effect via programming production. Mike has been absolutely marvelous in putting to computer language, the mechanics of high end, expensive studios. This is "streaming" internet video, not broadcast video.
The video you see on MSN, FoxNews, and network websites is digitally run through a Linux system located here in Kalispell, Montana, it is for the most part pre-recorded, processed and re-broadcast as broadcast quality.
VidBlaster when coupled with "good" and sometimes expensive equipment, and using DVD quality .AVI can be very good quality. I am currently in the process of doing a :20 minute, AVI pre-recorded piece to put on my website to show the quality that can be produced with VB. As Mike works with his programming VB will become
more HD compatable, free servers are still lax in providing the HD outlet.

[andranic]

I would love to see the camera cropping. For me sometimes im capturing video and the top and bottom need to be cropped .

[JakobR]

This could be done in the Effect module if we get aPnP cropped.

See this Topic:

http://vidblaster.com/forum/index.php?topic=804.0

JAKOB

[Mike]

To avoid confusion, and as we are now quite sure what is discussed here is not cropping, I update the title of this topic.

[JakobR]

Sorry if I confuse this but one way would actually be to crop in the Effect Module (with a new PnP effect).

1. We use a black background.

2. We add the Camera in the PnP and crop a littlefrom the botton and top (for example).

Thebackground will fill up and down to the border and be of the right aspect ratio.

JAKOB

[Mike]

No, you cannot remove underscan like this as you would only be replacing black lines with more black lines. The lines need to be removed and the image resized. That's either a trim or overscan, still waiting for the pros to comment.

[Johan Lundberg]

In TV-production,
Changing a cameras size in any way (cropping, resizing, changing aspect ratio etc) would normally be done in a DVE (Digital Video Effect). The DVE effect could be created either on an external DVE-machine or (if available) directly internally in the mixer. The DVE often works with more than one input channel which also allows you to do PiP and similar effects. Once cropped you can change the aspect of a source and have it stretched to fill the entire screen or keep the aspect and let the parts you cropped away be filled with something else or transparent, since the DVE outputs both a key and fill signal (key is equal to alpha channel). It's common to use the both these signals which then are keyed on another source in the mixer. This keying is most likely done on a mixer effect bus (ME). A ME is basically another row of PGM/PVW which is controlled separately and which output can be used separately or cut as a source on the regular PGM/PVW bus. The MEs are mostly used for setting up complete effect layers that will later be cut on the PGM/PVW bus but can also be used for cutting sub-productions and similar. In Vidblaster the DVE would be the "Video Effect".

The correct "TV-name" for affecting the size of a source would be crop/resize, but I understand that's not what you are looking for here.
Underscan/Overscan is more associated with displays and might be confusing. Maybe you could just call it "Input cropping" on/off and then force it to keep aspect ratio?

[Mike]

Thanks Johan. So you know no word for cropping while maitaining AR, trimming is not a word that you would use for this? I realize we're all struggling with English here as well :)

[Johan Lundberg]

Although not perfect, I think trim could work. I still think it's important to force it to keep aspect ratio though.
If you want to stretch a source it should be done in a VE and not at the source.

[Mike]

This option would not change the video resolution, it would simply remove parts and resize to fit.

[Johan Lundberg]

Good, then it should work well to put it at the source. I'm still thinking about the naming though, trimming for me is more associated with trimming a video clip (changing in/out in a player).

Tricky one...

[Mike]

I see. Well, I could call it crop and document that it won't change aspect ratio (and use VE for that).

Any native English pros who can help us out?

[Johan Lundberg]

Maybe "Input cropping" could work. Then as you said, document this function and explain when to use VE instead.

/Johan

[andranic]

Hi Mike ,

Any update on being able to crop the video ? Currently I am taking the video from another feed and sending it to FME cropping it to 640x360 and sending it out. I would like to do the same with Vidblaster but the video size is coming in at 720x486 and there are black bars on the top and side. I would love to be able to crop the video to the right size and send that out


Any news on this ?

[Mike]

See my last post, still waiting for that feedback.

[andranic]

Sorry But im not a pro when it comes to this stuff. Would this " Crop" feature not change the aspect ratio of the video ? . Meaning if I have a video coming in at 720x486 and the actually image or video playing is 640x360 can I " Crop" the video where only the video would show in the stream and not the black bars on the top or side .. Much like how FME does it ?

[Mike]

@Dan: Did you read the previous posts? AFAIK you are a native English speaker, and you have knowledge of video..

[weconverse]

I think it neither helps being a native English speaker, nor if one has video knowledge ;) This, and related threads, have grown into confusion. But, what do I know being a Swede, having a Polish father, and not understanding the meaning with color bars.

Seriously, perhaps we should start two new threads:

Camera module and image adjustments
Effect module and adjusting the source image(s)

[Mike]

It's very simple, this thread is about removing junk from the borders of a camera video stream. As this is a source module, the aspect ratio needs to remain the same so after removal the image will be stretched to fit. Hence this is for removal of only a few rows or columns of pixels (or in video terms, removal of a few lines at the top and bottom of the frame, and removal of a part of the beginning end ending of each line). The question is, is this called cropping, trimming or something else?

[weconverse]

If I start from the needs as I see, and I believe a few others too, there is actually another related issue. True, an option to crop/trim the sides of a camera source and let the remaining image stretch to fit the frame would be a really useful feature. In addition it would be nice to instead of stretch to fit, replace the unwanted parts of the side(s) with a color. Either black, or a color picked from a part/area of the image. The latter would be very useful for chroma key use down the chain. Even though Vidblaster really manages "auto key" well, it is difficult in some situations to balance the size/zoom of the motif (e.g. talking head) against a green background of limited size (or whatever colorone uses). Of course this could be done by masking with a jpg overlay, or by the implementation of a cropping feature in an effect module. On the other hand, one might not need that effect module if this could be obtained in the source module. Thus potentially saving PC power.

In any case, judging from the discussion so far, there seems to be no clear "right" term (crop or trim). If you think the issue I added is less important or impossible to implement, then I suggest that an alternative term would be "Stretch Camera", and the options would be Up/Down/Left/Right pixels. But I would also like to see the other feature "Mask Camera", and the options Color=xxxxx and Up/Down/Left/Right pixels, implemented.

[pashcre]

As I see it, "crop" would clear everything outside of a selected range, while "trim" would do the same, but stretch the trimmed image to fill the screen. Both of these would be useful to have. Perhaps a trim/crop option capable of both?

[weconverse]

Joseph, in this "simple thread" ;) the thing you call "crop" is not an option, because Mike pointed out earlier that the aspect ratio needs to be the same (meaning that the frame size could be smaller, given the aspect ratio remains the same).

[accu]

Native English speaker but not a video professional, although I do have a degree and about 14 years experience in newspaper photojournalism.
I’ve been scratching my head and can’t come up with anything better than Johan’s term: Crop/resize. To me, “crop” simply means to remove unwanted stuff from one or more sides of an image. Cropping may or may not change what we used to call the proportions (aspect ratio) of the picture. Adding the word “resize” would imply that the remaining area will be blown up to fill the existing frame without changing the proportions of that frame.
I would love to see this feature in the Camera module. With our Osprey 450e capture card I have been able to move a camera’s image left or right to get rid of unwanted black on one side or the other, but still haven’t figured out how to do the same at the top and bottom. For what it’s worth, the Osprey user guide says, “’Cropping’ means removal of unwanted video around the edges of the incoming image.”
Ideally for me, this feature would work the way cropping works in a simple picture editing program like Microsoft Picture Manager, where you can select an aspect ratio, like 4:3, and it gives you a frame of fixed proportions (similar to the way “Select Area 4:3” works when setting the screen capture area in VB) that you can make larger or smaller, or drag up, down, left or right. Of course with a VB camera crop/resize tool you would not have to choose an aspect ratio, since that would be determined by the camera's output.

[Mike]

Thanks all. I googled this some more and agree crop seems to be the best word for this feature, and also understand the confusion as many programs use the words crop and trim interchangeably.

@Roland: I do not think a visual approach will work. This feature is intended to remove the overscan or noise that sometimes is visible, and that's only a few lines. In a reduced size video window changing the setting visually would be too coarse. I think a simple numeric setting will suffice, as you only need to set it once for each camera.

Next question: does the original or the cropped video show in the camera module's video window? I can make cases for both, so interested to hear your reasoning.

[accu]

Of course you’re right, Mike. I hadn’t thought that through. Being able to “sneak up” on the ideal cropping by making small changes to a number would be a much better way to handle this infrequent fine-tuning.
On the question of original vs. cropped image in the Camera module, I had assumed that you would see the cropped version but I’m glad you raised the question. I think now I would vote for uncropped, since that would provide a side-by-side comparison of the cropped (in Program module) and the uncropped. For my application, the cropping would be so slight that at a glance you probably wouldn’t notice any difference.

[Sinc747]

+1 for uncropped camera module, cropped program module

[Echo7]

I agree with Tom's rather simple, but effective method. Hope VB 1.17 gets it?

[icon]

VB 1.17 is now an official release (http://vidblaster.com/forum/index.php?topic=1194.msg7021#msg7021), so I would guess it would more likely end up in 1.18 or higher

[weconverse]

another +1 for uncropped in camera and cropped down the line,(assuming not only program, but other modules (eg effects) will get the cropped (and stretched) result.

[Mike]

This will be available from VidBlaster Pro v1.19 & up.