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Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Thu Jun 06, 2013 2:03 pm
by florian
This is something I have wished for for years, but I guess I've just gotten so used to programming around it that it hasn't occurred to me to ask for it.

It would be great if locked to time media didn't automatically loop.

Thanks

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Fri Jun 07, 2013 4:05 pm
by Dennis Kuypers
Hi Florian,

nobody forces you to make the container longer than the actual media is...so what do you expect to happen after the media duration is hit? Should it just go to black? You can use [Adopt Media Duration] to apply the actual media length to the container.

Best regards
Dennis

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Fri Jun 07, 2013 4:25 pm
by florian
Dear Dennis,

Thank you for the condescending reply.

I do realize that I am not FORCED to make the container longer than the clip, and I know how to use the adopt media duration container menu. What perhaps you don't realize is that occasionally, you may want to hold on the last frame of a video roll that is locked to time. What I would like is for the media to hold on the last frame, so that I could for example, take a later cue to fade it out.

Parking the play-head on the first frame of a container is a programmer trick that ensures that video plays smoothly when you press play. If you do this with video you need to freeze at the end, you have to turn off lock to time, which means you have to put a STOP key on the first frame, and then a PLAY on the second frame, and then, depending on programming structure, build a container with a maxed out in-point value for the same piece of media to fade it or just have it hold.

Thanks.

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Fri Jun 07, 2013 4:51 pm
by Dennis Kuypers
Hey Florian,

I apologize for my response although no offense was intended. I probably used the wrong words since it is not my native language.
The questions asked were actually not rethoric, I did not think about holding the last frame being an answer.

Regarding to your issue, I understand the problem now. The players I worked with also needed to perform the last frame hold + fade out, but it was obvious to me to move the still image to a graphics layer to free the (limited) video layers. In other situations however, it might be easier to stay on the same layer. Let me add that to the wishlist.

Best regards
Dennis

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Sat Jun 08, 2013 1:35 am
by malkuth23
Don't have a PB computer in front of me, but I thought that if you stored the Play Mode to Play (without Loop) that it would freeze at the end.

Maybe that is only if the value is active and not if it is simply unlocked from time...

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Sat Jun 08, 2013 1:55 am
by florian
Hi Matt and Dennis,

It does work that way, but it means that in order to do something that should be fairly straight forward (be able to land my playhead on the first frame of a container while waiting for my next cue) I have to do the following steps:

1) Create Container
2) Adjust length of container
3) Change Container Mode to Freerun
4) Update default playmode on first frame of container to Stop. Store active
5) Store a "Play Once" Keyframe to the second frame of the container

This gets old pretty quickly. I've had to solve this problem this way for years, and every time I do I think to myself that there should just be a container option to solve this.

Dennis: As far as using a GFX layer instead of a Video layer goes, I pretty much only use Pro Servers on the shows I do, so I guess I've gotten frivolous with my Layer usage (since there are unlimited video layers on these systems). Regardless, you still have to move a fader and store, and burn extra texture memory for a second copy of the clip.

I know that there are workarounds, but in principle, workarounds are things you should only have to do until a cleaner solution presents itself. I'm kind of surprised that no one else cares about this. It would have saved me a lot of programming time on the show I just finished.

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Wed Jun 26, 2013 2:02 pm
by merCUrium
+1 on this!

Think it would be a nice container option with a Checkbox right beneath the free run option with default as "hold last frame" because, thats the more natural behavior i expect from an item "locked to time", while looping more or less is a jumping in time.
And most of the times when loops are used it is necessary to be able to exit the loop at any given time so they have to be unlocked anyways.

In addition a "soft snap on" to the clip-end-markers inside a container would be nice to easily align keyframes to it the quick way.

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Wed Mar 26, 2014 6:21 pm
by florian
(BUMP)

"Looping" is something that I should be able to turn off.

A useful thing about a timeline is being able scrub through your clips. If I have to choose between scrubbing and looping, then a timeline is suddenly a lot less fun.

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Fri Oct 03, 2014 2:44 am
by florian
(BUMP)

Please do this.

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Fri Oct 03, 2014 5:54 am
by malkuth23
After the last few shows I did, I have to say I have moved to Florian's side on this one.

It is a common thing that directors seem to ask for and it is a pain to create the workaround Florian described.

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Fri Oct 03, 2014 1:34 pm
by JustynR
It has been the same way for me.
All of the sudden I need to do this every show as well.


(another bump)

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Mon Oct 06, 2014 8:09 pm
by cyeary
Not a complete solution but what I do is have a global preset that has stop on frame one and play on frame 2 that is not locked to time. I have one for loop and one for play once. This allows this same method in a way. What it does not solve is the scrub or the sync.
Florians method would fix both of these.

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Wed Oct 29, 2014 6:03 pm
by erica frost
I too have had showcallers and directors asking me during rehearsals "can you just hold on the last frame until..." causing an internal sigh as I think back to this thread...

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Wed Oct 29, 2014 7:37 pm
by florian
totally. blocking through a show and being asked by the SM to hold that last look until a fade out gets called happens all the time. at this point i just bump this thread everytime i have to work around this.

Re: Lock to time without Loop

PostPosted: Wed Feb 18, 2015 11:47 pm
by florian
*bump*