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View Full Version : A really useful technique of scenarist, undocumented (?)


matzed
25th January 2004, 19:21
Hi all,

I found a VERY useful feature in Scenarist, that is not really documented, and a very useful way of using it : the copy/paste function.

In any part of Scenarist (Data, Track editor or Scenario editor) you can select any object and copy/paste it or cut/paste it (Edit menu). You just have to select the same parent as the cutted/copied object before selecting paste command (CTRL+V), i.e. copy a PGC from a Title is to be pasted on another Title. Even the same parent is ok : Scenarist will increment the name of the objects copied so there are no conflicts.

This is useful. But the following is very cool. If you export a project to a script, you'll have something that can be understood and modified before reimporting it into scenarist. And if you copy (or cut) an object, and paste it into the notepad (or any text editor), you'll have the part of the script of this object :D !

You can then edit it, copy the modified text and paste that into scenarist !

Examples :

- You have 30 chapters to add in a track. You have the info in the chapter file generated by DoItF4U. Take the track. Add one scene. Cut the track. Paste it into notepad. Search the string "Scenes=List", look for the Scene you created. Copy from "Item=Scene" line to the last "}" before the next section (another Item=Scene or Recording Information(RECI)=Recording Information section etc.). Paste it 30 times before the next section (in fact before the last "}" of the "Scenes=List" section). Modify the "Name=" and the "Scene Time=" info accordingly to each scene. Copy the whole text. In scenarist select the "tracks" folder and paste ! See the result

- On Title_1, you have a PGC with 20 cells and you want to change the cell command of them. Cut the PGC, copy into notepad. Modify the script using the search/replace command of notepad ;) (ok, you'll have to know and understand how the scenarist scripts are working, but it's not to complicated), copy the modified text, select Title_1 icon in Scenarist, and paste !

This function is great too to learn how scripts are working. You want to know how a track is "scripted". Screate a track, copy it and paste into notepad : study the result. Make a small change in scenarist, copy it into notepad : see the changes.

Of course, make a backup of your "scn" file before thoses operations !

Maybe it's a known function, and if it is, i'm sorry !

Matz

(excuse my bad english, i hope i can be understood...)


PS : to convert from the chapter list of DoItFast4U, where the unit is frames and not time like 01:21:45;23, to scenarist ones, i use an Excel sheet that i can attach here or send by email if it can be useful to anyone.

adam
26th January 2004, 06:56
For chapters I think it is much easier to just use Scenchap. It takes like 2 secs.

matzed
26th January 2004, 12:26
Of course, scenchap is better for that. This trick is more for advanced technique or when you have a big authoring project and you want to create a lot of objects from one "template". It is also useful for learning purpose.

Well, i found it useful ;)

Matz

Eyes`Only
29th January 2004, 19:25
I believe Scenarist 3.0 actually has the ability to copy/cut/paste within the Scenario Editor. Has anyone verified this?

RB
29th January 2004, 19:53
Well, it work in v2.7 already. I can basically cut/copy/paste anywhere in the program.

Eyes`Only
29th January 2004, 19:57
Commands too? That was something Sonic said was added to 3.0.

RB
30th January 2004, 08:19
Haven't tried commands yet. At least titles/PGCs/programs etc. can be copied/pasted in Scenario editor.

RB
30th January 2004, 15:24
OK, copying commands doesn't work in 2.7.

Eyes`Only
30th January 2004, 19:51
Well, I guess the ability to copy/paste cells is still pretty good though :D

pankid
31st January 2004, 08:38
It's no problem about pre,post command copy and paste
but buttom command can't do it

DnGermany
31st January 2004, 13:20
In version 3.0 you can also do button cmds.

matzed
2nd February 2004, 08:02
Originally posted by RB
Haven't tried commands yet. At least titles/PGCs/programs etc. can be copied/pasted in Scenario editor.

Yes, and the fact that you can paste into notepad, edit som options, and re-paste into scenrist is useful in bi projects : i had a project with 48 MPEG2 streams to add, each with the same commands etc... and i've done that with a copy/paste through notepad. I could export to a script, edit it, and reimport, but when you have a lot of subtitles,
it's tooooo long and doing that with notepad is really quick.

Matz

PhillipWyllie
25th June 2007, 00:39
Very interesting, thanks for sharing. You can copy pre, post, cell and button commands in 3.1 by right-clicking. You can even strip the text down, delete white space, and even add comments. Here's an example:

Object=Video Track
{
Name= #name of the asset in the data editor with "-t" appended
Display Mode= #either from: "Both Panscan and Letterbox", "Only Panscan", "Only Letterboxed", "Not Specified"
Scenes=List
{
Item=Scene
{
Name= #usually the name of the video track with "-scn" appended
Scene Time=00:00:00;00 #the first scene, and there must be one, must be 00:00:00:00
}
Item=Scene
{
Name= #name it what you like
Scene Time= #in hh:mm:ss:frame format, remember if the scene time doesn't match with an I-frame you'll get problems
}
#put other scene times here in the format:
#Item=Scene
#{
#Name=
#Scene Time=
#}
}
Video Stream=Main Video Stream
{
Item=Main Video Play
{
Data=Video
{
Name= #name of the asset in the data editor
Resolution= #either from "PAL" or "NTSC"
Drop Type= #either from "Non-drop frame", "Drop frame"
Data Start Time= #usually 00:00:00;00
Data End Time= #usually the duration in the hh:mm:ss:frame format
File= #where the video files is located on your HDD
Width= #either "720, "704", "352"
Height= #either "576", "480", "288"
Is Encoded= #usually "Yes"
Encode Type= #usually "MPEG 2"
Size= #Width from above, x, height from above, example:720 x 576(note the spaces)
Aspect Ratio= #either "16 : 9", "4 : 3", "4 : 3 (Pan-scan)"
Picture Structure= #either "Frame Structure", "Field Structure"
GOP Size= #the GOP size, example: "15 frames"
GOP Structure= #usually "N/A"
Bit rate= #the maximum bitrate in the MPEG-2 header
}
Start Time To Video= #same as before
Resolution= #same as before
Drop Type= #same as before
Start Time= #same as before
Duration= #same as before
}
}
}

dgoodbourn
29th June 2007, 13:08
This is how a lot of complex and interactive DVDs are made. If your naming convention is good, you can write applications to batch perform multiple tasks. If you have an interactive quiz for example will 1000 questions, author the disc with just one question, then import it into notepad or whatever, and batch the authoring to include the other 999 questions! If your file system is setup well it can even import the assets for you. Just import the script and you're away!!!!

D.