Simply Automate Common Video Processes

As a long-time user of Sony Vegas Pro editing software I’ve enjoyed the progress I’ve seen in this editing platform since version 3. Sony has done a nice job over the years building on and improving the software with each release. The latest version, Sony Vegas Pro 9.0, continues that progress. This isn’t an indepth post about the overall program as I am still playing with this new release. Instead, I wanted to bring to your attention an add-on for Sony Vegas called Production Assistant 1.0.

If you’ve done any post-production work (editing, video encoding, etc) you know how time-consuming some common tasks can be. Production Assistant let’s you automate a lot of processes that might otherwise take you out of your project “flow”, tie up the system or keep you in the editing seat well into the evening.

Production Assistant can be launched from within Sony Vegas or operate as a stand-alone tool and is much more than a batch processing tool. Batch processing, if you’re not familiar, is basically automating repetitive tasks (think resizing a folder of images) by setting up the process once and then clicking “Go”. Production Assistant takes it much further, though. You can add markers or station ID’s to the timeline at set intervals, effect specific clips in the timeline, remove unwanted black space between clips, export specific clips, automate the creation of show opens, create audio “ducks”, add backgrounds behind 4×3 footage in 16×9 programs, create thumnails from video or export image sequences and output multiple file formats, all automatically. The processes are customizable to fit your needs. It’s really a very cool add-on (to an already great piece of software) that could save you a lot of time which you can instead invest in your editorial.

Go to Sony Vegas Production Assistant and click Learn More and see video of it in action. The demos are very good, presented by Douglas Spotted Eagle of VASST software and tutorials, an expert of the Sony Creative Software lineup.