Saving a project as a video template for working offline

[RJ Johnston]

There is a file command to "Save as Video Template..." listed in Keyboard Customizations that doesn't have a matching menu item in the File menu. I thought I would see what it does. Up to now, I don't know what it is really for, but here is what I have uncovered.

Start a new project and add some stills or video to the media bin. Drag them to the timeline.

In keyboard customization under File is a command named "Save as Video Template...."

Assign a keyboard shortcut to that command, such as ALT-4.

After closing the Keyboard Customization dialog, press ALT-4.

A new dialogbox pops up and asks you for the name of the template. Just accept the default and click OK. When saved, it will have a .vidt file extension. Another file in XML format is also created that contains the names of the media, but I haven't figured out what that is for.

To load the .vipt file into Premiere Elements, you need to go File > Open Project, and then type the name with the .vidt file extension, because there isn't that file type in the dropdown. You can also type *.* and press enter for the filename, and it will then be displayed in the list.

AFter the project is loaded, you will note that all the media will be offline, yet you aren't asked those annoying questions about where the files are located when you open the project.

At this point, I think you should be able to take the .vidt file home and work on it without the actual media.

There isn't a command to load a video template into Premiere Elements, so to turn it back into a normal project file you will have to use Wordpad to make some edits.

For the first edit you need to search for IsProjectVideoTemplate and change the value from true to false. For all the others edits, search for OfflineReason and change the values from 10 to 0. You can change the filename extension from .vidt to .prel, but that doesn't seem to matter.

Now when you open the file, all the media will be online again.

So does anybody know what this is all about? Maybe someone with the Pro version knows.

[Steve Grisetti]

I've often wondered what it was too, Robert. Though I still haven't taken the time to dig deeply into it.

I'm assuming the video templates are similar in form to effects presets, in that you apply them to your movie and they automatically set up opening transitions, titles, maybe music, etc., and then you'd go in and customize them to fit your project. But,even if you create one, I can't find a way to apply it to another project.

And, if you haven't found a way, I KNOW we're in trouble.

Maybe it's a remnant of a feature that was discontinued -- or a feature that wasn't completely implemented in the last version.

[RJ Johnston]

Here we go Steve. You can design videos and slideshows with arbitrary media, and apply transitions and effects to them. Later you can just drag and drop media on the placeholders on the timeline and the effects and transitions persist.

After loading the .vidt project, you can add other online stills and videos to the media bin, then drag each one to a placeholder on the timeline. Any effects and transitions that had been applied to the "placeholders" will persist when you drop online media on them. At first when you drag online media to a placeholder, it looks like the placeholders are going to shift over, like in a ripple insert, but they stay put after the drop. But after you drop online media on a placeholder, it is no longer a placeholder.

One thing I noticed is that if you design a video template with stills that are a certain length, such as 5 seconds long, then if you later drag and drop online stills that are a different length, the new length is used. Same for video clips.

You can do all that without editing the project file in WordPad.

[RJ Johnston]

I uploaded a zip file to the gallery (members only) that contains a video template named 4x4.vidt that someone can try out. There's a readme file with instructions. You end up with a 4x4 split screen by adding 4 of your own videos to the media bin and then dragging and dropping each onto one of the 4 placeholders on the timeline.

http://www.muvipix.com/cpg/displayi ... p?pos=-800

[Steve Grisetti]

Thanks, Robert. I'm continually amazed at the stuff you discover!

[Steve Grisetti]

Robert, I tried it and it worked just as you said! (I did have to change the suffix of the template file to PREL however.)

It's definitely an undocumented feature however. I still suspect it's either something left over from a previous build that was never implemented or a feature that was never fully developed for version 3.

[RJ Johnston]

You should have been able to type *.* for the filename and press enter. That would give you a list of all files in the directory. Then you could select 4x4.vidt.

I wonder if Adobe will issue a patch to fix this annoying undocumented feature.

Was there a "Save as a Video Template" in keyboard customizations in Version 2? The answer is the command was introduced in version 3.

[RJ Johnston]

I hadn't noticed before, but there's a message in the status bar that tells you that you are about to "drop clip in placeholder." And if you hold down the shift key while you drop the clip, you are given the option to stretch the template to fit the clip, or trim clip to fit the template.

[Bob]

Hi Robert,

I played around with this earlier this year with the same results as you. I haven't used it since, though. At that time, I encountered some intermittent bugginess regarding clip selection after dropping a new clip into a placeholder. Most of the time, it worked correctly. But, from time to time, multiple adjacent clips would end up selected after simply dragging a new clip onto one of the placeholders. The selection seemed to be sticky, select something else then come back and select one of two adjacent clips and both would select. I couldn't select just one. I don't remember what I had to do to clear the selection, but once corrected it continued to work properly. Once, I ran into a situation where I'd drag a clip endpoint on track 1 and clips on track 2, in a different part of the timeline even, would change also -- very odd. I'd hazard a guess that it wasn't documented because it wasn't ready for prime time yet -- not sure why they didn't just remove it.

The Video template feature appears to be related to a similar capability in Premiere Pro. They don't call it a video template though. Pro allows you to create an offline project which works very similarly to this. It's in the same dialog that allows to to create a collected or trimmed project (similar to PrEl's archive feature).

I don't have Premiere Pro, but I've been reading up on it. I've been considering buying CS3 Creative Suite Production Premium when it's released and wanted to know what I would be getting. I already have Photoshop CS2 and want to get After Effects. Buying the suite is cheaper than upgrading Photoshop to CS3 and buying the stand alone After Effects package.

[RJ Johnston]

I can see where the video templates would be great for creating effect presets that are comprised of several effects or several tracks. All you would need to do is load the video template, add your own videos and stills to the media bin, and then drag them to the placeholders, and you're done with that sequence. Of course you would have to export the sequence and bring it into the main project. You could have a template, for example, that is especially designed for creating the track matte effect.

You can drag stills to placeholders that were orginally designed with videos or movies, or drag videos and movies to placeholders that were orginally designed with stills.

[RJ Johnston]

I discovered that if you don't use video track 1, then when you press the keyboard shortcut to "Save to Video Template" that you don't get the dialogbox that allows you to save the template. You may get a dialogbox that tells you that you have to save your project first, but after you save, you don't get the template dialogbox.