Hi,

You could use the size and position to position all 5 tracks on the preview screen in different places, but once you have made the edits you are going to need to resize them back to fill the screen.

Using 4 random clips, this is a screen shot of what I mean you could do.

George

Hi

. . . . If above the Timeline you click on the tiny reel's down arrow you can select which track becomes active in the monitor. . . . 

@Arthur-LW

I presume you mean this button

This determines which movie is shown in the preview monitor in a multi movie project not tracks - the Solo button

    determines which track(s) is (are) played in the preview monitor - however this 'turns off all the other tracks not selected for Solo play.

@ tsutherland

I agree with Georges answer, however do not expect smooth playback performance while trying to play 5 tracks of video at once. 

When you are editing I would suggest you put the main video on track one and lock it (lock symbol left end of the track) so it does not get changed during editing.

The other 4 videos should be on higher track numbers.

When making the cuts have no clips selected and make your cuts as necessary - this will ensure that the cut is made in all tracks that are not locked - this makes it easy to remove the parts you do not want leaving the snippets behind.

You can then move them up to a lower track number if you wish, to stop them moving sideways as you drag them up the tracks hold the shift key down at the same time as dragging.

HTH

John

I stand corrected, tsutherland.  If you import more than one mvp, then you can switch between them using the reel icon (and see the individual selected project displayed on the monitor), but this will not show you all your clips simultaneously stacked in the timeline.  (I gotta quit doing this stuff at 3 in the morning.  LOL)

Hi

@Arthur-LW

. . . . (I gotta quit doing this stuff at 3 in the morning.  LOL) . . .

Only if you do not suffer from insomnia 

John

Hi

@Arthur-LW

. . . . (I gotta quit doing this stuff at 3 in the morning.  LOL) . . .

Only if you do not suffer from insomnia 

John

It's a senior thing, John.  A glass of warm milk and some toast and in a couple hours or so sleep returns.

I think what I was trying to say is for the OP to create mvps of all the different versions, break each one into snippets and save them as say V1-a.mvp, V1-2.mvp, V2-1.mvp, V2-2.mvp, etc.  Then he could name a new project "Compilation" or some such, and add each snippet to the timeline as he sees fit, then applying fades and transitions to the mix as required.

Perhaps there is a more sophisticated way to do it with all the videos on top of each other, splitting deleting and inserting as one goes, but that would be way out of my league. 

Hi

@Arthur-LW

. . . . Perhaps there is a more sophisticated way to do it with all the videos on top of each other, splitting deleting and inserting as one goes, but that would be way out of my league. . . . .

Try my suggested method with video on 3 tracks- you will find it t is actually a lot easier then you think because of the way the timeline tracks work.

Think of track 1 being the background, as you add objects to the higher track numbers they appear on top of what is on a lower number track.

This makes the editing as I described very easy - there is no inserting or saving seperate sections to be put together again - it is all on the one timeline.

Cheers

John

Hi

@Arthur-LW

. . . . Perhaps there is a more sophisticated way to do it with all the videos on top of each other, splitting deleting and inserting as one goes, but that would be way out of my league. . . . .

Try my suggested method with video on 3 tracks- you will find it t is actually a lot easier then you think because of the way the timeline tracks work.

Think of track 1 being the background, as you add objects to the higher track numbers they appear on top of what is on a lower number track.

This makes the editing as I described very easy - there is no inserting or saving seperate sections to be put together again - it is all on the one timeline.

Cheers

John

 

So all tracks play as one and you see the videos superimposed onto each other?  Remember he has 5 different versions...

I'm not all that clear on what the OP seeks to achieve here.  He talks about snippets, so I'm guessing he wants whomever does a particular verse the best to jump in, then switch to someone else down the road, as if to make it a compendium of various talent doing the same number, broken up into pieces.

The poster remains silent so far, so I guess he needs to jump in here and clarify...

Btw, can you do a sample with actual video tracks like you describe and make it downloadable somehow?  I'd be curious to see what it looks like (I'm the visual sort.  LOL).

Alternatively to all the perfectly reasonable suggestions previously made ( and somewhat "off the wall" perhaps?).

If I read the OP correctly he is really dealing with a multicam project where there are 5 "cameras"/ video sources.   VPX, although rather more costly than MEP, can handle this "easily" (up to 8 "sources", I believe).  Could the expense of upgrading to VPX be justified for this one project?  Perhaps not, but if the OP were ever to do anything similar in the future the initial cost might be well worthwhile.

Or am I completely misunderstanding what is being asked?

Jeff

Hi

@ Arthur-LW

. . . . So all tracks play as one and you see the videos superimposed onto each other?  Remember he has 5 different versions... . . . .

I agree with Jeff's reading of the problem - there are 5 videos each on it own track of the same song/group, presumably taken from different camera angles, in one movie - in effect the OP is wanting to multi-cam edit however with 5 tracks this is more complicated hence the procedure I outlined.

Here is a quick example made from 4 movies on the timeline - the timeline ends up as shown below

  high res version here

note there is no inserting or cutting of the main video.

The result is

HTH

John