This is easier said than done. One way to do this is with a mask.

You need a black and white mask, preferably with the left half black and the right half white. Alternatively, you can use a white mask with a black box and resize it as I did. You can find masks in the folder:

C:\ProgramData\MAGIX\Movie Edit Pro 2014 Plus\VideoEffects\EffectAlphaMasks\HD

or in your case, ....2015....

Here are the steps.

Place your videos on tracks 1 and 3, one below the other. Apply PIP effects to tracks 1 and 3 as shown.

Insert the mask onto track 2 and extend it or trim it if necessary.

Using zoom, make the mask larger and drag it so that the black part takes up the left side of the screen, full height, and the white part completely covers the right part of the screen. You will of course see track 3, which will help guide you as to where is the centre of the screen.

Select track 2. Apply Chroma key Alpha. Now you will see both videos.

Select track 1, zoom in and drag it to the position that you want, remembering that the left border of track 3 will be the limit. Ignore whatever goes behind (above and below) the track 3 image, because when you make track 3 larger you won't see that part anymore.

Now select track 3 and zoom in and drag the image to position it where you want. You will only see up to the border that you had created with the mask. The white part protects whatever is on track 3, the black part lets track 1 show through.

Seems a little complicated John.

With the 2 videos on track 1 & 2 use "Section > Free Proportions" making sure you are in "Edit" Mode, drag the dotted borders to the size you want or enter size directly in the width and height  boxes eg 960 and 1080 then switch to "Preview" mode to see your section which will be half your HD frame moved to the center. Then go to "Size Position" and drag it across to whichever side you want it on then perform the same on the other video in the other track and drag it to the other side.

Peter

Hi Peter,

You're right of course, and that was my first choice. However, I always find Section a little buggy in MEP2014 and yesterday's exercise was no exception. It worked the first time but when I tried it again to make screen shots, it would not cooperate. When I select free proportions and drag using the left middle handle, sometimes it works, other times it ignores free proportions and resizes the entire box. Then if I try to resize using another handle, say the right middle handle, the box jumps back to full size. I tried again today after restarting MEP and succeeded, even though I did have a minor problem at one point as you will see in the video.

I made a quick tutorial showing this method. I did not show how to use the position box to maintain the top location by typing in the position box, should have, but I used the drag/resize method instead. Please take a look and comment.

The other method with the mask would have been much easier if I had a 50/50 black/white alpha mask. Then there is no playing around with finding the centre of the screen. I think I'll make one.

Hi

Assuming you want to keep the video proportions correct and the whole frame, I find the 'numbers' method to be quicker and more accurate then dragging video handles to size and position video- particularly if you do not have a full screen preview monitor or do not have dual screens:- 

1. Position the videos one to a track  eg tracks 1 and 2
    
2. Select one video, then select Effects, Movement, Size and Position.
    
3. Set the Height value to half that of the video eg 540
    
4. The video should now be centre top of the preview monitor.
    
5. Repeat steps 2 and 3 for the second video
    
6. Change the Top value to half the height of the video eg  540

You will now have the two videos one above the other.

Note: these instructions refer to a project  setting of 1920 * 1080. For other sizes you can work out the values, indicated in blue, needed - for stacking two videos they are half of the  projects height setting.

HTH

John

Hi John EB,

My assumption was that the OP wanted vertically left and right, full height, not top and bottom, so I used another method.  He should clarify or I should have asked him to clarify.

For clarity, here is the result of top and bottom as per your instructions.

Since the width is also half of the available screen size when the screen is 1920x1080, that is, 960px wide, then a 4 video display can be made quickly by moving the videos to the left to 0, and then then other 2 would have a position of 960 left. Just arrange the tops to 0 and 540. This makes a 4-image video wall.

I did another video showing how to do the side by side method using a mask that is 50/50 black/white. This method has the videos full height, but obviously one cannot see the entire width of each. This method allows use of zoom, size, position and pan with kf's and keeps the video in its own window.

Please take a look at both tutorials. Anything need changing?

Here is another example of using masks. I made 3 masks - 25% black/75% white, 50/50 but horizontally, 75/25 and then applied them between 4 videos. This allows the user to modify the size of the image in each window, i.e. zoom and pan. This cannot be done by resizing the videos except by using Section, and that would be more difficult. This way each video is kept inside its own window, and the user can move it around, as shown below.

Here is the setup for the masks.

I decided that if I can make up quick tutorials on some of these things, I would. It would be better than having the instructions disappear into long lost threads.

Thanks,

Hi

My method was based on John CB's assumption of what the OP wanted, which is a little unclear.

It is even simpler if you change the "Pixels" to "%" when entering the section size as you do not even need to do the maths.

Other simple possibilities are to use the P in P 2/1 or 4/1 if that fits what you want to see.

John CB - I can see the benefit in using the masks if you want to change framing within the section as you have thoroughly described. You can of course move / zoom one of the videos whithout affecting its visible section because one is always behind the other.

I have not experienced any buggy behaviour in the section effect but you do need to be sure that Free Proportions has not jumped back to Fixed proportions when you shift modes. Also you need to keep aware that when the box at the top of the dialog. says "Preview" you are in "Edit' mode and Vice versa.

Peter

@Peter,

I just tried again and I noticed that when I change to free proportions and then grab the middle left handle, the box changes size proportionally. I watched the dialog and it still said "Free proportions." I did an undo, and tried dragging again and it works fine. Thus there is something that stops the free proportions from working properly the first time in a session. Afterwards, it seems to work fine.

Going out of the effect, say to Size/Position and then back to Section definitely changes the Section default to "Keep proportions."

@Peter,

Nope, tried again and this time I captured what was happening so you could see the problems. One event that I did not capture was trying to move the Section box; this causes the box to go back to full size. Strange.

John

Nope, can't reproduce that one(s) here. One thing I noticed from your capture is that when you experience the reset the effect disappears in the KFramer.Very strange.

Anyone else?

Edit: See what happens if you uncheck Fill Screen.

Peter

Hi

@ Peter

. . . . It is even simpler if you change the "Pixels" to "%" when entering the section size as you do not even need to do the maths. . . . .

This can work better than by numbers but only when there is an even number of pixels for the starting width and height, when there is an odd number you can end up with a 1 pixel offset, which if you are creating a video wall can be disturbing  as the offset appears to be random.

I prefer to create fine borders between the images to mask any offset, such as this which also has a centre image

@ John CB - I cannot replicate the problem either.

John

Anyone else?

Hi all,

Yes, me! I quite often get buggy behaviour in Section. This is Movie Edit Pro Premium 13.0.5.4(UDC2), but this goes back through all versions.

Testing just now, I quickly reached the state in which Free proportions was displayed as the active option, yet adjustment changed the section proprtionally.

The difficulty is that it's intermittent so it's hard to pin down the cause. I've just returned to MEP (which I'd left open in that state) and now I get correct adjustment. Throughout, Fill screen was enabled.

Hi John EB

I seem to be getting a 2 pixel offset which I can not get rid of!

I prefer to have a small border between my sections also.

Speaking of Video Walls the creator in Adorage is quite nice for a lot of images with borders.

Terry thanks for testing. I must confess I do not use Sections much so it could happen to me too.

Peter

"I find the 'numbers' method to be quicker and more accurate" (John EB)

Me too.

Or for better quality: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/4019461/MEP-Sections%2BPIP%2BCollages-1.jpg

Hi Peter

. . . . Speaking of Video Walls the creator in Adorage is quite nice for a lot of images with borders. . . . .

Do you mean Heroglyph - if so I too like it for video walls - here is a short example

John

@Peter,

I tried Section again in MEP2014Plus after a reboot. I put on Free proportions and unchecked Full screen and had the same problems initially. The box would resize, trying to drag the box would cause it to go back to full screen. After a minute or so of playing around, it started working ok. Very strange. I recorded the session is anyone is interested.

@John EB,

Very nice 4-screen with a fifth centre-image. I presume that the 4 images are full size and the centre image was done using a mask?

@All

Not to be completely outdone, I created a split screen mask as before but feathered the centre edge on each side of the border, thus no border. I would like to do the 4-image masks the same way. Here is the result with 2 images with a vertical feathering.

I tried some of the Magix masks and some others that I had but the feathering was too large and in some cases, the edge of the image in the overlap was too visible.

John CB

When you uncheck Fill screen and adjust / move in Section, does the Size/Position effect appear in the KFramer?

John EB

Sorry I meant Heroglyph. Was your video wall example one of the templates? It's quite nice, as is your 4 way with the wee circle. How did you create the circular border?

Terry

You have some nice Collage templates there. I do the same thing when there are too many (maybe not so good pictures) but you just can't bear to throw them out.

Keep up the good work All!

Peter

@Peter,

No, nothing happens in the KFramer until I start to resize the box. Move the centre left handle inwards, Section and Size/Position show up in the KFramer. Grab the upper right handle and start to move, the KFramer jumps to empty. Again, it is usually only at the beginning of a session and then the problem seems to go away. I say usually, because sometimes the problem stays around.

I don't have the same problems in VPX6.

@John EB,

I just recalled that in your first reply in this thread you mentioned that it  "....I find the 'numbers' method to be quicker and more accurate then dragging video handles to size and position video - particularly if you do not have a full screen preview monitor or do not have dual screens." It reminded me that probably one of the little-known and little-used features is zooming in and out on the Preview monitor, as opposed to zooming in on an image. For those who don't know how, click on the Preview monitor and press and hold Ctrl and zoom in and out with the mouse wheel, and, while still holding Ctrl, drag the window around the screen with the left mouse button. When finished, use Ctrl+double-click the left mouse button to zoom back out and reposition the window to fill the Preview monitor. You can see these by using the popdown arrow to the right of the shuttle:playback speed slider at the bottom of the Preview window.

To post my tutorials in the Tutorials part, what resolution should I use? The ones I did here are wmv 720x480, file size 8.71MB and 11.1MB, respectively.

@All,

I think the OP understood and has moved on to another problem. Would be nice of him to tell us.

I went back and looked at some of the threads about Intros/Outros and Collages and how to save and then use them. The information is rather fragmented unless I missed something. This might be a good time to revisit these, maybe even including transitions and effects and get a step by step method for each. I recall saving a project and changing the extension to cfx. With VPX6, it wants to open a new movie when I insert the cfx that I created, so I'm obviously doing something wrong.

Terry, since you seems to be doing more of these than the rest of us, could you open a new thread in the Discussions part and do this? Even better, post the methods under tutorials?

Lastly, To try to replicate what John EB did, I used my 3-mask solution for 4 videos and added a circular mask for the 5th image along with a blue cross with centre circle jpeg to define the borders. With this method, the videos can all be resized and zoomed. I had to make my cross with circle larger and reposition it. It would be nice to save this as a collage.

Regards,