Predefined ramp shapes

You can define your own ramp shapes and apply them to any picture, sound and video objects. You may start out by producing a collection of ramps with a variety of dissolve properties or even special effects which you can use and apply whenever you need them. This will add to flexibility and efficiency.

What would you like to do?

Creating or editing ramp shapes

Copying ramps into the Pool

Assigning ramps to objects

Transferring a ramp to several objects

Importing collections of ramps

Creating or editing ramp shapes

1. In the Media Pool click category Ramps.

2. If there is no screen available yet, right-click a free area in the Media Pool and select Add. A ramp will be displayed, which can be edited like an object in the Preview Window. ... See also Editing ramp band. In addition to this, the context menu (right-click the Preview window) offers the following features:

3. Copy - for copying the fading-in properties to the fading-out ramp and vice versa.

4. Flip - to flip the ramp shape, e.g. to convert a concave ramp into a convex one.

5. Smooth - to harmonize the ramp nodes with reference to each other.

6. Simplify is used for eliminating superfluous nodes, e.g. for ramps which were produced via slider control or which were imported from old Wings 4.X shows.

7. All functions mentioned above can be chosen separately for the fading-in and the fading-out ramp.

8. Reset deletes all nodes except for the standard nodes.

3. A ramp consists of three parts to be edited: Fading in, center portion and fading out. By adding nodes you only specify the ramp characteristics, whereas the values of the standard nodes and their extension in time are currently irrelevant.  Only if you apply a ramp to an object will there be an extension in time; the locations of the standard nodes will remain as they were in the object.

4. If you want to edit a ramp, mark it in the Media Pool and modify the ramp in the Preview Window.

• Modifications in time can only be made for the objects in the timeline. For new objects, default durations can be specified. See Default duration for new objects.

• To simplify editing of ramps, the Preview Window can be enlarged. With the mouse, grab it at the raised double line (left margin below the cross) and pull it towards the screen centre. Now you can adjust it in size as desired. By double-clicking the title bar (top margin) or the raised double line you can switch over between the small and the large Preview Window.

• To facilitate editing your ramp you can use a grid in the Preview Window. Right-click the Preview Window and select Toggle grid. Every ramp section, i.e. fading in, center portion and fading out are split up into 5 to 10 segments. The grid width is adjusted to the display size and refers always to the corresponding portion of the curve.

• You can also create a dissolve ramp in the timeline followed by copying it into the Media Pool. The advantage is that you can see the ramp pair crossfade and immediately check any modifications with the projectors ... See also Adjusting the track height and Expanding the time axis.

Copying ramp shapes from the timeline into the Pool

...from objects

1. Right-click an object and select Ramp – Copy to Pool.

2. Name the new ramp and check the ramp portions to be copied.

...from dissolves between two objects

1. Move the mouse to the dissolve section between objects so that the mouse pointer turns into the X-symbol. Press the right mouse key and select Copy ramp to pool.

2. If necessary specify a new name for the ramp in the Media Pool.

Assigning ramp shapes to objects

1. In the Media Pool click category Ramps.

2. Grab the desired ramp with the mouse and drag it to the object it should be applied to:

3. Fading in

4. Centre portion

5. Fading out

6. Dissolving two objects

7. Apply all parts of a ramp by pressing the Shift key additionally when releasing the mouse key.

Transferring a ramp to several objects

1. 1. Highlight the corresponding objects you want to transfer the ramp to. See also Highlighting objects.

   2. In the Media Pool click on category Ramps.

   3. Grab the ramp in the Media Pool at its symbol and drag and drop it onto one of the highlighted objects.

   4. Answer the question with Yes.

Standard ramp for picture objects

You can define a standard ramp for newly created picture, video and text objects by double-clicking the required ramp in the Media Pool. The standard ramp will be provided with a red frame around it. Double-click this ramp again to remove this property.

• You can apply every ramp to picture, video, text and sound objects.

• Ramps can also be copied via the clipboard. See Copying ramps

• After assigning ramps to objects, the objects and their nodes can be edited as usual.

• For new objects, default times can be specified. See Default duration for new objects.

Importing collections of ramps

Usually a collection of ramps is imported when a project is set up. If the Media Pool does not contain any ramps you can also add some at a later time:

1. In the Media Pool click on category Ramps.

2. Right-click the right Media Pool section and select Import from template...

3. Select the corresponding template (Default Pools is the default selection) and click Open following which the ramps will be displayed in the Media Pool.

See also

Importing from other projects