Setting up Timeline for 3 video tracks + audio (live music)

How does one go about setting up a three camera angle project for a live perfromance video? Specifically, I'd like to know the 'standard' way to apply the three video captures to the Timeline and then the stereo audio track. I have imported all the media, which consists of the following:

V1: Static camera on the entire stage.
V2: Roaming camera 1
V3: Roaming camera 2
A1: Stereo mix

I've fussed around with pulling in the various parts, but Sudio seems to behave erratically. I paste in one video track, fine, then when I pull in another video track, it won't paste where I assume it should go, which is an adjacent video track (instead it pastes two lines below for some reason). Finally, I managed to get all video tracks pasted in adjacent to one another (just by trial and error, repeating the same drag and drop) but now I have lost the audio to the video and only the stereo tracks are visible, but I need the other vid tracks' audio to align all the video shots.

I even tried creating a multicam Timeline, but that just arendered one of the video tracks on the Timeline. (That said, I had no idea what multicam does, but it sounds like it's a useful mode for my purposes, although the video is not sync'd by timecode, hust three separate camera takes.)

I thought it would be a simple (albeit slightly time consuming) task to pull in the media and drag around until they are sync'd. It's truning out to be a total crapshoot, with Studio having a mind of its own in regards where the files appear in the Timeline and hiding/obliterating audio.

Where am I going wrong? What is the standard procedure to set this up?

I haven’t used multicam, but you set up the videos from the three cameras and then choose which camera’s content you want to play on the timeline.

Edit: see Howard’s note below for details!


They way I do it is have three video tracks on the timeline in Edit. The fixed camera would be video track 1, and the roaming cameras go to video tracks 2 and 3. You can turn off any of the tracks to let you view the footage from the three tracks. Before you cut anything, get the external audio synced to the video clips.

Don't bother syncing the audio to individual tracks it's only going to cause problems in the compound/multicam clip.

In the Media tap open each clip you want to use in the multicam and select an in point. With music just pick something easy like the first snare hit. Then select all the clips you want for the multicam, right click and create multicam clip, sync to in point, done.

Lay the multicam track on the timeline and manually sync it with audio.

Then you can cut in real time as the multicam track plays by selecting the cam number.

Good Luck

Don't bother syncing the audio to individual tracks it's only going to cause problems in the compound/multicam clip.

In the Media tap open each clip you want to use in the multicam and select an in point. With music just pick something easy like the first snare hit. Then select all the clips you want for the multicam, right click and create multicam clip, sync to in point, done.

Lay the multicam track on the timeline and manually sync it with audio.

Then you can cut in real time as the multicam track plays by selecting the cam number.

Good Luck

Thanks so much for providing some insight. I've not tried the method you're suggesting, so it's hard to envisage 'selecting an inpoint' (in this context, at least). I will have a go at tapping each clip in Media (as per your description) and perhaps your explanation will become clear.

I haven’t used multicam, but you set up the videos from the three cameras and then choose which camera’s content you want to play on the timeline.

They way I do it is have three video tracks on the timeline in Edit. The fixed camera would be video track 1, and the roaming cameras go to video tracks 2 and 3. You can turn off any of the tracks to let you view the footage from the three tracks. Before you edit anything, get the external audio synced to the video.

Thanks, that's more or less where I've got it at this moment. Ideally, I'd like to see all shots playing at the same time (with the music sync'd), which is how it's usually done, I think; right now, in deciding the best/less crappy shot for a particular moment, it's awkward having to mute a video track(s) to view just one, as it breaks concentration.

In this particular case, I'm working with a decent quality static shot of the stage, and intercutting with handheld cameras, so the elements aren't great. It's a bit like trying to mix poorly recorded audio, i.e., a patch job. I'm really pleased with the multitrack audio mix though, so I'd like to have some video with it. At this rate though, I'll probably only do a couple of songs, as the process is way too long winded.

Seem like you already made it into a single Multicam clip. Now that you have it as a Multicam clip, drag the clip to your source viewer and it will show you the 3 camera angles. Each angle has a number.

On your timeline what you do is cut by selecting the angle as you go through the audio track (see Howard's post). That's it.