Adobe Premiere elements: on-screen timer?

bucket · #1 (**permalink**) 02-26-2006, 07:32 PM

hey guys,

I've been trying out Adobe Premiere Elements this weekend because Movie Maker just isn't cutting it anymore as I get more comfortable editing videos. I've done a few personal DVDs as well as a wedding dvd.

With my current project I have a need to add a timer on the screen as a video plays. I'd like to be able to show on-screen how long the scene is.

Is this possible in some type of title or overlay format? I can't seem to find anything that would lead me to believe it can be done.

thanks for the help

Jason

Alan Mills · #2 (**permalink**) 02-26-2006, 07:46 PM

How long does the timer need to run for?

I can generate one out for you but you have to remember it's another layer of video footage and may big a big upload/download for me/you to grab it.

bucket · #3 (**permalink**) 02-26-2006, 07:55 PM

Originally Posted by Alan Mills

How long does the timer need to run for?

I can generate one out for you but you have to remember it's another layer of video footage and may big a big upload/download for me/you to grab it.

Hey Alan,

Ok, how about I explain the crazy thing I'm trying to pull off, it might help.

Once a year a bunch of us that went to university 10 years ago together get together in one place for a weekend of drinking /camping and other non-sense.

Someone brought a beer bong this year and a few guys thought it would be fun to see who could shoot a beer the fastest with it.

So what I'm planning ot do is show a timer on-screen as they shoot the beer. Most guys are around 5 secs, but one guy sucked and went for like 30 secs.

I think all I'd need is a timer overlay that ran at the bottom of the screen as most times the "actor" is in the middle of the screen.

What are you using to create the timer? I doubt I have the tool, but it's good to know for future reference.

If we can work something out, it can be emailed to bucketo@gmail.com. If it's bigger than 10 megs let me know and we can work out some ftp access.

thanks for the help/info

Jason

Marc Peters · #4 (**permalink**) 02-26-2006, 08:14 PM

I've update the faq with a video alan has just sent me to host:

http://www.videoforums.co.uk/reviews/faq

Question 12

bucket · #5 (**permalink**) 02-26-2006, 08:34 PM

oh.. very cool.

thanks for the prompt help. I'm playing with it now.

bucket · #6 (**permalink**) 02-26-2006, 10:03 PM

Quick followup after a few hours of editing: the timer is working perfectly!!!

thanks again,

Jason

Alan Mills · #7 (**permalink**) 02-27-2006, 12:26 PM

For the record. This piece of timecode footage was generated using the realtime effect that comes as standard with the Matrox Rt.X100 card and s/w.

I generated out 1 minute of 25fps timecode in widescreen PAL to a WMV file. I think the quality is good. Given that it is small white text on a black background there is next to nothing to actually use up the bitrate specified so it looks OK I think.

File size is about 1Mb.

If anyone needs different i.e. NTSC or 4:3 let me know.

Remember though, this is counting frames, and not tenths or 100ths of seconds or anything nice for timing races.

bucket · #8 (**permalink**) 02-27-2006, 01:06 PM

Hey Alan,

Now here's probably a dumb question. I'm in Canada, NTSC. I imported your timer no problem. I cropped it down so only the timer shows in a small box at the bottom of the screen over the main video. It runs fine on the computer. Because it's origin is PAL, am I going to run into any issues when I go to press my video to DVD and watch it on a TV?

thanks,

Jason

Alan Mills · #9 (**permalink**) 02-27-2006, 05:55 PM

no probs puitting it on a DVD and watching it on a TV in itself.

You problems may well come from the fact that you will likely encode to NTSC and have a different frame rate. I'm not sure how the conversion actually occurs.

I'll cut you an NTSC equivalent shall I, if I can. Can't say I've ever started an NTSC project before. here goes nothing....

edit: Seems I can't do this. Not looked fro this option before but it appears the Matrox Xtools have to be installed for either PAL or NTSC. So it look slike you're stuck with PAL, sorry.

MaddKaze · #10 (**permalink**) 03-14-2006, 05:35 AM

Actually, I wanted to do something like this too. I'm making a 24 parody and I need to know how to make a 21 minute countdown timer in the style of the show 24 (00:00.00 ; Minutes:Seconds.Milliseconds). Also, I'm only a beginner, so I don't necessarily know what an alpha filter is. Can someone please help?
Thank you in advance.