Video Editing with PaintShop Pro

Video Editing with PaintShop Pro

View the youtube video on this entry here: Video Effects in PaintShop Pro

The general process of this technique is to use a video editor (I'm using Magix Vegas Pro) to break up a video clip into individual images.  Then use batch processing with PaintShop Pro to apply an effect. Then chase that with an import in Vegas to recreate a video from the images.

In this way we can create any script in PaintShop Pro, and apply it to a video clip in Magix Vegas.

Rendering an Image Sequence

In this phase, we are going to be working in the video editor (in my case Magix Vegas).  The first step is to drag the video clip (or clips) that you want to process into the timeline. 

Once you have it arranged in the order you desire, go to File > Render As, and select Image Sequence as the Format, and choose which template you want to use, I'm going to use PNG.  Set the path, and note that this path will be filled with very many images.

This will begin the rendering process and will generate an image for every frame of your video.

Batch Processing

Now let's move into PaintShop Pro.  You can watch another video on many other tips besides batch processing for ways to go faster in PaintShop Pro here.

To perform Batch Processing, go to File > Batch Process.  This will open a dialog where you can select the images you just created.  Click the [ + Add ] button and navigate to the folder you created earlier that has your image frames.  Click the [Select All] button to add all the images.

Once your images are loaded.  You can click the Batch Actions button.  In this view, you can select the [Scripts] button and choose a script to run on all the images.  I'm using the PSP provided Colored Chalk script, but you can use any script you create.  

Make sure that the Slient Mode box is checked so that you don't have to click on a dialog box every time the script runs on a new image.  This would defeat the purpose of this approach.

Once you have your script selected, click the Output Settings button.  In this view, simply select where you want the processed images to be located (preferably a different folder), and choose your file format.  I chose PNG once again.

At this stage, click the [Start] button, and go grab some coffee, because this may take a while.

Importing an Image Sequence

Once all the images are processed by PSP, let's go back our video editor Magix Vegas and create a new project.  Now we want to File > Import > Media.  Then in the dialog, navigate to your newly processed images folder.  Select the first image, and ensure the Image Sequence checkbox is checked.

Then click [Open] and a new media box should be created that looks and feels like a media clip.  If a bunch of images are loaded into your project media, then you goofed somewhere in the last step.

At this stage you can treat that clip like any other video clip in your project, except that now it has an effect applied to it by PaintShop Pro.