Slow Motion

Use the Slow Motion effect to create high-quality slow motion.

In order to create slow motion, VEGAS Pro delays the original frames of the video so that there is more time between the movement those frames record. To attempt to create continuous motion, VEGAS Pro must create additional video frames to fill in the extra time between the original frames.

When you use the Playback Rate setting or the Velocity Curves to create slow motion, VEGAS Pro creates exact copies of the existing frames to use as these extra frames. Since the original frames are repeated, the process can result in choppy slow-motion sequences.

The Slow Motion Plug-In, on the other hand, synthesizes new intermediate frames from the existing frames. To do this, it analyses and interprets the differences between two frames to create entirely new frames that move smoothly from the first frame to the second. This makes the slow motion look much more fluid and natural in many cases.

For this process, VEGAS Pro leverages real-time computation technology that requires no prior analysis.

How to apply the Slow Motion plug-in to your footage

  1. Click the Video FX tab to open the Video FX window.

  2. Select Slow Motion from the list of plug-ins.

  3. Drag the Default preset onto the timeline clip event that you want to apply it to.

  4. Set parameters:

    • Click the Quality drop-down list and choose the setting you want. This setting determines the analysis precision in terms of how much video information the tool considers during the process. Experiment with these options. You might find that the lower-quality settings give adequate results with lower processing requirements.

    • Experiment with the Blending options to see which of those you like best.

    • Adjust the Playback Rate to set the new speed you want your video to play back at.

  5. Optional: Click the Visualization drop-down arrow and select the Show Optical Flow Field checkbox.

Automatically adjust the length

Once you’ve applied slow motion, your timeline event will no longer be long enough to hold all of the footage it did before you slowed the footage down. For example, if you slow your footage down to a rate of .5, only half of the original frames fit into the event.

To automatically adjust the length of the event so that it once again holds all of the original frames:

Click the Adjust Event Length button. This stretches your event to the size necessary to play the full media with the Slow Motion effect applied.