NOT ALL THE FEATURES ARE PRESENT IN THE DEMO VERSION
This tutorial assumes that you have set up an EMPIRE directory on your hard disc which contains the EMPIRE application, the ARMovie resource application and your source clips. EMPIRE also requires a Scrap directory in which to create the Output track. By default this is created within your System Scrap directory which needs to have enough free space to hold the output track (this takes 20Mb per minute of edited clips.)
The location of the EMPIRE Scrap directory may be changed by editing the EMPIRE !run file.
If you are only editing Black and White clips then you can use a Grey Scale Mode which generally gives better results in 16 colour modes.
For the purpose of our example we will assume that we have two clips that are currently too long that we first wish to join together and then add a new sound track onto the combined clip.
Starting up
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To start EMPIRE double click on the !EMPIRE icon in your EMPIRE directory and it will install itself on the icon bar.
Now click on the EMPIRE icon on the Icon bar and the Preview window and the Clip bank bank will be opened.
The options file determines which windows are opened when EMPIRE is run and whereabouts on screen the windows are placed. The default screen layout is shown below.
The three windows are from top to bottom the Timeline window, the Preview window and the Clip Bank.
To load any clip it can either be dragged onto the clip window where it will be added to any clips already loaded. Or if a ViA file is double clicked then it will automatically be loaded into the Clip Bank and placed on Track A on the timeline if there is nothing on that track already. Or alternatively clips can be dropped straight onto the timeline.
Next the clip can be previewed to check that it is the one you want to use.
This may be done either by double clicking on the required Clip in the Clip bank or by clicking on the PLAY icon on the A Track on the timeline.
For now click on the PLAY icon on the timeline and the clip will start to play in the Preview window. The clip may be stopped at any time by clicking on any of the windows or pressing any key.
When the clip has been stopped the frames displayed on the timeline will be updated to show the point where the clip was stopped. The red scroll bar on the bottom of the Preview window will be updated to show the position of the frame within the clip as will the red scroll bar under the A clip controls on the Timeline. If the clip had been double clicked from the Clip bank then the indicator on the Preview window will show Clip. However since we started it from the timeline then the Preview window should show A in the track indicator.
The significance of these two choices is that by dragging on the scroll bar on the Preview window then the track indicated will also be scrolled. In this way we can very quickly zip through the source frames to find the particular point we want.
We already have the first clip loaded so by using the scroll bar on either the timeline or the preview window we can move the timeline display to the point where we wish the first clip to start. The cue marker on the timeline shows the edit point on the selected track and the exact time is indicated in the timecode box next to the Edit icon.
The track can be moved to the exact point by clicking and dragging on the timeline frames until the required frame is under the cue marker or else by clicking on the step icon on the Preview window.
The IN cue point can then be set by clicking on the IN cue marker or else by clicking on the Green bar above the frames display on the timeline. The cursor will change to a Cue marker when it is over the correct point on the track.
The same process can then be used to select and mark the out point for the edit. The cue points can now be checked by previewing the edit.
To preview an edit click with Select on the Play icon and the Edit will be previewed.
If the edit points need to be altered then this can be done by stepping to the appropriate points and clicking on the IN and OUT cue markers at the new points. Once the preview is correct then the Edit can be executed by clicking on the EDIT icon.
The required section of the source clip will now be copied over to the Output track and the Output clip will be positioned at the end ready to add on the next clip. The next clip to be edited can now be dragged onto the Clip bank. Click Select on it to highlight it and then click on Menu and select 'Place on track B'.
The new clip will now appear on the timeline next to a new track B information box. To start editing with the new track click on the Red Cross next to the B box to change it to a Green Tick. The IN and out edit points can now be selected in exactly the same way as those on the A track.
When the edit is satisfactory it can be executed in exactly the same way by clicking on the Edit icon and once again the Output track will be updated to show the new frames.
At this point you will probably want to see how the two clips work when played together. To do this click on the Play icon next to it with Select and the complete clip will play in the preview window.
Depending on the length of the two clips EMPIRE may take a while to prepare the output clip, so an hour glass will show it's progress and then the clip will play.
If all is OK then you can continue to add on further clips and edits as required. However you may wish to alter the edit points for one of the clips.
In order to do this an Undo and Redo feature is included in EMPIRE.
Undo
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Pressing F8 will undo the last Edit and the Output track will be updated to show the state before the last edit was performed. The other tracks will not be affected however.
Show Redo
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If we want to see the actual Edit points for that previous edit we can use the Show Redo feature by pressing Shift F9. The Edit IN and OUT Points for the previous edit will be marked on the respective track and the clip will be loaded back onto the appropriate track. The edit points can then be trimmed as required and the Edit redone by clicking on Edit. Subsequent edits can be redone automatically by using the Redo feature by pressing F9.
Audio replace
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All the edits so far have been done using both audio and video tracks, but it is also possible to edit either track on it's own. For the purpose of our example we will now replace the existing audio track on both clips with a new audio track. This could be a new track from another clip or a piece of music for example.
EMPIRE has the facility for loading a number of different audio file formats including the .WAV file format that is used on P.C's and the AIFF format that is used on Mac's and Atari's.
The new clip is dragged onto the Clip bank as before except that this time the icon that is displayed will show that it is an audio Only file. To load audio clips they must either be given a file type of Data or DOS. If the sample rate does not match the current sample rate it will have to be converted using the Convert Audio option on the Clip Bank before it can be used on the timeline.
EMPIRE and Acorn Replay DIY currently work with 12000 Hz Stereo samples as the default.
The new audio clip can now be placed onto one of the Tracks. We will place our clip on Track A using the same Place on Track option that we used to place the video tracks. (It could also be dropped straight onto the desired Track direct from the Clip bank.)
You will notice that the timeline display now changes to show an enlarged waveform type display of the audio track in place of the previous video frames. The video selector on the A track is also greyed out to show that this is an audio only edit.
Note that once edited, audio only clips can be saved out directly as Acorn Replay Movies or as raw data files.
To replace the audio on the Output track we must now change our edit mode from Insert to Replace. To do this click on the Replace icon at the top of the timeline toolbox or else press INSERT.
When you do this the IN and OUT marker boxes on the timeline will also change so that both IN and OUT points may be entered on the Output track and only an IN point may be entered on the Source track.
The required start point is first selected on the source track and then the portion of the Output track we wish to replace is also selected. A point to watch out for at this stage is that the source clip length is long enough to match the Output track length. If it is not long enough then a portion of silence will be added on the end to pad the track out.
Once the correct length track has been selected Click on the Edit icon and the new Soundtrack will replace the original sound from the video clips.
Another feature of EMPIRE you may wish to use is to put a fade in or a fade out on the start or end of the clip. This may be achieved by using the audio editing features of EMPIRE. The audio fade is set up by moving the cursor over the required audio track display on the timeline and double clicking.
A new window will appear titled Audio Edit .
There are two main choices that appear on the menu.
These are Envelope or Line.
Envelope
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The Envelope option allows a duration to be set for the fade in and fade out and a peak value to which the volume will raise for both tracks over the duration of the edit.
Line
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The Line option operates over the entire duration of the selected edit and allows a Start and End volume to be set.
Channel Source
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The other choices that are available using this menu allow the tracks of a stereo clip to be swapped if required or for either left or right tracks to be used to create a new Mono track.
Once the volume settings have been made then Click on OK. The grey area behind the audio track will then change to show how the envelope will look, though the audio waveform itself will not be changed. The Edit can then be performed as with a normal edit. On the Output track the audio envelope will be shown on both audio tracks though it will not be reflected in the actual waveform. The actual audio level is only changed when the final output ViA file or ARMovie is created.
Saving the Files
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Having got this far you will now want to save the movie you have created.
To save the Movie track click on Menu over the Timeline window and select File, Save Movie. The Shortcut is to press F3.
A Save as box will appear which can then be titled and dragged to a directory as normal.
If you may want to consider re-editing the Movie at some point you will also need to save the Edit Decision List (EDL). To do this click Menu over the Timeline window again and select File, Save EDL. The shortcut is Shift F3.
Once again a Save as box will appear. Choose the Input option and then title and drag the icon to a directory.
If at any time you then want to re-edit the clips the EDL file can be dropped onto the Timeline and assuming you still have the source clips in the same directories you will be able to re-edit the Movie.
We hope that this brief tutorial will have given you some idea of how to edit with EMPIRE. The number of different ways in which EMPIRE can be used is enormous and even we are still thinking of new ideas. We are planning to produce a video tape showing the features of EMPIRE later in the year, so that's another good reason for making sure you register your copy of EMPIRE.
