Join multiple sources into one without reencode to feed Sphere Cam plugin?

Introductions
1

Not finding a question area in the English forum listing so not sure where to ask Cinelerra questions nor where to question/comment about the forum layout so creating the topic here until I get guidance.

Considering a 360 camera (likely Qoocam 8k), mainly for mapillary and similar tasks and before investing in technology noticeably different from what I currently have, I prefer to make sure I have a workflow planned for Cinelerra to handle the media processing. Found what looks like the unprocessed clip from both hemispheres in a file but it loads as two separate video tracks. The spherecam plugin looks like it may do okay but I havent found proper adjustments yet and trying to do so with the lion tutorial showed me that the plugins adjustability really wants both spheres on one track for processing instead of what I attempted of each track getting its own plugin and disabling the other side. I made the project twice the size of each sphere horizontally then use camera or projector to left/right align each sphere in the canvas. My way causes the spherecam align only setting to not end up useful, though I think it starts to work in a more expected fashion with both tracks set to multiply. Doing so then shows alignment tools, but only on one edge of the spheres in the middle of the screen so only one side can be aligned; if the spherecam has left+right enabled it should slide the spheres around so one is in the center and the other is split down its middle with the two halves placed on the first spheres sides which then causes the guides to show on left+right side of each sphere.

In any case, I thought this could all be avoided with an EDL but didnt remember that three was a 1 track limit as I normally didnt use that feature. Saving project and opening inside another project still gives the video tracks as separate tracks. Likely something simple I am missing but wasnt there a way I can combine the two tracks output into one track but without rendering a new file?

On a side note, the Draw guides shows on my side always as black lines instead of inverted relative to the video they cover and when zoomed out fully on a window inside my 1920 display the lines/circles become random specs of pixels on this much higher resolution content. Maybe black instead of inverted is an issue specific to FreeBSDs copy of Cinelerra-GG? Next up would be figuring out dng/raw image procesing steps if I get somewhere here.

2

Hopefully Andrea or someone can answer some of your usage/non-SpereCam questions. As far as SphereCam goes, I have not heard any feedback on how it works or how to use it – just the lion video you already found at:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zEQ4Cve3_-M

There is a Q&A Questions and Answers forum area but I have not figured out how to even get there.

Your question: the Draw guides shows on my side always as black lines instead of inverted relative to the video they cover and when zoomed out fully on a window inside my 1920 display the lines/circles become random specs of pixels on this much higher resolution content.

Can you attach a png file image which shows this? I am not sure what you are talking about but I can show that to gg.

3

@phyllissmith

Its easy to get to the rest of the forum; go up to the top right corner and tell it you speak another language than English. I think my content blockers in my browser may be removing it otherwise but havent stopped to figure out what the filter is properly. after a quick try of all languages and disabling/reenabling content blocking it now shows the Q&A area too; maybe a cookie issue for my side?

Ill try to get a pic later, and try to remeber the source of the video I am messing with as a sample of the camera response. It is all the colorful guides in the lion video; I think they are an inversion of the pixels they cover. On my side, every pixel of all the guides are just black. Maybe there is a setting somewhere to either control their color (if not inverted) or maybe I have a setting somewhere (video output) that interferes. Also the possibility of FreeBSD port or even a quirk to my machine at the moment.

4

Sorry, Ive never used the Spherecam plugin. Im not sure if your 360° camcorder produces a single file (mp4/h264-5) that, when uploaded in CinGG, becomes split into 2 tracks?
In any case a general advice is to use Shared Effects:
Apply the Spherecam plugin to one track; then right click on the other track and choose attach effects; in the window that opens select spherecam in the shared effects column and click OK. In this way the second track is affected by the effect applied to the first track. Basically the same effect for two tracks. You will probably have to use the Multiply overlay anyway.
If you figure something out, let us know so we can put a better explanation in the manual.