As you can see in the bottom right corner of picture I can not scroll any further. Is there something I accidentally hit or have turned off? Need assistance have to send a video of show tomorrow morning to a customer.  

Did you try the fireball effects in the built-in Generic Effects Collection?  

Hello,   I’m looking for a fireball/ gas mine/ super nuke effect. I haven’t been able to find anything in the effects… Do you happen to know of a similarly styled effect I can use as a placeholder, or possibly point me in the right direction for creating a simulation?   Thank you!

Perfect, thank you very much!

Yes, absolutely! You can save a site layout just by saving a show and using it as a template for future shows.   Option 1) Get everything set up to your liking, then do ‘File > Save’ to save a show file. Then, each time you need to design a new show, do ‘File > Open’ then ‘File > Save as’ to save a copy and start a new show.   Option 2) Get everything set up to your liking, then do ‘File > User settings > Save show as start-up template’. This will replace the default blank show with your show, exactly as it’s configured. With this approach, Finale 3D will automatically launch using your show template.   Why these options?   Because all of the digital assets for a show are saved directly in the show FIN file itself. This includes not only the positions, effects and the script, but also the music, camera presets, position shortcuts, scenery (background images, Google Maps, 3D models, etc.), and everything in ‘Show > Show settings’. The show FIN file also includes “blueprints”, which means report, label, and diagram templates, and custom table layouts (which are represented as puzzle pieces in the Effects and Script windows).

Is there a way to save site layouts?   Example: I will be shooting the majority of shows from one location. It would be helpful to be able to save my preset google maps view, field layout of positions, and custom camera views. Thank you!

Thanks Drew, I’ll have some time this week to give the outlined workflow a go.  Thanks!

Hi George Tasick, thanks for the great report. For better or worse, the behavior you described is how the ‘Script > Groups’ feature currently works. If you Group, say, 5 items, the items are visually consolidated on the timeline and in the script window, but in reality there are still 5 rows of script. You can see this by going to the blue gear in the script window and turning off ‘Show on row per group’. Now suppose you’re viewing your script with groups collapsed into single rows – when you select a row that represents a group, what you’re actually doing is selecting all 5 rows of script. This is the reason that editing the event time or other fields affects every line of script in the group. Instead of typing in an event time, try selecting the group and pressing Ctrl+F to bring up the ‘Set time’ dialog. In the future, maybe we can add some special handling for groups to achieve the result you expected. In the meantime, I think ‘Script > Time adjustments > Set Time…’ is a workable solution.

Hi George Tasick, thanks for the report, this is definitely a bug. Send me a minimal test case (MTC) show file with your slice on the timeline.

I use Finale 3D solely for product development and visualization. Cakes and single shot items, i’ll design and simulate them in finale, then provide those renderings to to factories as a complement to technical documentation.   This provides the factories with a visual reference of what i’m asking for, which works around language barriers and provides much faster understanding of the request.   Additionally, Finale 3D is a great tool for visualizing as a product designer, working out the timing/composition/effect combinations in a consumer device before sending to the factory.   The photo/video renderings from Finale 3D are also helpful in marketing the products (pre-production demo videos) and as elements of product packaging (photo renderings of very specific effects).   With these use cases in mind … the output format of my work is not timecode to be used on a shoot site as part of a live display … my output is video and photos of the products i create, to be used as production reference and/or marketing materials.   As such, my feature request is to include compositional guides on any given 3D camera view … including “safe frames, “thirds guides”, and “center guides”. These guides are very common in 3D programs where the final output is on a screen (TV, computer, mobile device, digital billboard, etc.)   Below is an example of safe frames … though only the “action safe” and “title safe” are relevant. Also notice how the action safe box (yellow) has little center markings for composing elements of the scene. The safe frames where more relevant in composing video for screens in the CRT days, when overscan was a much bigger issue. With modern screens the issue is much less pronounced, because screens are built to specific pixel dimensions, though some TVs still scale the image slightly and some screens have thicker plastic bezels that partially cover the edges of the screen itself.     The image below shows both safe frames and a “thirds grid” … the thirds grid is most helpful when framing up fireworks videos, because it always looks best on video (especially demo videos) when aerial effects break on the line between the top and middle third …   This image shows safe frames and a center marker … the center marker is especially useful when trying to center anything within the frame.   At present, Finale 3D can restrict the preview render to a 16:9 ratio … however this only helps to see the boundaries of what will be rendered. Aligning anything within those boundaries is a real guessing game … and the lack of these compositional guides makes it very difficult to be consistent from product to product, especially when a new project file is created.