How to reframe a video without moving the graphic that is locked into it
Tell Vizard Agent which element is locked. A finished master usually contains a fixed graphic — a leaderboard, a rank strip, a scoreboard — sitting above footage that can move. It measures where each band starts and ends, reframes only the footage under the graphic, and previews each proposed crop on real source frames before rendering anything.
What is the short version?
Reframing treats a video as one picture. When part of that picture is a graphic that viewers read positionally, cropping the frame as a whole shifts the graphic too, and a leaderboard that moves between shots stops being a leaderboard.
- Go to Vizard Agent with the master.
- Say which graphic must stay exactly where it is.
- Ask it to reframe only the footage band.
What do you need before you start?
The master and a list of what is fixed. Vizard Agent can measure the bands itself, but it needs to know which of them is load-bearing — a rank strip that has to stay put is a very different constraint from a watermark that merely should not be cropped in half.
- The master. The finished video, not the sources.
- What is locked. Named, not described as "the graphics".
- The target format. Vertical, usually.
- Anything baked into the footage. Stream text, captions.
- Whether the graphic can be redrawn. Sometimes it can.
What do you type into Vizard Agent?
Name the locked element and the target format together in the same sentence. "Make it vertical" is an instruction about the frame as a whole; naming the graphic turns it into an instruction about two separate regions, which is what the video actually is underneath.
Prompt
Variants worth knowing:
- "Measure the bands separately." The core instruction.
- "Only the footage under it." Scopes the crop.
- "Preview each crop." Cheaper than a render each time.
What does Vizard Agent actually do?
Here is the sequence on a real ranking video that had to be reframed without disturbing its leaderboard. The second half is one segment being re-cropped four times, which is normal when the footage also has text burnt into it.
- Inspects the master at each of its key beats.
- Measures the graphic band and the footage band.
- Sets the crop to work only inside the footage band.
- Checks the subject's position in each segment.
- Renders and reviews the crops at full size.
- Finds a segment where baked-in text clashes with the crop.
- Tightens that crop and re-checks.
- Moves the crop below the baked-in band when tightening is not enough.
- Previews the deeper crop on source frames at setup, punchline and payoff.
- Renders the final version with that crop.
- Verifies the graphic has not moved anywhere in the video.
Step two is the measurement everything else depends on. Once the two bands are known, the crop becomes a problem inside a smaller rectangle, and the graphic is simply carried through untouched rather than being something the crop has to avoid.
Step nine is the habit that makes the repeated attempts affordable. Previewing a proposed crop on three real source frames — the setup, the joke and the payoff — costs almost nothing, and it is what stops the fourth attempt being another full render that turns out wrong at the payoff.
Step six is a reminder that a master can have more than one locked thing in it. A graphic you added is one; text burnt into the source footage by whoever recorded it is another, and it constrains the crop just as firmly.
What does the result look like?
A vertical version in which the rank strip sits exactly where it always did, and the footage beneath it has been recropped shot by shot to keep the subject in frame. Nothing about the graphic gives away that the video was reframed at all.
Vizard Agent tells you the band measurements it worked from, which is what you need if a second version has to match this one.
When does this not work well?
If the graphic occupies too much of the frame, there may not be enough footage band left to crop within. A graphic that moves or resizes during the video cannot be treated as a fixed band, and one that is stretched by the reframe will need redrawing rather than carrying over.
- A large graphic. Too little footage left to work with.
- Graphics that move. They are not a fixed band.
- Text baked into the footage. A second constraint.
- Very different aspect ratios. The bands may not both fit.
- Low-resolution masters. Cropping inside a band costs pixels.
How do you fix a result that came back wrong?
Say which segment it is and what is wrong inside it. Because Vizard Agent crops each segment separately within a measured band, a note about one particular moment becomes a change to a single crop rather than to the whole reframe.
- "The subject is out of frame here." That crop moves.
- "I can see the stream text." The crop goes below the band.
- "The graphic looks stretched." It needs redrawing, not scaling.
- "Show me before you render." Previews on source frames.
How does Vizard Agent compare to doing it yourself?
By hand the whole frame gets a vertical crop, the graphic goes with it, and the fix is to add the graphic back on top afterwards — which means recreating something you already had, usually not quite the same.
| By hand | Vizard Agent | |
|---|---|---|
| The frame | Treated as one picture | Two measured bands |
| The graphic | Cropped, then rebuilt | Carried through untouched |
| Per-segment crops | One crop for all | Chosen per segment |
| Baked-in text | Found in the export | Found and worked around |
| Iterating | A render each time | Previews on source frames |
Common questions
Why not crop the whole frame? Because the graphic moves with it, and viewers read it positionally. Vizard Agent keeps it still.
Can it redraw the graphic instead? Sometimes. Vizard Agent will say when carrying it over is not possible.
What if the graphic changes during the video? Then it is not a fixed band, and Vizard Agent handles it differently.
Does each shot get its own crop? Yes. Vizard Agent chooses one per segment inside the footage band.
What about text burnt into the source? Vizard Agent treats it as a second constraint on the crop.
Can I see a crop before it renders? Yes. Ask Vizard Agent for previews on source frames.
Will the graphic be resized? Not unless you ask. Vizard Agent carries it at its original size.
How much footage band do I need? Enough to crop within. Vizard Agent will tell you if there is not.
Does this work for square as well? Yes. Vizard Agent applies the same two-band approach.
Will the captions move? Vizard Agent places any captions you add against the new frame.
Can it match a second version to this one? Yes, using the band measurements it reports.
What if the crop cannot avoid the text? Vizard Agent moves the crop below the band rather than tightening forever.
Does the audio change? No. Vizard Agent keeps this to the picture only.
Why did my reframe move the scoreboard? Because nothing told the crop that the scoreboard was not part of the shot.