Tips and tricks Adobe After Effects (from a computer nerd, not a programmer)

Started by Shield, May 25, 2013, 03:43:49 AM

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Shield

Just thought I'd share my experiences so far; if this helps out anyone that's great.
The following assumes you're using a 5d3 + Adobe after effects for importing.

Tip 1 - If you use a Sigma or Tamron lens, you can fix the vignette in the Adobe Raw importer if you select a Canon lens.  If you pick the actual lens you have it may not work (my Tamron 24-70 didn't).

Tip 2 - In Adobe after effects, you can import all of your DNG sequences and queue them up for rendering - just make sure you have 1 movie and at least one "composition"  Meaning if you drag/drop one movie to a composition and hit "add to render queue" and then try to add another one, it'll only render the LAST movie you added to that composition.  I manually create new compositions and get them all in the render queue so I don't have to sit and wait for each one.  If you know of a better way, I'm all ears.  So if I'm doing 6 raw sequences I'll have 12 files - 6 imported DNG sequences, 6 .wav files, and 6 compositions.  One per "movie".  The only reason I mention this is Adobe Premiere works a little differently; you can swap files out and keep adding to a render queue and it'll render correctly.

Tip 3 - Get a USB3 reader - it makes a WORLD of difference copying .raw files back over.  I picked one up tonight along with a PCIx - USB 3 4 port device and it's about 5x as fast copying files back over.

Tip 4 - If you want to record 1920x1080 with audio, insert an SD card in your other slot and it will automatically (assuming you have changed it from the default "beep").

That is all for now.

Shield

Also, if you're using a modern multiple core CPU, be sure to adjust your memory & processor settings in Adobe After effects.  Like a moron I was using the default and render times took forever - adjusted it so it uses 8 "cpus" now and it's flying.  Well, relatively speaking, of course.

Ctrl-M is the shortcut key to add a project to the render queue.

All for now.

squig

Tip 7- In the render queue click on the output module arrow and create a preset for whatever you want to transcode to, in my case prores 4444.

eyeland

Quote from: Shield on May 26, 2013, 07:56:39 AM
Also, if you're using a modern multiple core CPU, be sure to adjust your memory & processor settings in Adobe After effects(...)- adjusted it so it uses 8 "cpus" now and it's flying.
Are you referring to "render multiple frames simultaneously"?
Daybreak broke me loose and brought me back...

driftwood

Faster Renderings: As well as optimising for multi-processors like above, when rendering make your render composition 'view' 1.5% in size and it will make more use of your RAM.
Canon 60D, Canon 5DMK3, Lexar 1000x 128GB CF, Panasonic (shhhh!) GH2s & GH3s. :-)

1%

Maybe everyone knows this, but for those that don't CAPS LOCK kills the preview while rendering. Speeds things up a bit when you're rendering a file with all memory and all cores.

bnvm

Here is my process, some steps are repeats from other posts above.

Setup(only needs to be done once):
1. Create an output module preset for the format you will be exporting to most often and assign it to the movie default.
2. Turn on Render Multiple Frames Simultaneously, from the preferences->memory and multiprocessing.

Importing:
1. Import each dng sequence and adjust settings in ACR, I don't worry about FPS settings or anything else at this point.
2. Select the first sequence and right click and select interpret footage, set FPS and anything else needed.
3. With first clip selected right click and select remember interpretation.
4. Select all other sequences  (assuming they were all shot with the same FPS, etc...) right click and select apply interpretation.
5. Select the 8 bpc channel button and pick 16 bpc, 16 bits for color correction if needed.
6. Select all footage and drag it down onto the new composition button, it looks like the film strip next to the 16 bpc button, select multiple compositions ( this will set up all the compositions for you at once.)

7. color correct, import and align audio for each comp.

Rendering.
1. With the first composition active viewed in the timeline hit control+m, select the output path for the movie.
2. Select all remaining compositions in the project tab and select Composition->Add to Render Queue (they will all be setup to to export to the location set in step 1).

3. In the Render Queue you can press the + button to add another output module a render, this allows you have a single render write out multiple file types/resolutions if needed.

4. Press the Capslock key(disables the view refresh) and hit render.

Eventually I will most likely be exporting an openexr sequence from AE and wav file and encoding with Adobe Media Encoder, I have got that process all worked out yet. Media Encoder is much faster and gives better results than AE. AE is not recommended for final encoding since it cannot do any multipass compression limiting its encoding capabilities considerably.

Thats it.

1%

Yea, intermediate from AE and then compress with something else...

Canon eos m

Help. When I import multiple frames DNG or CR2) to AE CS6, these look crazily good on the ACR screen but then become extremely grainy when imported to the AE interface. What am I doing wrong?
Canon 5D Mark III, Gopro Hero Blacks with 3D Casing, A Few Lenses, Adobe CC 2014, MacBook Pro, Windows 8 PC, Lots of Video Rig!

Started Nuke. Loved it but then the 15 day trial ran out. Back to After Effects and loving it :-)