• Adobe After Effects

  Exporting Video from After Effects CS3 quality issues

  Posted by Camareo Waller on February 20, 2008 at 6:13 pm

  Hey all,

  I’ve imported a video from FCP 4.5 into AE CS3 for color grading and effects work. However, every time I try to export the video, the video quality declines sharply. Which conversion/export options and codecs should I use to maximize quality of my video?

  As a bit of specific information relevant to my issue, I’ve included my post in the FCP forum, describing what I used to film and the options I used to export the video initially from FCP.

  I’m trying to export a video from Final Cut Pro 4.5 to After Effects CS3. I was wondering which settings should I use to maximize the quality of my video.

  For starters, I shot the video using the Canon XH-A1, 30 FPS SD, Widescreen (I placed a 2:35:1 matte on it in FCP).

  Should I export using Quicktime Conversion or just as a Quicktime movie? Also, it says the video resolution is 853×480 or something of the sort, as opposed to the 720×480 standard.

  I’ve exported the video once using quicktime conversion, h.264 codec, best quality. I’ve tinkered with a bunch of size options, but I don’t know the best to use. The video quality using these options has a fairly noticeable drop from how it appears in FCP and the original footage.

  Any help would be GREATLY appreciated!!

  Ben Mcrae replied 15 years, 5 months ago 2 Members · 3 Replies
• 3 Replies

• 

  Camareo Waller

  February 25, 2008 at 3:57 am

  Yes, I shot in Standard Definition DV.

  Could you or anyone list some good codecs that comes with FCP and AE to use, or ones I can download?

  Also, it may be a slightly dumb question, but how would I go about exporting by reference from FCP?

  For the final product, I was just planning on having it as a self contained video file so I can keep it in my external hd for archival purposes, as well as to burn it on dvd’s.
• 

  Camareo Waller

  February 26, 2008 at 1:56 pm

  So I tried something different. I Imported my FCP video into Premiere Pro CS3 and exported it from Premiere as a quicktime video. The quality of the image was preserved in that it’s identical to my FCP video. I took the Premiere video and then placed that into After Effects CS3.

  The video image has been preserved a bit better, BUT my video now has something of a vectorized look to it. It looks like this in the AE timeline as well as when I export it to video. I used the Photo-JPEG codec when exporting from Premiere to AE and from AE to my desktop.

  Any help?
• 

  Ben Mcrae

  February 15, 2011 at 5:57 pm

  Dave,

  Lets say I’m taking my footage into After Effects for color grading, and I’ve exported my timeline in FCP as a reference movie. After I’ve made the adjustments to the footage in AE, what’s the best way to get it back to FCP for final output?

  Thanks,

  Ben

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