Animation codec with field ordering?

[Jeremy Garchow]

If you are rendering out of AE, then you choose the filed order and it really has nothing to do with the codec. DV PAL is typically upper field first. What pixel size are you using and I have taken that you have rendered the effect in FCP?

Jeremy

[Jeremy Garchow]

Woops, typo there. DV PAL is typically LOWER field first. PAL uncompressed is Upper field. Try rendering Lower field first out of AE.

[David Roth weiss]

Will,

I’m not certain about your fields issue, but the animation codec is not a QT editing codec and it is not much appreciated by our beloved FCP app for that reason. For many reasons, your best bet is to export sequential 32-bit TGA files from AE. That will also certainly clear up your fields issues as well.

DRW

[Jeremy Garchow]

[David Roth Weiss] ” For many reasons, your best bet is to export sequential 32-bit TGA files from AE”

FCP doesn’t support image sequences either. Rendering animation is just fine, I do it all the time.

Jeremy

[David Roth weiss]

[JeremyG] “FCP doesn’t support image sequences either.”

Jeremy,

Sure it does!!! I use them all the time for exactly the what Will is trying to do. You should try it Jeremy, all the special efx artists here in Hollywood spit out nothing but sequential stills when exporting from AE, Combustion, Fire, Flame and Inferno. They are the only way render farms will work properly and huge 2K and 4K projects, but the work even better on SD projects.

DRW

[Rafael Amador]

[David Roth Weiss] “Sure it does!!! I use them all the time for exactly the what Will is trying to do”
How you do it David? Nesting the still? or..
cheers,
Rafael

[Martin Baker]

Will

You don’t say whether you’ve rendered lower or upper from AE but I’m presuming lower to match the sequence. So for a DV PAL sequence:

If you’ve rendered from AE as lower field to Animation codec:
– Import into FCP
– Change the field dominance setting to “Lower” in the Browser, BEFORE you’ve added the clip to any sequence.
– Add clip to sequence (FCP should not add the Shift Fields filter because it knows the clip matches the sequence).

If you’ve rendered from AE as upper field to Animation codec:
– Import into FCP
– Do not change the field dominance setting (FCP assumes animation codec movies are upper as you’ve discovered)
– Add clip to sequence (FCP will automatically add the required Shift Fields filter)

It’s very easy to go round in circles with this because there is some weirdness. For instance, changing the field order of a clip already in a sequence has no effect at all. Anyway, the above steps work for me on 5.1.4

Martin
Digital Heaven, London UK
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[Jeremy Garchow]

[David Roth Weiss] ” You should try it Jeremy”

Okay, you have me curious. Now how do you do it? I understand how to get it out of AE, but how do you get it into FCP? Import and render?

[Todd Beabout]

I bring in image sequences through QuickTime Pro (File>Open Image Sequence) and then kick out a .mov that I bring into FCP. I don’t know if this is what DRW is referring to, but it sure would be nice to give FCP the ability to recognize an image sequence on import (like Avid, AE, Combustion, etc.) as they are somewhat of a standard for bringing animations into the edit suite.

-Todd Beabout
Vazda Studios

[Jeremy Garchow]

[Todd Beabout] “I bring in image sequences through QuickTime Pro”

i know that method, but that defeats the purpose, no? I could just render out an animation if I’m going to do that.