Best rendering settings

[Steve Roberts]

There’s no “one best” set of settings, otherwise the other settings wouldn’t exist. 🙂

Note that AE cannot record to tape. You need a non-linear editor (or playback utility) to do that.

By “rendering” I mean that the compuer is generating new image frames. AE always renders, but NLEs may not. When you are doing cuts-only editing in an NLE, you are not rendering, you are just playing back the original file at different points in time. However, when you are adding an effect or transition in an NLE, you are rendering, generating new image frames.

When you render, you recompress and risk losing quality.

1. You want to minimize recompression. To that end, if you are creating graphics in AE, and you expect them to pass through one more rendering cycle later on, you should render them to the Quicktime Animation codec. That codec is almost as good as uncompressed, but gives smaller file sizes. It is the standard for all-purpose high quality rendering, because it can handle more recompression cycles.

2. Some NLEs prefer Targa sequences. Those files are comparable to Animation-compressed files.

3. If you expect to drop a clip right into a timeline in the NLE later on with no rendering expected in the NLE, render that clip to the codec of the timeline. For example, if it’s a DV timeline, render the clip to DV. If it’s an Avid timeline, render to an Avid codec. If the editor uses a Decklink card, render to a Blackmagic codec. Ask your editor first.

4. If you don’t have room for Animation-compressed files, try Photo-JPEG at 89% or 94% or so. It’s the codec of choice for stock footage, so it’s quite fine.

5. Most computers cannot play back Animation-compressed files in real-time, which is a necessity for layoff to tape. Your NLE should play back using a codec that your hard drives and video I/O hardware can handle. If you don’t have special hardware, you are probably using DV in your NLE, so your timeline would be a DV timeline as mentioned before.

Does that help?
Steve