Dissolves clipping on export when “use maximum render quality” is checked

[Tim Kolb]

I haven’t run into anything like that, though if you’re exporting to matched frame settings, “max render quality” won’t gain you anything but export time…

Max render quality is intended to be used for converting framesizes or PAR…a 1080i sequence exported to 720p for instance.

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

Adobe Certified Instructor

[Richard Angle]

Thanks for the response Tim. I am still a bit unsure of what exactly the “use max render” setting does. I think read that it could help in scaling 1080 to 720 and I do this quite often. I shoot some projects in 1080p and keyframe zoom and pan animation into the unoperated “wide shot” before scaling down to a final 720 p output for web use. Seemed to me that the Max Render setting would benefit me but I have yet to do any real tests.

This is a very real issue and I find it unusual that more people aren’t posting about it. I find a few posts all the way back to Sept of 2011 on the subject (CS5.5) but that is about it. The whole Creative Cow thread was re-posted on Adobe’s site where people were saying that it is not a bug. I’m sorry, but I truly believe it is indeed a bug, and a pretty serious one at that.

I ran a few further tests last night. The dissolve clips happen not only on “Match Sequence Settings” export but also on H.264 renders. The culprit is the “Use Max Render” setting. If it doesn’t work correctly, then I’m of the opinion that Adobe address the issue as soon as possible.

On a tech note, this whole issue reminds me an awfully lot of that little luminance shift issue that FCP had back in the days between versions 1.0 and 1.1. Any of you guys remember the text FCP shift of death back around the turn of the century?

I have two jpeg still dissolve frames that I’d like to share to illustrate the issue. The first below is a frame grab directly from my timeline while the second is the corresponding frame from the export of a sequence with “Match Sequence settings” and “Use Max Render” both enabled. The chosen still frame is the last frame before it jumps to 100% transparency on the exported file. Which is a good three or four frames before the timeline video reaches 100% transparency. This is my first time trying to post pics. My apologies if the links don’t show up.

Thanks everybody and please see the two stills below.

[Richard Angle]

My apologies all. Please allow me to rephrase the picture explanations from my original posting a few min ago.

The first still frame is of the exported test file. The second picture on the bottom is its corresponding frame grab directly from the timeline. The still frame was chosen as the first frame following the abrupt 100% transparency on the exported test file. This point is a good three or four frames before the dissolve on the timeline truly ends.

In motion, it causes a very abrupt incoming and outgoing clip on each and every dissolve.

Please see pics in original post and disregard last paragraph.

Thanks,
Richard Angle

[Tim Kolb]

Well…I edit 720 with 1080 footage and do the “2 composition” thing too. (I’m doing it today as a matter of fact.) I use “max render quality” in those cases and I think it does have a benefit, but it does take longer to output.

If it’s a bug, I agree it should be fixed…but I don’t have this problem, so I suspect there may be another factor? A particular plugin? A certain display card driver version?

Has anyone trouble shot this looking for common software/hardware components among those having the problem?

TimK,
Director, Consultant
Kolb Productions,

Adobe Certified Instructor

[Richard Angle]

Hi Tim. Thanks for your help with this. I did some further tests rendering six different codecs at different frame sizes and data rates. All of them rendered perfectly with “Use Max Render” deselected while every render with “Use Max Render” selected clipped the dissolve. I think I agree with you that it must be a hardware triggered issue. It’s just strange that it only happens on rendered material. Since it is rendered material, wouldn’t this rule out any weirdness from the video card? The past posts I read on the issue were all in regard to CUDA. I am just using the HP 3000 onboard video card on my system for the time being.

Please allow me to make one final correction in regard to my description of what is specifically happening. The exported file does not clip out of the dissolve early as I had previously thought. Rather, the dissolve continues through to the tail end of the dissolve and sort of freezes the luminosity for the last 3 or 4 frames of the dissolve. It does just the opposite at the onset of each dissolve. It’s difficult to put into words but that’s the best I can describe it.

If anybody could see if their exports might be behaving in the same manner, then maybe we could figure out what’s going on here. “Use Max Render” is however definitely affecting or being affected by something. Just don’t know what yet. I’d certainly rather be rendering at the highest quality possible, even if it does dramatically increase render times. But I can’t sacrifice my dissolves. Thanks all…

[Richard Angle]

Can anybody offer any suggestions to this issue? Every time I turn around, something else is bugging out with this program. Please someone help me determine what is going on here.

I’ve experienced fades and dissolves not working linearly.
I’ve experienced .mts files not playing back audio.
I’ve had to can two days of rough cutting simply because it was impossible to relink my files. (grey diagonal lines though conformed footage.

I’m serious in saying that every single project presents itself with an astounding bug that costs me days of work!

Somebody, please. Can you reread this posting and help me get to the bottom of this. I literally cant finish a multi thousand dollar project because I can’t get my fonts to fade up evenly. The exact same project was flawless when outputting the approval file a week ago. Now I can’t output the final.

Please?
Richard Angle

[Douglas Stevens]

Thank you so much for posting this!!! It solved the problem that I describe below and which I just posted on the Creative Cow forum. You have given me back my weekend.
When I de-selected Use Maximum Render Quality on the Encoder I got my five second dissolves back.

Hopefully this will help someone else as confused as I was.