Is my font supposed to be this blurry?

[Jerry Smith]

OK, I see that this is due to turning on 3d. But why should that make the text blurry? Is there any way I can clean this up?

[Derek Boettcher]

Do you have a camera in the comp? Check to see if your text is in focus. Also, check to see if the continuously rasterizr layer option is available, and if it is, check it. You could also right click the text and turn it into shape layers or masks for further control.

Best,
Derek Boettcher
Creative Management
BTH Media Group
https://bthmedia.com

[Jerry Smith]

This happens with the camera off and with rasterize/collapse on.

[Derek Boettcher]

Check to make sure you are viewing it at max quality and not quarter or half. If it isn’t that send me a few screen shots.

Best,
Derek Boettcher
Creative Management
BTH Media Group
https://bthmedia.com

[Jerry Smith]

That is about a 71pt font that is scaled down to 51% and then brought into z=-2050. That is the top of a bolded “I”. I also have the same problem elsewhere with other font sizes. It seems to be purely a 3d problem because it does disappear when I turn off 3d for text at z=0.

[John Cuevas]

Which render engine are you using (Ray Trace or Classic), press cntl+k and switch to the advance tab. If it’s classic, please post a screen grab of your timeline and comp please.

Johnny Cuevas, Editor
ThinkCK

“I have not failed 700 times. I have succeeded in proving that those 700 ways will not work. When I have eliminated the ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work.”
—THOMAS EDISON on inventing the light bulb.

[Jerry Smith]

I had been so busy with other issues that I failed to give much thought to text. Now I realize that neither the camera nor the z value are relevant. Almost all my text is a bit blurry.

I am using Classic. I tried Ray Trace briefly, but to no avail. Adobe explains that Ray Trace doesn’t help with text.

How can I see how blurry the render is? I can get a .mov, but I can’t seem to zoom in with the default mac viewer to see what is going on.

I’m thinking that either this is a well known unfortunate fact about 3d text OR it is some simple setting OR it will look better when rendered.

(I’m pretty clueless about rendering. Despite about 200 hours of AE, I’ve only rendered about 10 things.)

[John Cuevas]

Jerry, when you are saying the text is blurry, are you zooming in to see it? And I mean, magnifying the comp window to 800% or 1600%, because if that’s the case the text, everything will become blurry.

Set your comp viewer to 100%, then either use a camera or select your text layer, press “s” and scale up the text. You will see it’s not blurry at all.

Johnny Cuevas, Editor
ThinkCK

“I have not failed 700 times. I have succeeded in proving that those 700 ways will not work. When I have eliminated the ways that will not work, I will find the way that will work.”
—THOMAS EDISON on inventing the light bulb.

[Jerry Smith]

Thanks John for your patient. And yes, scaling up the text makes me want to believe everything is going to be fine. Buttt, I have worked very hard to make all my edges razor sharp, except for a few that are allowed to have a one pixel transition from black to white. I’ve spent most of the last two weeks zoomed in to the MAX. And now I see text that has a two pixel transition and I am not happy about that. Not happy at all. Furthemore, it definitely goes away when I turn off 3d. Moreover, even in 3d, depending on position, scale, etc, sometimes it goes away.

I’m just confused about something. This is the vector age we are living in. And I assume text is vector based. So, if somebody draws some straight text, like “I” or “T” or “L” then I have assumed that there will be no more than a one pixel transition. And even if we put it in 3d, as long as it is parallel or perpendicular to the earth, then again also there will be no more than a one pixel transition.

Am I wrong about that??

If not, then there must be something wrong with some setting. I am assuming that my RAM preview tells me exactly what my rendered version will contain in terms of sharpness.

[Jerry Smith]

It seems to be a very general problem. I’m surprised that there isn’t more discussion of it online. So, if you take a solid layer. Then put some 70pt text. Then zoom in to the pixel level. You will see one pixel transition from text to non-text. But if you make the text 3d, then you will see two pixel transitions from text. Why??

And while it is not that easy for me to zoom in on a rendered .mov, and the pixels don’t show up the same way, I can still see the traces of those two pixel transitions.