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Keying workflow – better way?
Is there a better, more efficient way to do this?
I have HDV green screen video, captured and encoded with the Cineform intermediate codec. I bring it into AE to cut the key with Keylight. I want to add moving graphics in the background, timed to the audio. However, I can’t seem to get enough of my timeline to play in preview so I can really tell what I’m doing. So I export the matted footage back to Premiere, and composite there, which involves more rendering. It would seem more efficient if I could do everything in AE. Suggestions?Many thanks.
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3 Replies
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you can fit more (longer duration) of a render into available ram by decreasing the resolution of the preview. at the bottom of the preview windo there is a pulldown that probably says 100%, change that to 50%, for example, allows you will fit 4x the preview length into available ram, so that may help you out some. note, it will not effect your final render resolution.
you can also set the time controls to start the preview from the current position in the time line rather than previewing from the beginning of the comp every time. if needed, bring the time controls up from the windows menu.
you can also adjust the comp’s in and out times to work just on sections of your comp, just hit ‘b’ to set the beginning of the section and ‘n’ to set the end point then you just preview the section you are working on. this, however, will effect the final render if you don’t set your in and out points back to the original in and out.
working with audio timing, i’ll usually use layer markers as visuals references to audio queues. i’ll often add them to the audio layer, but if the audio and timing is complex, you can add them to multiple null layers (or any layers) to separate, say, beat queues from voice queues… to easily add markers to a layer, select the layer, then hit the decimal on the numeric key pad to hear the audio only. hit the asterisk key (on the numeric key pad) to add a marker as you listen to the audio. you may not see anything as you are listening to the audio, but when you stop you will see the markers.
then you can refine teh marker positions but holding the option (mac)/alt (pc) key and drag the time cursor in the timeline or preview a sort portion by holding time cursor still while holding down option/alt, then just drag/add the markers as needed. you can also label the markers if needed.
Kevin Camp
Senior Designer
KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW -
Thanks Dave. Good points. I use Cineform Aspect to convert my HDV footage before editing. It’s my understanding that Aspect recreates the intermediate frames, removing the temporal compression. It certainly makes the files much bigger
. And it may be that AE is chocking on all that data. I have 3 gigs of RAM, and I think I’ve got the switches set so that AE can see most of it, but I’m not an expert… -
Thanks, Kevin. I’ve tried reducing the size of the preview screen, running all my layers in draft mode, setting the resolution to 1/4, and I can still only get about 3-4 seconds in ram preview. I have 3 gigs of RAM available for AE, and I think I’ve got the switches set so that Windows will use it. Maybe it’s just too much data.
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