PhotoShop File Too Big for After Effects!?!? Please Help

[Sam Moulton]

first question, in your planned comp are you going to be at 100% scale at some time? If not, then you don’t need all those pixels.

[Empathetic1636]

Im bringing that huge 8720X5813 PSD into a 720X480 Comp, so I can animate the camera around it. There will not ever be a time where I need to see the entire 8720 image at once.

[Sam Moulton]

so I guess you’re planning to push in and see about 8% of the image? If that’s the case, then you have several options. The one I use for really huge pan and scan projects is to cut up the photoshop file into smaller slices and match them as needed in AE so I never have more than about 4X the comp size in the project at a time.

If you’re not going in that close, say in to about a quarter of the image then all you need is about 2500 pixels in width…

[Empathetic1636]

I will be going in pretty tight.

I should say unfortunately I have already animated the camera moves. (I used a 8720 X 5813 Jpeg as a reference) So, If I could keep all of the pixels so that I wont have to redo the camera moves that would be amazing on my end.

So, I would cut the image up into say maybe 4 sections. Do I take the sections into AfterFx as 4 separate Comps, piece them together and then PreCompose, and then use that as my main file to pan/scan with my 3D Camera? And would this make my life easier?

Thanks So Much for all of your help by the way. Its pretty amazing at how helpful you have been.

[Sam Moulton]

you could just cut your image in quarters by taking the original and using the canvas size tool to make 4 new versions that were half as wide and high. Now each of these 4 new photoshop comps would be brought into AE comps. Create a new standard sized comp and bring the four comps into the standard comps. You then move the anchor points to the appropriate corners. Upper left comp would have the anchor point moved to the lower right, lower left comp to the upper right and so on so that when the position is at the default the comps are exactly lined up. Now you can take your pan and scan moves and add them to the existing camera. You should have faster renders and fewer problems.

let me know if this works. I’ve done it a lot, just never with photoshop files with 115 layers.

[Majorasshole]

Rather than cutting and seaming the image itself
Also, try moving some layers to seperate PSDs and import multiple PSDs with 20 layers each instead of one with 115.
Flatten/merge as many layers together as you can, and flatten any effects so its just pixels.

And that said. thats a hell of a lot of layers and very high resolution. I wouldnt comp a feature film at once using assets that data heavy. The pros break it all into less system taxing elements because of experience. You may have to wait weeks for your final render.