Problem playing back AE7 render files

[Kevin Camp]

you are probably rendering to a codec that is uncompressed or losslessly compressed, so your files are very large and the data rate to play the files in realtime exceeds the limits of your hard drive.

that’s usually not much of a problem, since those types of codecs are designed to maintain quality while going between ae and an nle, dvd authoring software or other compression utility, to reach the final destination. they are called intermediate codecs, and while you won’t be gaining quality in you hdv footage, you won’t be losing any quality by recompressing the footage to transport it to another piece of software.

what is your final destination?

Kevin Camp
Designer – KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW

[Chopper06]

Hi thanks for the prompt reply. Yeh when i am rendering i just go Uncompressed because i dont want to lose anything. When i tried ‘DV Codec’, the size was basically identical to the original, but i thought i was losing quality. Could be my eyes playing tricks because im thinking about compression and loss of quality.
My destination is an internet video. But later i will do projects to DVD etc. Just wanted to deal with this hurdle now.
So if i go to DV Codec as compression instead of Uncompressed, i shouldnt lose quality?

[Kevin Camp]

whenever you use a lossy compression, like dv, you will lose some quality. hdv is a highly compressed codec, it is actually more compressed than dv25 (standard dv) and the data rate is actually lower than dv25… so, i’m not sure how much you would be losing by rendering to dv, it may not be very much.

you can render out to a couple of codecs… maybe try dv, photojpeg, and uncompressed. bring those back into ae, drop them in the same comp and toggle between them to see the differences. if you have to edit in dv, then rendering to the native dv codec that your nle works with maybe a good option.

can your camera shoot in sd? you might just want to shoot sd for now if your not ready for hd… you may be able to use a better compression codec, like dv50, if you shoot standard def. and you wouldn’t need to use ae to downconvert your hd (saves time and disk space). but i don’t know the specifics of your setup or reaasons for your workflow.

Kevin Camp
Designer – KCPQ, KMYQ & KRCW

[Chopper06]

Yeh ive been recording in HDV and downconverting through the camera as i capture it via Firewire. Ive read a few articles/posts where it has been recommended to do this as some believe you get a better picture shooting in HDV then downconverting (as opposed to shooting in regular definition in the first place). When i capture (in Premiere 1.5) the footage is captured using ‘Panasonic DV codec’. When i put the footage in After Effects, then render it using the same codec, i get a file almost same size as the original but it looks to me to have lost a little quality. When i render using ‘No Compression’, i get a giant file that struggles to play back in Media Player.
I suppose this is just the nature of the beast, but ive been capturing and using standard DV footage in Premiere and AE for a few years now and have never had a problem. Large, effects laden AE renders tend to be big, but i hadnt noticed short, unaltered footage becoming so unwieldy too.