Aharon Rabinowitz
Forum Replies Created
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“I don’t understand why everyone doesn’t just avoid squishing or stretching these pixels by just working at 720×486 D1 in the first place in both after effects and photoshop.”
The reason I don’t is Because the PAR correction views in both AE and PS suck. Everything is jagged. You can’t really see what it will look like.
I don’t know about you, but when I have 2 days for turn around on a project, I want no surprises. Not being able to see my artwork clearly is something I try to avoid.
Now if they would work out the kinks on that feature, I might be more inclined to do it that way.
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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
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Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com -
“Brian Maffitt at Total Training recommends that resolution, and the Good Herr Maffitt has never steered me wrong. I trust the gent.”
And he knows a lot. I have the DVD’s myself. But I don’t agree with everything on there as being the best way to do something. Not that they aren’t extremely helpful, and an essential to any training library.
“I would rather squeeze pixels than stretch pixels, which is what you do if you work in 648×486, the other popular square-pixel resolution… even if it does fit automatically into 720×486.”
Why is squeezing better than stretching? just because the pixels stretch automatically, doesn’t mean they’re being distorted. Think about it – NTSC DV Widescreen and non-widescreen have the same exact resolution 720×480 (check the comp settings in AE)- They just have different PAR’s – clearly things are being squished and stretched, and yet we work at the same resolution for both. So there really must not be distortion when the pixels are stretched to fit in the proper aspect ratio. They have to be unstreched or squished to get back onto your TV and look proper.
“I just highlight my 720×540 layer, use the command-option-f keystroke combination (mac) and I’m done.”
Right but what you are actually doing is changing the aspect ratio (thereby stretching the pixels) and then shrinking it to fit. If the change in PAR is distorting things, you’ve now done it twice. And you’ve obscured some of your image by hiding pixels.
Of course, the 648×486 resolution is also built into AE, but that leads me to my third reason….
Makes you wonder why it’s there, right. Once I realized that the square pixel equivilent was 648×486, I saw that AE had that setting – I didn’t even notice it before that.
Oh well… The fact is, I’m a big talker, but how much do I really know. Thus this posting to begin with.
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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
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Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com -
I think this applies to both still images and video footage you create.
The point of my question is this –
The only alteration to the footage that is 648×486 when droped in a 720 comp is that the pixels are stretched. But any square pixel image is stretched when dropped into a non-square comp. And that’s not really an alteration or loss of quality in the image. If it were, it would be an industry standard to NEVER work in square pixels, since there would be a generation loss right at the begining.
It’s been my experience that woking at 648×486 and dropping it into a 720×486 comp yields results as good or better than 720×540. And less work – since you don’t need to resize. There’s no reason that you should create art or video, and then have to squish it down, if there is a better alternative.
To my knowledge, there is no broadcast system that uses square pixels (I could be wrong about this), or at least not one that uses 720×540 – so what’s up with 720×540? Why do people use it, or say to use it.
I feel like at some point someone said it was the right thing to do, and then people just continued to do so, without thinking about a better alternative.
Thanks.
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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
—————————————-
Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com -
Try the effect called “Lightning” and “Advanced Lightning.” i think they are both under the Effects > Render Menu – Don’t have AE in front of me… Not sure if advanced Lighting only comes with the Pro version.
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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
—————————————-
Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com -
“Are they all doing it wrong then?”
In my opinion, for what it’s worth, YES. Most people say to do it this way, but it’s been my experience that if you plan on going to 720×486, you build your art in the square pixel equivilent of your non-square pixel comp – which is 648×486. Do the math – 0.9 x 720 = 648. The 486 (height) is not being stretched, so it stays the same.
Try this: If you make something 720×540 in square pixels, and drop it into a 270×486 (0.9) comp – then you will see that the image is too big. It needs to be shrunk down to 90% of it’s full size to fit properly. But if you make something in square pixels at 648×486 and drop it into the 720×486 (0.9) comp, it will automatically adjust itself – thanks to some help from AE’s PAR correction tools.
If you read Dr. Strange Pixel, you will see he says the same thing – the square pixel equivilent of 720×486 is 648×486.
One thing to think about – A pixel is a given size. It doesn’t change unless your PAR is changing. When you shrink something down to 50%, you are hiding every other pixel so it can fit into half the space – right? You can;t make the pixel any smaller, so it has to hide the pixels instead and tighten up the ones it’s showing. In may cases, it’s not noticebale, but sooner or later, especially in high contrast images moving and scaling up and down , you will see a shimmer or pixelation as pixels hide and show themselves over and over again.
If you shrink something down, you may have a problem – often/usually not, but sometimes it can be a real pain…
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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
—————————————-
Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com -
“Fairly” is about right – It’s passable, but not really good. In this case, since none of the elements are real, and you have total control over them, why not plan ahead?
Also, If you really want to play with slow motion, check out Twixtor from Revision FX – https://www.revisionfx.com – by far the best plug-in for playing with time.
I think we have a revision FX forum here as well. They can help you use the plug-ins if you run into trouble.
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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
—————————————-
Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com -
No matter what, Pixel ASpect Ratio Correction allways looks jagged – so ignore that. It’s only to give you a rough idea
of what it will look like.I might have missed this, but make sure your render settings are set to “Best Setting” and not “current settings”
Also, a lot of people make this mistake – even the experts – the correct square pixel equivilent for 720×486 (0.9) is 648×486 not 720×540. If you work at 720×540, you have to shrink it down by 10% which may create bad pixles.
If you use the resolution I just gave you (648×486 – there is a preset for it in AE, just like 720×540 and 720×486), and then take that comp and nest it into a 720×486 comp, everything should adjust itself automatically to look correct when you render.
If it still doesn’t work, run a test: Render at the square pixel aspect ratio – if it looks good, then import the video into AE and drop it into a comp at 720×486. Render. If it looks bad at either step, you may have some a problem with your renderer, though I can honestly not say what that would be.
Also, there is a Zaxwerks forum, here at the cow. If none of this helps, maybe they’ve seen this problem before.
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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
—————————————-
Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com -
I don;t have a lot of experience using Zaxwerks (a free plug-in that comes with AE Pro, non-educational), but it is designed to do this sort of stuff. You make your text (and logos) in Illustrator, and then Zax turns it into 3D objects.
For more info go to https://www.Zaxwerks.com/ and there is a Zaxwerks forum here at the cow if you have questions.
I should point out that in the War of The worlds ad – the text doesn’t actually fip, so it may not really be 3D. could be text that has a Bevel effect applied to it, and then the AE effect called CC Lightsweep which passes over it.
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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
—————————————-
Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com -
It’s important to note that if you don’t have your footage at a high frame rate, when you slow your footage down, it’s going to play a bit choppy.
When I plan on doing slowmo, I like to render things out of my 3D program at 240 FPS, or to slow every thing down in my 3D program to 1/8 the normal speed.
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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
—————————————-
Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com -
I’ve been on a vacation from everything but work…
Hi there! Welcome!
…and now, back to work.
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Aharon Rabinowitz
aharon(AT)yahoo(DOT)com
http://www.allbetsareoff.com
—————————————-
Creative Cow Master Series DVD
particleIllusion Fusion Volume 1
available @ http://www.pIllusionFusion.com