Brendan Coots
Forum Replies Created
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You should work in 16-bit and output back to 10-bit uncompressed, TGA sequence etc.
Brendan Coots
Splitvision Digital
http://www.splitvisiondigital.com -
I have a slightly different view on this topic.
When you are a freelancer subcontracting for an ad agency, the situation is a little different than when you are working directly for an end client. In a standard subcontractor agreement, the agency isn’t necessarily paying you simply for some art, they are paying for assistance in completing the project. This almost always includes ownership of all project files, media and intellectual property.
BUT (and this is the key element here) if the agency didn’t ask you to sign a contract saying as much, then they are hosed and you are fully in the right. I would think they would laugh, point and never hire you again if you asked for $50k for After Effects project files they paid you to develop, but that’s a separate issue.
Brendan Coots
Splitvision Digital
http://www.splitvisiondigital.com -
I think it goes without saying that any paid employee should be checking their own work and turning in “proofed” work. This is especially true given the pay grade of artists in this industry.
As for QC, I have my artists proof their own work, then I (as Creative Director) review it, then the Producer reviews it before passing it off to the client. It’s a lot of extra work, but it is worth it when it comes to client confidence, repeat business and reduced revision cycles.
Brendan Coots
Splitvision Digital
http://www.splitvisiondigital.com -
I think my post upstream was misconstrued – In every single case where someone has come to this board for advice because they are getting screwed, they lack any formal written agreement, or their agreement is missing key details. Those who operate on a handshake may think they are being noble and “above the fray,” but all they are doing is injecting unnecessary risk into high-dollar situations. Maybe it’s worked for them so far, but it’s only a matter of time. It’s easy to think that your client is cool enough, and the relationship strong enough, that a contract would only stiffen things and drive a wedge into the relationship. But this is about making sure both sides know what to expect should a wide variety of situations occur, as they often do during any given production. Leave nothing to chance, or risk losing those “bros” at the first whiff of a kink in your well-laid plan.
If I buy an artist for a block of time and the job is cancelled, the artist would be reimbursed. I just don’t have to worry about it because my client contract covers such contingencies. PROTECT YOURSELF.
Brendan Coots
Splitvision Digital
http://www.splitvisiondigital.com -
Go into your project settings and check the box “Match Legacy After Effects Quicktime Gamma Adjustments.” This should help.
Brendan Coots
Splitvision Digital
http://www.splitvisiondigital.com -
While most of our machines have BlackMagic Decklink cards, the two machines this happened on just so happen to have no third party cards of any kind installed. In fact, they are both very much stock configurations apart from OWC RAM (8GB) and the Perian/Flip4Mac combo.
Brendan Coots
Splitvision Digital
http://www.splitvisiondigital.com -
Sticky situation indeed. On the one hand, if there was no explicit agreement that you would be paid for a specific duration, regardless of whether that time would be utilized, then you don’t have a LEGAL argument. At the same time, as a one-time freelancer I understand your plight and this is a lame situation to be in.
Honestly, this happened to me now and then, and I never asked to be paid for lost time, it kinda comes with the territory. The only way to avoid it is to have a contract you ask your clients to sign that specifically stipulates that you are being booked for X number of hours and will be paid for those hours no matter what happens. This way it’s all very out in the open and both parties know exactly what to expect.
Brendan Coots
Splitvision Digital
http://www.splitvisiondigital.com -
Admin assistants can be great, but unless they are already experienced in the business side of your industry, you could find yourself spending the same amount of time guiding, training and managing any assistant-level employee as you currently spend doing the things they would be hired to do. Been there, done that. Also, you should have a plan as to what you and your partner will do with your newly found free time, or you will just end up paying someone else to do your job with no overall increase in productivity and a substantial increase in overhead. In small business land, this isn’t a good idea.
Depending on the situation, I tend to think bringing in a salesperson is a good first hire unless you already have more work than you can handle. This will generate the revenue needed to pay extra salaries and will ensure your second-string employees (such as an admin assistant) have the work to keep them busy and earning their keep. Hiring in a top-down fashion (revenue generating positions first) makes sure you aren’t wasting money having employees with little to do.
Hiring editors, animators and other production crew is a good long-term strategy, but you must have the revenue there to justify a full time hire. Generally speaking, if you spend more annually on contract editors than a full-time editor’s salary would be, then hire one. Otherwise, you risk bleeding cash for no good reason. You also risk high turnover if employees have little to do and always feel like they are struggling to justify their jobs.
Brendan Coots
Splitvision Digital
http://www.splitvisiondigital.com -
For the washed-out issue, it MAY help to enable “Match Legacy After Effects QuickTime Gamma Adjustment” in your project settings, and make sure to do a “purge all” on your ram cache before doing RAM previews. This is to ensure old frames are getting flushed out of RAM and properly replaced with newly rendered frames.
Newer versions of After Effects read gamma metadata from certain codecs and adjusts accordingly. This is great with some source material but it can cause major confusion with others. The “Match Legacy” option basically forces After Effects to ignore this metadata.
The flashing color bars is a little tougher. If I had to guess, it sounds like you might be getting spotty bandwidth on your single-gigabit line. Gigabit can, on average, deliver about 40-60MBps if configured correctly, BUT that says nothing about the consistency of the connection overall. If you download Aja’s free disc speed test and run it, you will see that your connection dips and spikes wildly over a gigabit connection, sometimes jumping between 5MBps and 70MBps from sample to sample. This is the nature of ethernet/TCPIP. It could be that your connection is fluctuating so wildly (from heavy internet or other traffic during renders) that AE literally fails to connect with the source footage here and there, and renders the color bars as a result. I could be wrong here, but it’s the only answer that makes any kind of sense to me.
If this is in fact the problem, a fix will cost a little money – add a second gigabit line to both your mac pro and the machine serving up your footage, and get a router/switch that does link aggregation (802.3ad) so that the two gigabit lines act as one, giving you much more bandwidth/overhead to work with (closer to 90MBps average). The HP Procurve 1800 24G does the job and is a relative bargain at $380.
Brendan Coots
Splitvision Digital
http://www.splitvisiondigital.com -
Rendering interlaced out of a 3D package? Doing so throws away half your available resolution and seems a little pointless (may shave a few seconds off the renders, but still…).
That said, your settings breakdown is correct.
Brendan Coots
Splitvision Digital
http://www.splitvisiondigital.com