Brendan Coots
Forum Replies Created
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Without more info form the poster, there is no way of knowing but if you scan this forum going back 3-4 months, you will see about 20-30 similar threads – “I’m using HDV and it’s going slooooow!” Whatever is going on, the lesson here is people should convert HDV footage to another codec before using it in AE or other apps as it seems better suited to being an acquisition codec, not a production codec.
By the way, HDV is interframe, not intraframe. It’s easy to mix up the two names.
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Sorry but you’re wrong on this. Yes AE expands everything to full 8bit, BUT that says nothing about how fast AE can READ the source material into AE for expansion. Since the HDV codec uses interframe compression like MPEG2 files, AE is going to choke on it, and hard. Every codec can be read at different speeds – some take longer than others to parse and HDV is among the slowest out there. As was mentioned in the first two responses to this thread, RAM is not the issue here.
Maybe you should make certain you are correct before using harsh words towards others.
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Many forums use what’s known as “no-follow” links, meaning search engine spiders will NOT crawl those links to your site. Many search engine spiders won’t crawl message board posts regardless, since they have been a haven for spammers for many years now.
If you want to improve SEO here’s a few ideas:
– Paying for links to your site is a huge boost if done correctly. Find sites with a high page rank and similar topics/subject matter, and offer to pay them to link to your site from their home page. The trick is that the link should contain a keyword you are targeting, such as “Orlando video production.” if this sounds too complicated, consider a link-buying service like text-link-ads.com.
– Make sure text on your site is extremely refined and targeted to your key words. This doesn’t necessarily mean saying “video production” over and over, but your pages should be very well defined, including proper title and keyword metatags.
– Use a program like WebCEO to manage your keyword campaigns. This program helps you decide which key words are worth targeting and optimize your site. Then it shows your site’s rankings for those keywords so you can track results over time.
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My profile seems busted, my sig line doesn’t work either… Or maybe I am just special? Who knows.
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Be wary of the cheaper muslin screens, every last tiny wrinkle will impact the quality of your keys. A good chroma key backdrop should be laminated to foam or some other backing material to keep it flat and wrinkle-free. These types of screens are more expensive but definitely worth it. Go to https://www.bhphotovideo.com and search for “Matthews chroma key” to see some decent backdrops.
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1. Contracts – By using thorough, carefully crafted contracts that cover a variety of potential profit-sappers, we have been able to increase our profit margin quite a bit AND minimize disputes. I’m not talking about things that clients might object to, just making sure that the contract spells out exactly what the client will get for their money, and what is and is not covered under the agreement. If anyone objects to these types of provisions, you have just exposed a Grinder who is angry they won’t be able to totally rob you. When people tell you they do business in this industry on a handshake, they are essentially admitting that they have no control over their profit margin.
2. Careful project planning – By spending the time to plan, script, board etc. you trim a lot of fat. Once you enter production each hour gets very expensive, so every hour of planning is worth pure gold. This includes things like having junior artists provide prep work for the more expensive senior artists, so their time is only spent doing the tasks that require their pricey skill set. All this planning also minimizes revision requests from the client since they have signed off on your storyboards etc.
3. Avoiding the Jonses – Some studios buy every new piece of software or gear out there, under the impression that all this stuff will make them look more impressive to their clients. They also do it under pressure from their artists, who insist that they simply can’t go on without the newest version of something. Resist all of these impulses, and force yourself AND your team to financially justify every single purchase. If needed, your company should make purchases by committee. This way no single interest can dominate spending decisions.
Honestly, if your concern is weathering the coming year I would focus somewhat less on maximizing profit and more on getting a larger percentage of what work IS out there. You can only trim so much fat and you WILL be met with resistance doing so. It is also a long-term process since it requires organizational discipline and total buy-in from everyone. But if you set out to focus your efforts on business development, there is no ceiling and it’s something your entire organization will get behind and support.
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What videos are you comparing your files to? For example, you asked how TV shows and other video play full screen. If you’re referring to DVDs, they play full screen quite smooth, but the video file on the DVD is usually about 4-6GB in size. If you converted your 200MB file to a DVD using a DVD authoring program, it would play back on a TV smoothly as well.
If you need it to play back smoothly on a computer, Flash videos are a good option, it doesn’t really get better than that in terms of file size vs. quality.
Unfortunately, a reality of video production is that file sizes are huge, it’s just comes with the territory. I would suggest putting a second hard drive, maybe 320GB or larger, in your computer just for your video projects.
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Messing with “Max RAM cache size” can have completely unintended consequences, and generally Adobe doesn’t recommend tweaking that setting unless you are experiencing problems this setting specifically addresses.
Your best bet is to:
1. Increase your RAM. After Effects CS3 can easily utilize up to 8GB RAM for previews and rendering. Any less and it will use fewer and fewer processor cores, because it needs about 2GB RAM per CPU core to use them. Go into your Preferences>Multiprocessing tab (make sure multiprocessing is turned on) and it will show you how many cores it is currently taking advantage of. With 4GB RAM I bet it’s only using 2-3 of them.
2. Add a fast hard drive to your system and dedicate it to the Disc Cache for all of your programs. A very small (50GB or something) 10,000RPM drive is perfect for this task, because the system needs to access it as fast or faster than RAM in order for it to be useful. By adding this drive, enabling disc cache and giving AE about 4GB for Cache, you should be able to greatly extend your previews without having to reduce quality.
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Personally, if I had never read this thread and randomly came across the name “Blue Cow Creative” I would never in a million years have made the connection to Creative Cow. And I certainly wouldn’t have thought “wow, they must have stolen this name!” I really don’t see what the controversy is, but that’s just me.
I also don’t think a lawsuit would result in anything but a LOT of wasted money for both sides. One legal test of infringement is whether a reasonable person would be confused and think the infringing company was the same entity as the plaintiff. Well, I’m reasonable enough and I didn’t see the connection. Besides, one is a media production company and the other is an industry website/magazine – how could any reasonable consumer get confused when they aren’t even in the same business?
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Personally I think you’re asking the wrong question. The question is, how MUCH do you like the client and how MUCH do you need the work? You’re not a slave, you get to choose which jobs to take and which to pass on. If you need a vacation, tell them you aren’t available. If you like the client or need the money, take the job. But by charging a large premium simply because the timing is inconvenient for you is probably going to damage your relationship with the client and isn’t entirely fair business practice.
Rush fees are another issue, and if that turnaround is too quick for your shop then by all means apply a rush charge. Nothing too out of the ordinary there.