[Dave Forrest]

Thanks guys,

I guess I was typing my last queeries just as you were answering them!

Ok – so, regardless of what the text looks like, come render time, it’s going to come out looking sweet and smooth and also be the right size and shape? If so, that’s great! No worries!

Thanks,

Dave.

[Dave Forrest]

Thanks – it was the pixel aspect ratio toggle.

But – when that switch is off – is it showing me how the final result is actually going to look? Because if so, that’s no good – it looks terrible – the text is smoother, granted, but it’s also elongated!

My footage is DV NTSC Widescreen (1.20) 720 x 480. Even when I create a new composition with this footage (by dragging it over the new comp icon in the project panel) it displays it in the monitor with the PARC off and it’s all squashed up. To view it at its ‘normal size and shape’ (the way it displays in Premiere and on a TV screen) I have to switch PARC on – and the image looks terrible…?

I realise this whole PARC thing is a bit of a nightmare – the HELP section in AE trys to explain it but quite unsuccesfully. What I need to know is – which setting (PARC on or off) do I use to view exactly what the end result will be?

Thanks,

Dave.

[Dave Forrest]

Oh well. That’s a shame.

Many thanks Jeff.

Dave.

[Dave Forrest]

Joe, you’re a life saver – that is a far more practical way to do it.

I guess the trade off is that every time you link back to the main menu from a sub menu, the animation plays. Or is there a way to link back to the loop point in the video perhaps?

Dave.

[Dave Forrest]

Yes, I have a short 8 second animation rendered out as a QT movie. I have imported it into Encore, created a new timeline for it and set its end action to go to a menu. The menu is a still image – I have simply rendered out the final frame of the animation as a Photoshop file.

Dave.

[Dave Forrest]

Thanks for the feedback. I think I’ll pass on it for now.

Hunter – LOVE ‘The Defenders of Stan’ – very funny stuff! In the first episode you fade from a comic book still to live action – this was what I was hoping to acheive with ‘ToonIt’ except I wanted the comic book still frame to move as it faded into the live action. In retrospect and having seen your work, perhaps it doesn’t really need to move after all.

I’ve been taking stills from my footage into Photoshop and applying the ‘cutout’ and ‘posterise’ filters as well as a few other steps to create some black outlines. One thing I’m struggling with is the ‘print texture’ that you seem to have nailed pretty well. Mind if I ask how you get that ‘dotty’ appearance?

Dave.

[Dave Forrest]

Thanks Kevin,

I’ll definitely try both of those suggestions.

The clip is about 6 minutes long. My PC has 3 GIG of RAM.

Dave.

[Dave Forrest]

Kevin,

In the ‘Export Movie Settings’ dialogue box the menu on the left has an ‘Audio’ option. Selecting it gives me no less than 5 pull down menus.

The first one is ‘compressor’ – the only option available is ‘uncompressed’.

Then we have ‘sample rate’ – options: 32000, 44100 and 48000 Hz.

The next is ‘sample type’ – 16 bit is the only option.

Next is ‘channels’ – Mono or stereo.

Finally there is ‘interleave’ – none, 1 frame, 1/2 second, 1 second, 2 seconds.

Thanks,

Dave.

[Dave Forrest]

When I hit Export Movie from the File Menu in Premier CS3 a Windows dialougue box appears called ‘Export Movie’. I can either hit ‘save’, ‘cancel’ or ‘settings’. If I hit ‘settings’ it opens up a Premier dialougue box called ‘Export Movie Settings’ by selecting ‘Video’ from a menu on the left I have a ‘Compressor’ option. It is currently set at DV NTSC. There is a drop down menu – I can choose from DV (24p Advanced), DVNTSC or DV PAL. Seems to me like I’d choose DV NTSC. Still no mention of codecs but The ‘Help’ section refers to a codec as a compressor!?

This probably isn’t helping at all is it…

Dave.

[Dave Forrest]

OK, I sense my lack of knowledge is becoming a little tiresome – please bear with me.

The AVI file was rendered out of Premier. I honestly don’t know what codec was used, only that I never had the option to choose one or anything like that. I’d guess that whatever Premiers ‘default’ codec is (if there is such a thing) – that’s the codec that was used.

Dave.