[John Adams]

Brilliant! Works like a charm. Massive thanks, Dan
You’ve just saved me hours of removing tracking markers from a greenscreen backdrop by hand.

I’ll have to learn more about “length” as I don’t have a scoobie what it means… but I know it works. Cheers!

Rugged yet hygienic.

[John Adams]

I see says the blind man…. I was looking at the wrong prefs file. I checked the file com.adobe.AfterEffects.plist in the root of the Preferences directory (Mac OSX) and I had no joy. But, Filip, your post got me thinking I must be missing something, and I was.

If anyone else is a numpty like me, then follow the path below and you’ll find the proper prefs file:

~/Library/Preferences/Adobe/After Effects/Adobe After Effects 8.0 Prefs

That’s where this kernel of joy is hiding:

[“Mask Colors”]
“Cycle Label Colors” = 01
“Default Color (0xAARRGGBB)” = “00ffff00”
“Interpolated Mask Dim Factor” = “0.750000”

Ok, I’m off to go hide in a dark corner now.
Cheers all for your help.

Rugged yet hygienic.

[John Adams]

Here’s a timesaver if you’re doing lots of replacing:

– duplicate your comp, open it to the timeline and select the layer you’d like to replace
– drag the new footage to the timeline while holding alt/option and drop it on the target layer

Keyframes, effects, masks, and overall good karma will all stay intact on the new footage.

Rugged yet hygienic.

[John Adams]

Ahh.. so are the mask colours tied to the label colours in the preferences? (I’d check right now but AE is locked up rendering)

Sneaky, that…

Cool, I’ll give it a go, Dave.

My retinas extend their utmost gratitude to you.

Rugged yet hygienic.

[John Adams]

A great company I’ve recently come in contact with is Deep East Music. Their stuff is awesome. Heads above the royalty free dross out there that passes itself off as music. They do bespoke tunes as well. And their client list is pretty impressive (Adidas, Toyota, and Spiderman 3 for those of you into your superheros…). They’re a small company, nice guys to deal with, have taken lots of time with me on the phone when I’ve been looking for tracks.

I know I’m bigging them up quite a bit but coming across truly helpful folks in this business is always a relief, so I want to help spread the sunshine.

OK… I’ll shut up now. Hope you find what you’re looking for.

Their site –> https://www.deepeastmusic.com/

Rugged yet hygienic.

[John Adams]

[Bob Flood] ”
but what about a batch list? this is basically a text version of a bin, with any and all columns visible in your bin showing up as tab delimited text, which can be brought into excel.”

I had to laugh at myself for a good long while before replying, Bob. Thanks for your tip. It’s just what I’m looking for. Was too busy thinking the solution needed something elaborate to see the simple answer in front of my face.

Cheers, Bob, and everyone for their help.

[John Adams]

Big thanks to both Andy & Jamie for their quick and helpful replies.

Andy — I just downloaded the trial of Final Print and although it’s not exactly what I’m looking for it’s a step in the right direction and a huge help.

Jamie — Pilotware sounds interesting. Thanks for the tip. And please do keep me in the loop if your no.2 pulls off some xml wizardry. I’ve got a coder friend working on the same thing for me. I’ll let you know if we get results.

[John Adams]

Click on the clip you want to move, hold down the ‘alt’ key, drag the clip to its new position. You’ll see the cursor change shape (downwards bent arrow). Drop the clip in its new location and *presto* the other clips on timeline will move to accommodate. Works best with snapping on.

Very handy. Hope it helps you out.

[John Adams]

thanks for the advice — i’ve opted to just go with creating my own blow outs, scratches and leaks in AE, then compositing them over top the original video in FCP.

I found GenArts had some stock footage that was perfect but I don’t have the dosh or the time to order it. Maybe for the next project…

Thanks for your tips.

[John Adams]

thanks for the tip about the trial vesion of Sapphire. Some very cool stuff. Unfortunately it’s not quite what I’m looking for, but fun nonetheless. Thanks.