[Mathew Fuller]

First you need to know if you are working in 32 bit? 16 bit? Log or Linear color space?

Most likely dpx sequences.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_Picture_Exchange

Keep in mind you will need to add an adjustment layer on top of your footage with the cineon converter effect added to see the color space properly.

[Mathew Fuller]

One thing you can do in these situations if all else fails…

If you can get your movie to RAM preview… get as much as you can in RAM.. you may have to split it into chunks… I had to do this once.. I had a comp that WOULD NOT RENDER…

Then go to Composition > Save RAM Preview… and save it as a QT movie or series of movies if you need to… this is a good way to get around problems you just can’t seem to solve.

[Mathew Fuller]

Also.

Turn off openGL when rendering.

Turn Capslock on to disable preview render.

[Mathew Fuller]

Just remember… there are different kinds of Raid setups. Raid 5,6,0, JBOD etc…

For uncompressed you would use Raid-5 I believe… read online about the differences… some allow you to have a drive fail and recover… others don’t and just allow for speed.. but if you lose a drive you are screwed…

If it is uncompressed HD your regular internal hard drive will never play it back correctly…. I can promise you that.

[Mathew Fuller]

Your video I would imagine is uncompressed and your hard drive is not fast enough to play the uncompressed video at 1920X1080… you would need to be running a RAID-5 or something like that to get smooth playback with uncompressed HD.

Just because it is playing back poorly doesn’t mean the video is messed up.. you just don’t have the hard drive speed… hope that makes sense.

Compress your video once rendered using one of the many compression tools available.

Also… if you plan on getting into post production… get used to using Quicktime movies… I have been a VFX artist for 10 years.. and I can assure you the industry loves this format. I have never worked with an AVI or WMV in 10 years.

Even if thats what is supplied by the client… I convert all footage to QT before I get started.

[Mathew Fuller]

You can use a program called Automatic Duck… it goes from Final Cut to AE and splits all of your edit points into layers… with transitions coming across… it does have some limitations though..

If it’s just a few shots… just export QT movies.. import into After FX and Roto Roto Roto..

~ Mat

[Mathew Fuller]

I just started creating tutorials for creative cow…. and I’m adding one a week at this point…. so how can I not recommend my own tutorials?… right?… I promise I have some good stuff in the coming weeks.

Tut 01:
https://library.creativecow.net/fuller_mathew/AE-Parenting-Possibilities/1

Tut 02
https://library.creativecow.net/fuller_mathew/AE_Advanced-2-5D-Animation/1

~ Me

[Mathew Fuller]

If you are using something like a Blackmagic card for output to a preview monitor.. and your Blackmagic output is set to SD/29.97 for instance but your comp is HD/23.976… you can get this problem as well.

[Mathew Fuller]

Hope the following helps:

These Expressioss can be used to make a connector that stretches like a rubber band between two layers, which by default are named
“End 1” and “End 2”. Obviously you can change these names to anything you like. The connector layer wants to be a horizontal
rectangle, with the anchor point of the layer moved to the left center edge of the layer.

The connector has 3 separate expressions applied to it: one for position, one for rotation and one for scale. The Expressions are
listed separately below.

// apply this Expression to the Connector layer’s Position parameter
// set follow1 below to the name of the first layer to follow
follow1 = “End 1”
this_comp.layer(follow1).position
________________
// apply this Expression to Connector layer’s Rotation parameter
// set follow2 below to the name of second layer to follow
follow2 = “End 2”
diff = sub(position,this_comp.layer(follow2).position);
(Math.atan2(diff[1],diff[0]) * 180/Math.PI) + 180
________________
// apply this Expression to Connector layer’s Scale parameter
// set follow2 below to the name of second layer to follow
follow2 = “End 2”
stretch = length(position,this_comp.layer(follow2).position);
[stretch,scale[1]];

[Mathew Fuller]

The matte choke has a few ways to soften the choke dont just use the default.

Also if you don’t have the “Key Correct” plugin… I think it is very hard to deal with many of the problems you are having.

You can also try and get rid of the spill on the shirt via the spill sponge in Primatte.