[Mike Imam]

Hey Dave,

Didn’t do anything to the field settings since there are no fields (right?). The footage is actually 720p (1280×720) and so is the comp, so no scaling going on either.

Just checked the original footage files (the H.264 ones) and they also have the jagged lines so I’m now thinking this has something to do with my camera? Any idea of the cause so I can avoid it next time?

Any way to correct for it in AE?

Thanks a mil.

[Mike Imam]

I know this is an old thread but I ran into the same frustrating problem, and found the (simple) solution here:

https://forums.adobe.com/message/4315608

Looks like you need to have your work area over the portion you want to Rotobrush. Why they force this is anyone’s guess but it worked like a charm for me. Talk about non-intuitive. Hope this helps others.

[Mike Imam]

It is indeed strange, which is why I’m also scratching my head.

As for playback, I’m viewing the results by exporting the clip in ProRes and watching in QT. My ram previews are useful but due to the precise nature of what I’m trying to view I figure outputting was the best method so I could see a true final result.

Hopefully someone out there can explain why the 29.976 timeline options is stunning stutter-free. All I know is it’s working…

Mike

[Mike Imam]

Apologies, I had added that slo-mo info to my first post but not in an obvious manner.

Thanks for the help! Looks like your suggestion is working to some degree, but it’s still a stutter-y for some reason. It appears the thing that has made the biggest difference for me is turning on Frame Blending for the layer. For some reason it’s smoothing everything without any ghosting effects (since the frame information exists so it’s minimizing interpolation, I assume).

The second thing I did is actually put my 59.94 footage into a 29.976 timeline, and those extra frames have made things look a lot better.

Would love to know the logic behind frame blending as I’m not exactly sure why it helped (again, no ghosting and the frame info exists, so by all accounts the motion should not require blending).

[Mike Imam]

Thanks for the quick reply Dave. So be clear, after I drag my 59.94 clips onto my 23.976 timeline I should be ok using Time Stretch to 160%? The goal is to get the clips to play smoothly in slow motion (like they do in VLC reduced to 13x slower). The problem with the method described is that I’m still getting a slightly juddery result (the motion looks jerky rather than smooth). The scene is question is a tracking shot of a man walking down a hallway – the camera follows him from the side.

The end goal of the vid is digital (YouTube, Vimeo and the like) so I think I’ll be ok with H.264 (unless there’s a noted performance difference using ProRes). I usually just output my clips to ProRes as a master file and then compress them to a hi-res H.264 using Quicktime Pro before uploading to the sites.

Thanks
Mike

[Mike Imam]

Amazing – Kevin, this is exactly what I needed. Thanks a mil. Works great!

[Mike Imam]

Ted is right – I’ve had the same problem and employed a similar method as a fix. It’s a bit tedious (depending on how many clips you have) but it’s the simplest way. Did you pre-comp your clips? If so, you could just drag the new footage into the existing precomps, hide the old footage layer and be done with it. This is why it’s sometimes a good idea to use pre-comped clips rather than clips themselves in your timeline: instant global changes.

Either way, I output using ProRes and there was no discernable difference when I re-imported back into AE.

[Mike Imam]

Makes total sense. This is helpful. Thanks for the very complete answer!

[Mike Imam]

Thanks a mil for the help! Didn’t realize the switch was on.

[Mike Imam]

Wow, that is ridiculous. And it’s been driving me mad! I’ve wasted hours on this problem…

Thanks so much for helping. I checked my vid out in VLC and the colors look fine. Is this because I’m using QT7 as opposed to QTX?