[Tim Kurkoski]

Another tip- if you have your comp zoom set to “Fit”, your zoom may end up at a fractional value, which can cause issues with vector art. Change your zoom to 100% to get a true preview and it should look smoother.

[Tim Kurkoski]

Blending Modes (aka Transfer Modes) are your answer. If the term isn’t familiar, look it up in the help files. Usually, you just try the different modes to see what looks best, there’s no right answer for every case.

[Tim Kurkoski]

Try this:
Roll back your system date and time to before Photoshop stopped working.
If Photoshop now opens, go to Help > Adobe Online, and set it never to look for updates.
Then set the date and time back to current.

[Tim Kurkoski]

Yes, resolution is a challenge for you on this project.

First, decide on your output format, and use that resolution for your project settings. If you’re going out to video resolution (tape or DVD), do one of the following:

a. When you do your screen captures, set the application to capture at video resolution size- 720×480 or 640×480.
b. When you place your screen capture footage into the video-sized project, don’t scale it down. Leave it at or near 100%, but animate the screen so the area visible is what is being focused on.

If your output is going to be for a larger size, to fit the screen capture at 100%, you’ll need to either scale up the video to match (which could be ugly), or let the video play with a border around it. The upside of the latter option is that you can get creative with the border.

[Tim Kurkoski]

Make sure you’re going to the right preferences folder. Applications store their preferences in your user folder: Users//Library/Preferences. Specifically for AE, there’s an Adobe/After Effects/7.0 directory in there.

Trashing the plist files don’t usually do anything. They contain a minimal amount of system-related data about things like the position of the application window on screen.

[Tim Kurkoski]

It doesn’t matter what company makes the tools you use. What matters is what the final product looks like.

What determines which tool you use in particular is determined by how comfortable you are with the given tool. If you’ve been using a particular tool for a while, even if it’s outdated and lacking in fancy features, if you can make it do what you want, what does it matter?

To draw a quick and dirty analogy, let’s talk about a crescent wrench. You use a wrench made by Stanley. Your friend uses a wrench made by Craftsman. Your friend insists that the company should switch to Craftsman tools because he likes the grips they put on the tools. You don’t honestly care, because your Stanley wrench works, and you aren’t bothered by the grip.

This analogy falls apart in the computer world sometimes. Exchanging files with other people, for example, can be a headache if people are using different applications. But if you’re working on a project solo, and can produce the output you and/or the client desire, who cares where it comes from?

So ask your friends that if the “industry standard” was to jump off a cliff, would they do it too? It doesn’t matter what other people do, what matters is how YOU like to do it, that you’re comfortable with how you do it, and that you get the output you want and your clients are happy (and giving you lots of money because of it).

Oh, and Mac vs. Windows is irrelevant, same argument as above. Tell your friends to grow up. (I like them both, I use them both.)

[Tim Kurkoski]

Yes.

[Tim Kurkoski]

I had this problem on some newer G5’s in our office. Here’s how to fix:

1. Go to Applications/Utilties and open Audio Midi Setup.
2. Under the Audio Output section change the format to 44100.

These new G5’s (and the MacTels also, I think) are shipping with newer sound cards that support audio rates above what AE can support. Hence, the error.

[Tim Kurkoski]

You need to go into the mask properties and specifically select the Mask Shape property. Then copy and paste into the position property.

If you select just the mask, the whole mask and all of it’s properties (feather, expansion, etc.) are selected. That’s excess data for a motion path, as all you need is the vector data, which is contained in the Mask Shape property.

[Tim Kurkoski]

I’ve used the TechSmith codec with Premiere Pro just fine before. The problem is likely due to resolution. You’re probably capturing at 800×600 or some other computer screen-sized resolution. But unless you’ve changed them, your project settings are at video (DV) resolution: 720×480 (or 576 for PAL). That means the video has to be reduced, and some pixels are getting tossed out, and depending on the content and the detail in it, Premiere may not be doing it in the most optimal way.

The best solution is for you to create a project with custom settings that match the resolution, frame rate, and codec of your captured video. This should work as long as you don’t need to combine it with real video footage. In which case you’re probably still best off editing the screen capture footage in it’s own project, then exporting AVI files at DV resolution to be used with your other footage.