First time poster, longtime reader.

Been reading a lot to figure this out. I have shot about 35 interesting timelapses. I have not edited any of them except my first.

http://vimeo.com/12413354

My problem is that I edited this on an AVID, a system I know and that I had access too, but I don't have that AVID to work with now. I just picked up After effects and Premiere Pro CS5. So I am trying to figure the best work flow with these programs.

So far I have taken the image files (JPG) and created an image sequence within QT Pro. I 'saved as' all of them. Should I have exported them instead? The problem I see are the black bars on either side of the image due to the image size Photo-HD Video disparity.

Would it be best to forget the QT Pro image sequence creation and just import directly into After Effects or Premiere Pro? Do I get to retain better image control this way? Does saving the QT Pro image sequence compress the sequence in an adverse way when it flattens the files?

So... if I am importing the image sequence into After Effects, resizing the image and presumably losing the top and bottom of the image sequence, then exporting from After Effects to a Premiere Pro Project, WHY DOES A RED LINE APPEAR ABOVE THE TIMELINE INDICATING THERE IS A PROBLEM. Is this a resolution issue? It will not play nor render. I have a HP Z400 tower with 12 Gigs of Ram (Windows) and have been trying to make this work. Even importing the QT Pro image sequences give me this red line and do not want to play int he timeline.

I feel this is a simple issue that many newbies may encounter so any help will probably be valuable to future viewers-users-time lapsers. Any help will be welcomed and appreciated.

Bonkie

Yes, this is the point to AE. It's made to compile files, add effects, change color, scale, encode, etc.



Yes. You're 'probably' compressing by encoding the files directly out of QT.

Don't know what you're ram preview issue is? Maybe look at the settings?

Ok the settings show that I have 9 gig of ram allocated to After Effects, Premiere, Encore etc... and 3 gig of ram allocated for other programs. Seems about right, but still having the red line not wanting to play or render issue. Hmmm.

Did you play with the previews section and make sure your video drivers are all up to date?

I don't use Premier, only AE, but can't you open your AE project in premier with out rendering it out?
http://help.adobe.com/en_US/aftereffect ... -7fe8.html

You haven't told us what size the jpegs are. If they are larger than the video frame of your AE sequence, you can scale up to crop them out without losing any rez.



Impossible to answer from where I'm sitting but generally, no. After Effects is not where you're going to try to color correct individual images. Do that in Photoshop with batches or other routines that have been discussed here often and extensively.
"Compression" does not seem to be the correct term in this usage. QT Pro will compress your jpegs in many ways if you scale or transcode to a different codec which you have not stated.



The red line does not indicate a problem, it just indicates you cannot play it back in real time. That is a function of many factors such as effects, scaling, frame rate, sequence settings, processor speed--RAM is not really one of them. If you render into RAM, the red line will turn green. Um, that's oversimplifying AE's RAM preview function. It is wildly adjustable.

bogiesan

Thank you all for responding. I will tackle tacking a look at all these points this afternoon. My images are-were shot JPG fine 5616 x 3744, (I know I should do raw) but I am still in timelapse infancy and getting the shots all night long fills up my 32 gig card even in JPG depending on the sequence... subject, etc...

I am using a Canon 5D mk2, and need to learn the AE settings for Ram Preview. Had not dealt with that yet. Will post more later.