Lower third batch production - easier way?
by Warren Morningstar
on
Oct 30, 2009 at 12:47:54 am
I've created an animated lower third that I now need to output with 60 different names. I thought I could stack the names in the composition and just turn the eyeball on, send to the render queue, turn the next layer eyeball on, send to queue, etc. Nope. The queue doesn't remember the layer settings, it just uses the current settings. So now I'm against a deadline, have a comp with 120 text layers that needs to be rendered out two layers at a time. Any suggestions on how I can send it to the render queue once?
Re: Lower third batch production - easier way? by Stuart Elith on Oct 30, 2009 at 2:56:34 am
I think I would just pre-comp the whole animation except for the name, then have the name on a separate layer. Then you can just duplicate that comp 60 times and change the name for each. It may sound like a bit of work, but you're going to have to type each name out separately anyway, so having all the copies doesn't really matter. And since you precomped the animation, if you do need to change something you can just adjust it once and they'll all update.
I think that's going to be easier than any alternative, I can't think of anything else you can cut down. It really wouldn't take long, just 10 mins of repetitive Open comp, change name, send to queue.
Re: Lower third batch production - easier way? by Dave LaRonde on Oct 30, 2009 at 2:19:47 pm
There may be an easier way: for all those names in one comp, render an image sequence.
You can tell AE to make all these name layers one frame long -- I'm pretty sure the command is Called Sequence Layers -- then just render the sequence and put them over the animated background in your editing application. Don't forget to get the type of Alpha channel right: straight/premultipled.
Dave LaRonde
Sr. Promotion Producer
KCRG-TV (ABC) Cedar Rapids, IA
