Best Codec for exporting animations with alpha channel from FCP timeline

Question

Level 1

8 points

Best Codec for exporting animations with alpha channel from FCP timeline

Whats the best codec for exporting animations (hopefully using loseless compression) that will retain alpha channel, and use the current sequence settings for fps and size?

Currently Im exporting image sequences, but I'd prefer a wrapper.. I don't know much about the 'Animation' export codec.. I did notice that set to current size had some funky value of 753x450 or something.. instead of my current project size of 1920x1080...

Anyhow.. Just seeing what others are doing..

basically Im reading out some titles that I'll end up dropping over video later.. but since they render out so slowly (**** lower 3rds is slow) Im trying to get a jump on the process..

Tx..

Mac Pro, Mac OS X (10.4.10)

Posted on Feb 5, 2009 4:57 PM

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Answer 1

Wherrito

Level 2

185 points

Feb 5, 2009 5:05 PM in response to joe259

I'd use Animation, millions of colors and preserve alpha.
You can also export a TGA image sequence.

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Answer 2

Nick Holmes

Level 7

30,018 points

Feb 5, 2009 5:07 PM in response to joe259

Apple Animation codec with 16 million colors +.
The + is your Alpha channel.

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Answer 3

Wherrito

Level 2

185 points

Feb 5, 2009 5:11 PM in response to Nick Holmes

Oops - yeah, "millions +" there is no "preserve alpha" button in FCP.
(Getting my apps mixed up.)

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Answer 4

Feb 5, 2009 5:14 PM in response to joe259

PNG should do it. I think PNG is lossless (that's what they say, anyway). But realistically, if you use PNG, Animation, or JPG2000 set on highest quality, I'd dare you to tell a difference.

I use PNG because it's supposedly lossless, renders twice as fast as Animation in a FCP timeline, and is usually about half the size.

If you use "Export Using Quicktime Conversion", you will need to check all of the settings manually to make sure they match your sequence settings. This is always true, no matter what codec you use.

If that sounds risky, your other option is to go into your sequence settings and change the codec to the one you want to render to (this will probably turn your whole timeline red), and then choose Export -> Quicktime movie.

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