Ok, I know we used to be able to render out quicktime files with no problem using the older versions of blender and adding an alpha channel to the file as well. I just started using the Blender Beta 2.53 and I do not see the quicktime export in the output settings. All I want to do is have a Quicktime file render with an alpha channel so I can float my creation in After Effects. If anyone has the the answer for the Quicktime files or the next best thing for me to use that can handle alpha channels. this would be much appreciated:confused:… Please Advise…
What version are you using? If it’s the 64bit Windows, this does not include QuickTime.
The latest beta is 2.54 by the way
My Bad… It is beta 2.54 64bit. I have 2.54 32bit, too. It is in there. Thanks Richard. Do you know if it will be added to the 64bit version any time soon?
Not sure that 2.5 offers uncompressed RGB in quicktime wrapper at all via FFMPEG. Doesn’t seem to work selecting codec as none.
I’m on Linux so don’t know if Apple Quicktime / Pro works, do you have that installed, it may not be available even through 2.5, may not have been transferred over in the encoding options GUI’s from 2.4xx
Why not just render 16bit tif image sequences?
quicktime player ( pro version ) accepts image sequences, I think. just render to format png, with settings RGBA and premul.
Apple doesn’t support quicktime for Windows 64bit, and don’t think they have plans anytime soon. I’m on Win7 64bit and I’ve had nothing but nightmares trying to get quicktime to play nice (even though quicktime “runs” on Win7 64bit). Even just playing videos on quicktime, compared to VLC and Windows Media Player, it leaves a lot to be desired.
Once I just switched to image renders with alpha for animations, I stopped wanting to take a bath with a toaster.
Here’s what I would do …
For every digital output that you produce except “the final print,” use the MultiLayer output format. (This is based on OpenEXR.) This format is high-precision, “loss-less,” and captures multiple layers of information separately. It is specifically designed to be “a render-output or intermediate-working-file format” not “a final-image format.”
Who cares that the files are comparatively large. (I saw a 2 terabyte external disk drive for sale recently at … Wal-Mart. “On sale today.”)
You generate all of your material in this format, up-to and including the “final print.” Now, you generate files for distribution, which are all copies of that “final print.” QuickTime is one of the formats that you can use. You can print just as many different variations as your needs may require … and every single one of them stands alone from all the rest. None of them are “the ‘final print.’”
The only time when you “throw-away data” is when you are producing these distribution files. And at that point in the process, you don’t care, because you are not actually throwing anything away such that you do not have another, pristine copy of it.
Does Blender’s stuffed up multilayer OpenEXR import into AE without issue? No upside down, mirrored or sluggish performance? That’s useful to know.
Just render to a PNG sequence and enable RGBA.
Apple doesn’t support quicktime for Windows 64bit,
I use Quicktime 7 pro on XP 64 and it works fine. Except with Blender. Which is a Blender bug, not an Apple or Windows bug.
As far as I can tell, Blender on windows does not support Quicktime correctly (never has in my many years of use). It may be due to the fact that the developers mainly use Linux and are not actual video editors or motion artists. If you work with quicktime daily, you understand what it is supposed to do. Then you try to get output from Blender in the Quicktime format and you will see failure.
It does work better on OSX, however.
Hi! I’ve bought the Action Essentials 2 from videocopilot.net. This is a package of quicktime movies, all with alpha channel. These are made for Adobe After Effects and work fine there. In Blender some of them work great (I’m on Win XP 32 bit using Blender 2.59), with alpha channel and so on. But it looks like Blender cannot read the alpha channel from other files from the same package. I’m still investigating the problem there, but it seems like a bug of some sort. But the “repro” is 100% on these files. Some work great, some doesn’t. In AE they all work just fine. I’m only speaking about the alpha channel.
Maybe someone has a workaround for that problem? Could you recommend a software that is free and capable of exporting quicktime to a series of PNGs? With alpha of course?
Best regards,
MSZ
EDIT: I’ve found a workaround - you have to buy Quicktime Pro, and export mov file as image sequence. You can choose PNGs, and that will support alpha channel. That’s the cheapest solution here, as far as I know.
It imports well, but I wouldn’t recommend using blender’s multilayer in AE. I composite blender’s passes in AE on a daily basis and I prefer to spend some time to extract passes in blender and import separate sequences to AE, because “EXtractoR” - plugin that reads passes works very slowly. It takes ages before you can see what you are doing. For tests? It’s ok, but for serious work - I’d extract in blender.