Mastering the Render Queue
The render queue in After Effects is like a Blackberry. On the surface, it has a very basic and direct intention. Need to make a call? Dial a number and go. Need to render a composition? Add it to the queue and hit render. But just like a Blackberry, if you dig a little bit deeper the render queue in After Effects has a lot to offer the motion graphics artist. In this post I’m going to give a comprehensive overview on how to become a render queue power user.
(Update: There’s are some great links from Todd Kopriva in the comments, be sure to check them out)
-
Multliple Output Modules for One Render
Select output module, hit
cmd+d
Many people don’t know you can actually have as many output modules as you want, all in the same render. Need an .avi, a quicktime, and an image sequence? You’d be crazy to do three separate renders for that, using multiple output modules you can generate them all from the same render!
-
Stop Render, Reset Render Item to Original State
During render, hold down
option, click “Stop”
When you stop a render, by default After Effects tries to be smart and help you out by creating a new render item in your queue, based off your original render item but with the “render range” updated to render only the frames that haven’t yet been rendered. It my entire career, I’m not sure if I have ever used that once. But something that is VERY helpful (and should be the default, if you ask me) is if you hold down
option(alton a pc) while you click “Stop”, After Effects will still create a new render item in the queue, however this one will be identical to the original render item. Very nice. -
Change Default Output Module (OM) or Render Setting (RS) template
hold down
cmdwhen selecting OM or RS from dropdown
Using templates for your render queue are a huge timesaver. With templates you can setup specific render settings or output modules that you use often, and have them available in the respective dropdowns inside the render queue. There are system defaults that get used when you add a new item to the render queue, and if you don’t set new defaults, you end up always having to change them every time you add a new item. Have 30 comps you need to render? Well unless you set new defaults, you’ve got to change them all by hand. With this trick, you just hold down
cmdwhen you select a OM or RS from the dropdown, and it will make whichever template you choose the new default. Sweet!
Tip: This technique also works for “Save Frame As…” for saving out stills. Just add a new single frame to the Render Queue (cmd+option+s) and set the new defaults the same way. -
Duplicate Identical Render Item
Select the render item, hit
cmd+shift+dAs with most things in After Effects, a simple
cmd+dwill duplicate an item in your render queue. The same works with layers, effects, and even footage items in your project window. But render items have more configurable options than some of those other things, and if you have a render queue stacked with render items and you want to duplicate #8 out of 20 items, often times you will have to reset your output directories and sometimes even some of your render options. By usingcmd+shift+d, After Effects will duplicate your render item Exactly the way you set it up the first time, which can save you plenty of time in the long run. -
Drag from Project Window directly to Render Queue
Select your chosen items from project window and drag ‘em over!
This is one of those features that just makes sense. What’s really useful about dragging items to the queue directly from your project window, is using it in conjunction with the “Changing default output modules” from above to reap huge time-saving rewards. For example, if you have 100 quicktime movies that you need to re-render as half-res jpg sequences, you can just create the templates, set them as defaults, and drag all 100 quicktimes to the queue and hit render. Boom! Now go get some coffee.
Tip: If you have multiple items to drag, but they are all going to the same directory, drag only one item first and set it’s output directory. Now you can drag over the remainder of the items together, and they will all set their default output directories to the correct folder.
-
Add Selected Item(s) to Render Queue
Select item(s) in Project Window, hit
ctrl+shft+/For those of you that are too lazy (I prefer the term “selectively efficient”) to even drag items from the project window to the Render Queue, you can actually just use the
ctrl+shft+/hot-key combination to add selected items to the queue instantly. -
Debug with “Current Render Details”
Twirl down “Current Render Details” to access information about why your render is soooo slowwwww.
Render moving slow? Sometimes it’s just because you are such a sick compositor that your sheer “make it look like sex” skillset creates comps that are slow to render as a whole. But, more commonly, there is something specific that is slowing your render down. Maybe a certain layer with 50 masks on it, or some ridiculous glow effect that isn’t even necessary, or something else all together. Current Render Details shows you (in real-time) what after effects is rendering and gives you a feel for how long each effect/layer is taking. By viewing your Current Render Details you can analyze and target layers or effects that are slowing your render down, and pre-render the problem layers to make your renders zip along. I use this all the time - I’ve literally seen this save HOURS over the life of a project. Every second counts when you are hitting deliveries, and there is no point wasting time waiting for renders that don’t have to be slow!
-
Getting the Most Out of “Embed Project Link”
When working in teams, this can be a lifesaver.
People gloss over this setting because it’s not very intuitive. But, I’m willing to bet that you have been in the situation where you’ve got a pre-rendered quicktime movie in your AE project, and you need to change it but have no idea where it came from. Sound familiar? If you work in teams, this can happen often, and is especially problematic if a freelancer has left the project mid-way through and you’ve got to decipher their project.
Fear not. Because After Effects defaults to having Embed Project Link selected, chances are you can find out exactly where the movie came from. Any time a movie is generated from AE with this option selected, metadata is stored in the file about which After Effects project rendered it.
To access this data, select the quicktime movie in the project window and hitcmd+e. If After Effects can find the absolute path to the file, it will automatically open it. If it can’t find it, it will at least give you an error message that tells you what file to look for… useful error messages from Adobe? I know, I couldn’t believe it either:
-
How to use “Import and Replace Usage”
View OM options in the render queue, then use the pic-wip technique to choose which comp to replace.
When you have the Output Module window open, you’ve probably seen Import and Replace Usage under the Post-Render Action menu. The problem is, if you’re looking at it in the Output Module window, it doesn’t tell you the whole story.
To get the most out of import and replace usage, twirl down the details for your output module inside the render queue window.
That little spiral icon is the key to your success. That represents the “pic-whip” in After Effects, which means if you click on that icon and drag it onto any composition, that comp will be linked to whatever option the pic-whip represents. In this case, wherever you drag and drop that icon, the chosen comp will be replaced everywhere in the project by the resulting render. Useful for pre-rendering comps as mentioned above. (Always be sure to keep original, non-prerendered comps somewhere in our project though, for backwards compatibility.)
And there you have it. As I said in the beginning, the rabbit-hole of the render queue goes deeper that it seems from the surface, and if you devote the time and continued effort to put these techniques into your pipeline, you will reap the benefits of efficiency and quality I/O.
Hope you enjoyed it, if you have any great Render Queue tips that I missed, please leave them in the comments for us all to enjoy!
Thanks for reading.
March 9th, 2009 at 9:10 am
This is a great post. I recommend that you leave a comment on the relevant page of After Effects Help on the Web so that people reading it will then come over to this page of yours. Here’s a link to the “Work in the Render Queue panel” section:
http://help.adobe.com/en_US/AfterEffects/9.0/WS3878526689cb91655866c1103a4f2dff7-79e6a.html
It looks like you’re using After Effects CS3. The Render Queue panel in After Effects CS4 is very similar. One addition is that you can now just click the plus sign (+) button next to an output module to add a new output module.
The few differences in the Render Queue panel between After Effects CS3 and After Effects CS4 are listed here:
http://help.adobe.com/en_US/AfterEffects/9.0/WSF288ABA0-1445-4297-ABAC-EBBCAE82E0FB.html
March 9th, 2009 at 11:12 am
Thanks Todd, you are exactly right. This post covers the Render Queue as it was in CS3, haven’t gotten to get in depth with CS4 yet. Thanks again for the great comment, going to call attention to it up top.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:38 pm
Great post, here’s another tip: If you need to change the output module template and render location of many RQ items after they’ve already been added to the queue, instead of selecting the RQ item (which works for changing the render settings of many items), shift select the the output modules themselves and then change one (as well as select a new render location if you want) and they will all change.
March 9th, 2009 at 12:50 pm
That’s a good one too Lloyd - love it, thanks for posting.
March 11th, 2009 at 5:48 am
Dude, your blog rocks. Please keep the articles coming!
March 11th, 2009 at 9:25 am
Cheers Jeremy, thanks for dropping by. You’ve got some nice work of your own!
March 13th, 2009 at 4:00 am
[...] Visit Tutorial [...]
March 21st, 2009 at 3:41 pm
thanks! i had some of this rendering knowledge sometime ago, but it slipped away, thanks for the for well presented and succinct reminder : )
March 22nd, 2009 at 1:17 am
[...] [...]
March 22nd, 2009 at 1:18 am
[...] Visit Tutorial [...]
March 27th, 2009 at 3:34 am
[...] Mastering the Render Queue [...]
March 31st, 2009 at 11:40 pm
Oh my god I only now found out about having multiple output modules of the same render… and here I’d been rendering twice when doing a full res and a web-sized render version!
April 23rd, 2009 at 6:29 pm
another one: say you’re doing a huge, overnight or lunchtime render to frames - maybe a multi-machine render perhaps. And you want to have a quicktime movie there to watch when you get back… just drag the OUTPUT MODULE into the project window. This will create an offline clip that will be replaced with the sequence once it’s rendered. Now, simply drag the offline clip back into the render queue and set it to render your movie. Now when you get back, you should have your sequence and also a movie ready to watch.
April 27th, 2009 at 12:51 pm
[...] found The Mograph Blog from a tweet about the post on Mastering The Render Queue. From there looking through the posts, I realized I had just hit a goldmine of awesome tips. Run by [...]
April 27th, 2009 at 3:17 pm
[...] found The Mograph Blog from a tweet about the post on Mastering The Render Queue. From there looking through the posts, I realized I had just hit a goldmine of awesome tips. Run by [...]
May 7th, 2009 at 5:03 pm
[...] found The Mograph Blog from a tweet about the post on Mastering The Render Queue. From there looking through the posts, I realized I had just hit a goldmine of awesome tips. Run by [...]
May 7th, 2009 at 5:03 pm
[...] found The Mograph Blog from a tweet about the post on Mastering The Render Queue. From there looking through the posts, I realized I had just hit a goldmine of awesome tips. Run by [...]
May 28th, 2009 at 4:23 pm
hey this is a very interesting article!
June 4th, 2009 at 4:54 am
Original post by mattusximus
June 9th, 2009 at 6:33 am
Need more info about Visionary manga ? You are welcome here http://anime.goodnanoav.com .
June 11th, 2009 at 11:05 pm
No more posts?
Your blog is awesome, pleeeease keep writing!
June 12th, 2009 at 7:45 am
Best reviews of the day about AttorneySuffolk county district attorney, Attorney client privileges and Attorney finder http://attorney.goodnanoav.com/
June 14th, 2009 at 11:14 am
Best Hummer and other auto information source here http://automoto.goodnanoav.com/
June 15th, 2009 at 11:37 pm
Very nice site!
June 16th, 2009 at 9:16 am
Incredible site!
June 16th, 2009 at 9:20 am
Very interesting site. Hope it will always be alive!
June 16th, 2009 at 9:32 am
Great .Now i can say thank you!
June 16th, 2009 at 9:43 am
It is the coolest site,keep so!
June 16th, 2009 at 9:49 am
I bookmarked this guestbook. Thank you for good job!
June 16th, 2009 at 9:59 am
Excellent site. It was pleasant to me.
June 16th, 2009 at 10:04 am
Great site. Good info
June 16th, 2009 at 10:15 am
Great site. Good info
June 16th, 2009 at 10:17 am
I want to say - thank you for this!
June 16th, 2009 at 10:19 am
Excellent site. It was pleasant to me.
June 16th, 2009 at 10:31 am
Incredible site!
June 16th, 2009 at 10:35 am
Great site. Keep doing.
June 16th, 2009 at 10:37 am
Perfect work!
June 16th, 2009 at 10:49 am
If you have to do it, you might as well do it right
June 16th, 2009 at 11:20 am
Perfect work!
June 16th, 2009 at 11:35 am
Very interesting site. Hope it will always be alive!
June 16th, 2009 at 11:37 am
Perfect site, i like it!
June 16th, 2009 at 12:36 pm
Beautiful site!
June 16th, 2009 at 12:50 pm
Nice site! Thank you!
June 16th, 2009 at 1:03 pm
If you have to do it, you might as well do it right
June 16th, 2009 at 1:33 pm
It is the coolest site,keep so!
June 16th, 2009 at 1:33 pm
Beautiful site!
June 16th, 2009 at 1:48 pm
Great work,webmaster,nice design!
June 16th, 2009 at 2:17 pm
I bookmarked this guestbook. Thank you for good job!
June 16th, 2009 at 3:22 pm
Great work,webmaster,nice design!
June 16th, 2009 at 7:16 pm
Perfect site, i like it!
June 17th, 2009 at 11:34 am
Best choice of the week about Bbws, Mature bbws, Adult bbws and Lesbian bbws http://bbw.goodnanoav.com/
June 17th, 2009 at 12:53 pm
Nice site! Thank you!
June 17th, 2009 at 1:08 pm
I bookmarked this guestbook. Thank you for good job!
June 17th, 2009 at 1:24 pm
Incredible site!
June 17th, 2009 at 1:41 pm
Great work,webmaster,nice design!
June 17th, 2009 at 1:56 pm
Great .Now i can say thank you!
June 17th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
Beautiful site!
June 17th, 2009 at 2:28 pm
Great site. Keep doing.
June 17th, 2009 at 3:28 pm
Great site. Good info
June 17th, 2009 at 3:41 pm
Perfect work!
June 17th, 2009 at 4:24 pm
If you have to do it, you might as well do it right
June 17th, 2009 at 5:45 pm
Perfect site, i like it!
June 17th, 2009 at 6:38 pm
I want to say - thank you for this!
June 18th, 2009 at 11:16 am
I want to say - thank you for this!
June 18th, 2009 at 11:34 am
Very interesting site. Hope it will always be alive!
June 18th, 2009 at 11:51 am
Great work,webmaster,nice design!
June 18th, 2009 at 12:09 pm
Excellent site. It was pleasant to me.
June 18th, 2009 at 12:48 pm
Perfect work!
June 18th, 2009 at 1:28 pm
It is the coolest site,keep so!
June 18th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
Great site. Good info
June 18th, 2009 at 2:28 pm
Beautiful site!
June 18th, 2009 at 2:39 pm
Great site. Keep doing.
June 18th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
Nice site! Thank you!
June 18th, 2009 at 4:53 pm
Perfect site, i like it!
June 18th, 2009 at 6:26 pm
If you have to do it, you might as well do it right
June 18th, 2009 at 9:02 pm
Great .Now i can say thank you!
June 19th, 2009 at 9:42 am
Very nice site!
June 21st, 2009 at 11:51 pm
Great work,webmaster,nice design!
June 22nd, 2009 at 12:03 am
Beautiful site!
June 22nd, 2009 at 7:14 am
It is the coolest site,keep so!
June 22nd, 2009 at 11:35 pm
Incredible site!
June 23rd, 2009 at 6:43 am
Best choice of the month about Fetish, Smelling fetish, Fetish pantiehose and Kilt fetish. http://bdsm.goodnanoav.com/
June 23rd, 2009 at 8:47 am
I bookmarked this guestbook. Thank you for good job!
June 24th, 2009 at 3:01 am
Incredible site!
June 24th, 2009 at 3:21 am
Great site. Good info
June 24th, 2009 at 6:01 am
Great site. Good info
June 27th, 2009 at 8:35 am
occur findings…
clathrate mitigation america stories per climatic…
June 29th, 2009 at 7:19 am
nhzbbvni…
nhzbbvni…
June 29th, 2009 at 9:52 am
vymrcwwq…
vymrcwwq…
July 15th, 2009 at 6:41 pm
[...] Mastering the Render Queue [...]
August 12th, 2009 at 7:12 am
[...] found The Mograph Blog from a tweet about the post on Mastering The Render Queue. From there looking through the posts, I realized I had just hit a goldmine of awesome tips. Run by [...]
September 2nd, 2009 at 12:54 pm
[...] Mastering the Render Queue — The Mograph Blog themographblog.com/2009/03/09/mastering-the-render-queue – view page – cached This blog is about After Effects, Cinema 4D, Scripting, Workflow, and the best ways for you to set like, uh, 1 million keyframes today. A Fine Motion Graphics Blog — From the page [...]
January 30th, 2010 at 5:48 pm
Vicodin….
Vicodin withdrawl. Vicodin side effects. Vicodin. Snorting vicodin. Buy vicodin without script….
February 1st, 2010 at 4:15 am
how to ollie…
[...] Learn how to ollie like a professional [...]…
February 2nd, 2010 at 3:56 pm
Zithromax….
What is zithromax. Does alcohol affect zithromax. Zithromax antibiotic. Zithromax for gonorrhea….
February 3rd, 2010 at 3:11 am
Carisoprodol….
Buy carisoprodol online lowest price guarantee. Carisoprodol fedex cod. Carisoprodol….
February 3rd, 2010 at 4:18 pm
Ultram….
Ultram er 100mg. Ultram er. Ultram side effects. Ultram. Buy ultram online. Ultram prescriptio….
February 3rd, 2010 at 10:41 pm
Tamiflu….
Rumsfeld tamiflu. Tamiflu side effects. Tamiflu. Tamiflu chemicals*. Tamiflu it kills rats does it stop bird flu. Tamiflu precautions….
February 6th, 2010 at 4:56 am
Percocet….
Percocet 93-490. Percocet online. Percocet….
February 6th, 2010 at 7:37 am
fap turbo scam…
Und ein Ende ist bisher nicht in Sicht, denn auch ihr drittes Album “Gute Reise” wird ganz sicher ein Kassenschlager….
February 6th, 2010 at 10:02 pm
Methotrexate and hair loss….
Treatment of discoid lupus with methotrexate….
February 7th, 2010 at 12:04 pm
how to ollie…
[...] Be the best, ollie like the best [...]…