Dropping frames in QT export from CS3

Question

I just got CS3 for my PC and I was all excited about the new
feature that lets you export dynamic/actionscripted/MovieClip
content. I do animation targetted at TV, so everything needs to be
rendered to AVI or Quicktime, so I figured that this new feature
would let me use a dynamic camera symbol as I've always wanted to.
I've run into a problem, though: the export process seems to
drop frames! As far as I can tell, Flash is rendering and recording
the frames of the animation in real time (or perhaps just close to
real time). If the computer has any hiccups because of another
process demanding some processor time then the resulting quicktime
will have frozen bits where the renderer couldn't keep up.
You can see what I'm talking about by looking at the
quicktime and an AVI of the same scene here:
http://www.pinkandaint.com/flasherror/bad.mov
http://www.pinkandaint.com/flasherror/good.avi
To test this theory, I tried witching applications a bunch
during a render. Sure enough, there were long sections in the
resulting quicktime where the renderer missed frames. The quicktime
is the right length and number of frames -- it just repeated the
same frame over and over where it couldn't keep up.
That's not the only problem, though. When I look at the
exported quicktime file in either Quicktime Player or Premiere pro
(version 1.5) it reports a framerate significantly lower than in
the original FLA. In the file I'm looking at right now, the FLA's
framerate is listed as 29.97 but the MOV file reports a rate of
19.29 (which is, incidentally, different than the framerate I got
any other time I exported the same scene). In premiere, when I tell
it to interpret the footage as having 29.97 fps the clip gets
significantly shorter than it should be -- in this case 161 frames
rather than the 208 frames that it is in the FLA.
I'm pretty sure this is the same way that the various
SWF-to-video programs do things. I thought it was an interesting
kludge to use those external programs but I was sure Adobe would be
able to do something more elegant and sure-footed with this new
export feature. Couldn't they have somehow guaranteed that each
frame would get captured? It seems like they could have just
modified the Flash player to play with artificial time, where the
time to render each frame was always reported as 1/framerate.
Oh, and there's one more problem. The Quicktime renderer
seems to do something different about the order of execution of
actionscript or something. In the rendered quicktime movie the
first frame displays my camera symbol even though I explicitly made
it invisible with actionscript on the first frame of its timeline.
When displaying in the Flash player the first frame does _not_
display the camera symbol....
Has anyone else encountered these problems? If so, have you
figured out a workaround? I tried setting the framerate really low
(I was at 29.97, so I set it down to 10) but it still seemed to
miss frames.
-David

Answer 1

I can understand your frustration with this feature as it
tries to capture in real time what's being
compiled in the player - but your last line is a bit unfair:
"...it
> exemplifies the Flash team's disregard for animators in
favor of web developers."
Copy Motion and Copy Motion as AS3 are useful new additions
for animators. I will add however that I
myself have a list of animation oriented features I would
love to see added in flash but for now
have you checked out www.flashants.com and their SWF2Video
tool? It exports an SWF to AVI with
flawless results. Worth looking into if you have the need to
output any kind of flash content to video.
Chris Georgenes
Animator
http://www.mudbubble.com
http://www.keyframer.com
Adobe Community Expert
*\^^/*
(OO)
<---->
animator_geek wrote:
>
quote:
Originally posted by:
Newsgroup User
> [...]
> Turn off other applications. When recording, Flash uses
all of your system's
> available resources as much as possible, so any
interference of the system
> performance affects the result of the recording. We
recommend you exit other
> applications while exporting to a video.
>
>
> So you're telling me that Flash makes my computer
completely unusable while
> it's rendering? Sorry, I thought we left that kind of
limitation behind with
> DOS. Particularly for something like this, where the
rendering process should
> be
completely independent of real-time. The renderer should go
exactly
> as fast as it needs to in order to capture every frame.
Whether I set the
> frame rate to 1 or 1000 should make no difference in how
many frames are
> dropped in the rendering process.
No frames should ever be dropped I
> mean, what's going on here? You guys have access to the
actual source code of
> the renderer. Can't you adapt it so that it when it's
rendering non-real-time
> the SWF thinks that it's executing at exactly the frame
rate it desires? You
> could just set the renderer's "clock" to whenever the
render was started, then
> increment it 1/fps seconds every frame. The program
would never be the wiser.
> You could even let the timer run (or simulate it
somehow) for 1/fps seconds
> between rendering each frame, thereby handling any timer
events that need to be
> sent while the SWF is running.
>
> Clearly I'm not privy to the inner workings of the Flash
player but as a user
> there's a certain standard I expect, particularly when a
company touts this
> great new feature. It's supposed to work as advertised.
This feature clearly
> does not.
>
> Now I've been a software engineer in the past and I know
that sometimes
> workarounds have to be made but this is just too much.
To me as a user, it
> exemplifies the Flash team's disregard for animators in
favor of web developers.
>
> -David
>
>
quote:
Turn off audio. The audio in a Flash movie may also slow the
performance
> possibly causing dropped frames. Turn off the audio, if
you have many
> dropped frames in the first attempt. Other video editing
tools can be used
> to add the audio to the video after export.
>
> Reduce frame rate. If the movie dimension is a full size
NTSC video, 740 x
> 480, and frame rate is 30 fps, you are more likely to
have dropped frames.
> Reduce the fps of Flash movie increase the chance of
grabbing all the
> frames. Other video editing tools can be used to adjust
the frame rate of
> the video after export.
>
> Optimize your animation. Try to avoid a lot of screen
motion. The greater
> the area of change on the screen, the more likely
slowdown will occur. Also,
> if possible, restrict your use of transparency and alpha
channels as they
> too can cause poor performance.
>
> Use ActionScript 3. Animation created by ActionScript 2
and ActionScript 3
> are different in play back performance. Convert the
ActionScript in your
> animation to ActionScript 3 for optimized performance.
>
> Dimension settings in 2 places. The dimension settings
in Export Settings
> dialog sets the dimension of the SWF movie to be
captured. The Size settings
> in QuickTime Settings dialog sets the dimension of the
exported MOV files.
> If the SWF size is smaller than the exported MOV size,
the picture quality
> will be degraded; if it is larger than the exported MOV
file, you may have
> better picture quality. For best quality (and often
performance) these
> settings should match.
>
>
>
> "animator_geek" <[email protected]>
wrote in message
> news:[email protected]...
> >I just got CS3 for my PC and I was all excited about
the new feature that
> >lets
> > you export dynamic/actionscripted/MovieClip
content. I do animation
> > targetted
> > at TV, so everything needs to be rendered to AVI or
Quicktime, so I
> > figured
> > that this new feature would let me use a dynamic
camera symbol as I've
> > always
> > wanted to.
> >
> > I've run into a problem, though: the export process
seems to drop frames!
> > As
> > far as I can tell, Flash is rendering and recording
the frames of the
> > animation
> > in real time (or perhaps just close to real time).
If the computer has
> > any
> > hiccups because of another process demanding some
processor time then the
> > resulting quicktime will have frozen bits where the
renderer couldn't keep
> > up.
> >
> > You can see what I'm talking about by looking at
the quicktime and an AVI
> > of
> > the same scene here:
> >
http://www.pinkandaint.com/flasherror/bad.mov
> >
http://www.pinkandaint.com/flasherror/good.avi
> >
> > To test this theory, I tried witching applications
a bunch during a
> > render.
> > Sure enough, there were long sections in the
resulting quicktime where the
> > renderer missed frames. The quicktime is the right
length and number of
> > frames
> > -- it just repeated the same frame over and over
where it couldn't keep
> > up.
> >
> > That's not the only problem, though. When I look at
the exported
> > quicktime
> > file in either Quicktime Player or Premiere pro
(version 1.5) it reports a
> > framerate significantly lower than in the original
FLA. In the file I'm
> > looking at right now, the FLA's framerate is listed
as 29.97 but the MOV
> > file
> > reports a rate of 19.29 (which is, incidentally,
different than the
> > framerate I
> > got any other time I exported the same scene). In
premiere, when I tell
> > it to
> > interpret the footage as having 29.97 fps the clip
gets significantly
> > shorter
> > than it should be -- in this case 161 frames rather
than the 208 frames
> > that it
> > is in the FLA.
> >
> > I'm pretty sure this is the same way that the
various SWF-to-video
> > programs do
> > things. I thought it was an interesting kludge to
use those external
> > programs
> > but I was sure Adobe would be able to do something
more elegant and
> > sure-footed
> > with this new export feature. Couldn't they have
somehow guaranteed that
> > each
> > frame would get captured? It seems like they could
have just modified the
> > Flash player to play with artificial time, where
the time to render each
> > frame
> > was always reported as 1/framerate.
> >
> > Oh, and there's one more problem. The Quicktime
renderer seems to do
> > something different about the order of execution of
actionscript or
> > something.
> > In the rendered quicktime movie the first frame
displays my camera symbol
> > even
> > though I explicitly made it invisible with
actionscript on the first frame
> > of
> > its timeline. When displaying in the Flash player
the first frame does
> > _not_
> > display the camera symbol....
> >
> > Has anyone else encountered these problems? If so,
have you figured out a
> > workaround? I tried setting the framerate really
low (I was at 29.97, so
> > I set
> > it down to 10) but it still seemed to miss frames.
> >
> > -David
> >
>
>
>
>
>
>