"Create Multiple Compositions" renders black — preview normal, render silent black (CC2024 & CC2026)

# Adobe Community Forum Bug Report (Form Format)

## Title:

“Create Multiple Compositions” produces comps that render completely black — silent failure, no error

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## Issue:

Compositions created by dragging multiple MOV files onto the New Composition icon in the Project panel (“Create Multiple Compositions”) render as completely black output. Preview plays back normally. The render completes with a success status and no error message, making this a silent failure.

## Steps to reproduce:

1. Import multiple MOV files into the Project panel
1. Select the MOV files and drag them onto the “New Composition” icon (film strip icon at the bottom of the Project panel)
1. AE creates one composition per MOV via “Create Multiple Compositions”
1. RAM Preview any of the created comps — video plays normally
1. Add the comp to the Render Queue
1. Render using any format (ProRes 4444, PNG sequence, etc.)
1. Check the output — completely black

## Expected result:

Rendered output matches the preview with visible video content.

## Actual result:

Rendered output is completely black. No error message is displayed. The render queue shows success.

## Application version:

- After Effects CC2024
- After Effects CC2026 (v26.x)
- Both versions reproduce this issue

## Operating system:

- Windows 11

## GPU driver version:

- (Not GPU-related — issue persists regardless of GPU settings)

## Comparative context:

- Does it affect all projects? — Yes, reproducible in any new project
- Does it affect new projects? — Yes
- When did the problem begin? — Unknown, discovered April 2026. Confirmed on both CC2024 and CC2026

## What I’ve ruled out:

- Color management settings — no effect
- Bit depth (8/16/32bpc) — no effect
- Footage interpretation — no effect
- Re-encoding source MOVs via Media Encoder — no effect
- aerender (command line) — same black output
- PNG sequence output — same black output

## Suspected cause:

The “Create Multiple Compositions” workflow inherits the source footage’s internal timecode into the comp’s displayStartTime (e.g., source TC 1:00:59:05 → comp displayStartTime 1:00:59:05). This appears to corrupt the comp’s internal state so that RGB data does not reach the render pipeline. Manually resetting displayStartTime to 0 after creation does not fix the issue.

## Workaround:

Create compositions manually (Ctrl+N / Cmd+N), then drag footage into the comp. Manually created comps render normally.

## Why this is critical:

The render completes without any error or warning. Users have no indication that the output is broken, which creates a high risk of delivering black frames to clients.

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(Screen recording can be provided upon request)

Kazuki Inoshita / InovativeWorks
AE plugin developer — aescripts.com/authors/inovativeworks/