Participant

Answered

After Effect 2018 Upgrade: H264 is missing from Format Option when Quicktime format is selected.

Forum|Forum|7 years ago
April 6, 2018
17 replies
147913 views

hi, i have just upgraded AE to the latest version 2 days ago. Then i realised after i added my AE file to the Render Queue, H264 is no longer listed under the format options after I selected Quicktime.

I can still export to H264 in Premiere pro after the upgrade. Please advise.

John

This topic has been closed for replies.

Correct answer Rick Gerard

H.264 files should be in an MP4 container. Apple never did a good job supporting h.264 in a QT container, it was buggy and unreliable, and they are not doing any further development. That is why it was removed. It should have been removed a long time ago.

You should be using the Adobe Media Encoder to render h.264 MP4 files and unless you have expert skills and a thorough knowledge of video formats and compression you should never see the words Custom in a composition setting or a render setting. Just use the presets that match your intended audience and then study up on video formats and compression.

BTW, this question has been asked and answered hundreds of times. Many of those answers are on this forum and they are all the same. Do not use H.264 Quicktime. It's a dead format.

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flakecase

Participant

Hi John

I, like many others, have been successfully using the h.264 codec from the Quicktime drop-down since 2012. No issues. Now, because someone decides it's "buggy", then stating that everyone should be using AME to render h.264 anyway, is total horse puckee!! Now I am forced to take an extra step and run my AE projects through AME if I want my output in h.264. Why is it that more often than not, whenever Adobe presents an upgrade to any of my apps I have to ask myself is it worth the prospect of a leaner better working application, or am I once again going to have my jacket pulled over my head and get —

Kind of stuck here. Not like any of us can retool and find another path. $#@!!&!!

Moderator note: Profanity and profane language can get you banned, so please keep it clean. We have those younger than 18 reading here.

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Budd Tugley

Inspiring

What's the workaround? Meaning what's the new format that I should save in, Rick Gerard ?

I'm bent about this but willing to move forward. Neither Adobe or Apple ever go back so might as well get with the program.

But I will add my whining to the rest of everyone because I'm currently reinstalling CC2017 to make it through my project tonight. All my clients ask for H264 video. I don't want to do it with Media Encoder because it's an additional step that I shouldn't have to take: upgrading an app should create less work for me, not more. And not sure what the problem was with a completely stable trouble free codec I've been using for years. Ok rant over. My cheese has been moved again.

ondřejh71856982

Participating Frequently

So how did you moved on with dealing with media providers? Just today i received specs from digital screen provider, that has - surprise surpruse - mov h264 (again). Since adobe self decided to screw us over and remove it from cc2018, my questions are:

What do you do to change the standards in the field so providers dont require us to output mov h264 anymore? When can we expect this to happen? What steps have been taken?

Dave_LaRonde

Inspiring

ondřejh71856982 wrote
What do you do to change the standards in the field so providers dont require us to output mov h264 anymore? When can we expect this to happen? What steps have been taken?

As far as I know, NONE. Apparently, the Powers That Be at Adobe were clueless that people still want these file types. I'm talking about the people who pay those who use Adobe software... who in turn pay Adobe.

Long story short -- don't get rid of your CC 2017 applications. You'll probably need them for a long time before Adobe wises up and realizes it screwed over its users big time by dropping support for a lot of QT codecs.

MiikuLehtela

Participant

Oh I would very much like to have QT-H264 to be back on the render menu, thank you. It's been most helpful when showing clients a quick peek of what's cooking. I mostly work for investigative journalist, so they don't much focus on the visual side of things. They're more in to the content. As for Encoder I'm sad to say I've only experienced difficulties: to begin with it didn't launch at all. After some difficulties I've been able to get it going, but unfortunately it only loads the project and then freezes.

I've tweaked the problem by starting all my AE projects by opening an old project and thank god H264 still sits there in the rendering menu.

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laurapanel

Participant

Not using H264 mov's isn't an option. I've worked in broadcast commercials for 15 years, on high profile work like Superbowl spots and on lots of award-winning campaigns. Our clients (almost ALL of them) always want three deliverables:

1. Pro Res .mov "masters"

2. H264 .mov reference/viewables

3. H264 .mp4s

The reality is that we can't go to our clients and say, "Sorry, Rick on the internet says that h264 .movs are buggy, despite your experience over the past ten years. We've been able to deliver them for a decade, but Adobe agrees with him, so we can no longer support that format." They come back to us with "figure it out," meaning we either get them what they need or they do one of two things: pull the job or ride it out with us but don't give us repeat business... sending us into a tailspin of workarounds. For now, we're not updating Adobe products on half of our systems in order to accommodate these asks.

I'd do the following (works for us, for now.) If you have a working copy of AE that can output h264 movs, don't touch it. If you were unlucky and updated, pester Adobe. Ask for the functionality to be replaced, at least in Media Encoder, if not AE. Then reinstall CC 2017, keeping CC 2018. Having the dual install seems to give 2018 the functionality we need on some machines, but I think that it was never deleted from those machines, which may mean that the codec wasn't deleted. On others, we have to save our 2018 projects back a version and render them out from 2017, or work in 2017 entirely. If it helps, we also keep QT Pro 7 on all of our machines, but I'm not sure that it affects anything.

It's easy for people to instruct you to 'educate' your clients when they aren't the ones expecting repeat business... and a paycheck.

jackthegiantkiller

Inspiring

Thank you for framing this argument as I would. Any experienced animator, producer or director knows you don't get to simply declare how or what your clients wants, particularly if they are a significant agency or client. I could see being in a meeting with said agency and a sophomore designer piping up and saying "Adobe doesn't give us that output option anymore." The agency head would give them a cursory glance and say "You don't make that call, so figure it out." The producer would then likely skewer that animator later.

So, y'all keep on educating those clients. Now if Adobe makes some dramatic change to AME, so that it actually works efficiently (or at all) then I will gladly eat crow and go on my merry way. Otherwise, come on, Adobe. Throw us a replacement bone that doesn't involve AME.

Kyle Hamrick

Community Expert

Not to belabor this point any more than it already has been, but I've also been a video professional for more than a few years, and adapting to change/creative problem-solving is pretty much what we do.

The inclusion of "over the past ten years" jumps out at me here. You know what else we were doing ten years ago? Over-nighting files to clients on physical hard drives. Stuff changes, you know? I take your point about doing what the client wants, but at some point, you have to force them to stop using the old stuff and move onto the new. I'm guessing you're not still delivering spots to stations on BetaSP, or burning a whole lot of DVDs for clients anymore.

Yes, it's easy to say "educate your clients" to people on the internet. It's also easy to start the 14th thread of "OMG ADOBE BROKE EVERYTHING!!!1" because you didn't read release notes. Should they have made the QT change more prominent? Probably! Is it a professional's responsibility to figure out what an update affects before applying it to the software they use to make a living? I say yes.

All snark aside, I guess I'm curious about what's being proposed, exactly. Apple stopped supporting these codecs, and announced those intentions a couple years ago. Do you want Adobe to rebuild Quicktime from the ground up, so the people who can't/won't update to a more modern format aren't mad? If that's what you're asking, then decide what other stuff you don't want them working on, because as is the case with most humans operating under their employers' for-profit business model, they have a finite amount of resources to maintain every aspect of this software. There have been a few solutions proposed in this and several related threads, namely using AME or AfterCodecs. If those don't suit you, then by all means, go vote on the UserVoice site.

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Francesco_Giacomelli

Participating Frequently

Sorry everybody,

Maybe I am wrong, but AME is not color managed (while After Effects is). If I work in After with color management ON, there is no way to export in H264 retaining color management....

The workaround that I've found is to export a Prores in After, importing it in DaVinci Resolve and exporting the H264 from there.

Any suggestions?

Thanks.

W

WDTechnicalDirector

Known Participant

We always export ProRes and select Match Source in Media Encoder to ensure quality output. We have never used color management because of your issue. Get familiar with Lumetri and color correction/managment. Adjust your files to desired look and save a LUT. Then use LUT settings to manage your color to Media Encoder. You may have to copy the same LUT file from After Effects into the Media Encoder correct folder (inside the application's folders). I've tried to use the "Select option inside Media Encoder to load a LUT but that is not working for me. However, you can apply the same LUT treatment that came from After Effects by selecting it in the Effects tab at Lumetri Look/LUT.

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Francesco_Giacomelli

Participating Frequently

Thanks WD for your answer,

I'll give a look at your LUTs workflow, but I think that it's not the same thing as a color managed workflow.

The main issue for me is gamma setting, that get screwed when exporting in AME.

X

xdgyzo

Participant

Adobe wanted to make room for media encoder so they just removed the popular quicktime h.264 format and stuffed it inside media encoder so you would have to pay more, they are obviously money hungry.

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David Arbor

Inspiring

xdgyzo Sorry, but that doesn't make any sense. Media Encoder doesn't cost you any more, regardless of what Creative Cloud plan you have. MediaCore is the backbone of all media encoding for Adobe applications, and it's integrated into Premiere exactly the same way. Even if you pay for a single app plan of Pr or Ae, you still get AME. Read Rick's answer that was marked as "Correct" for why you shouldn't use QuickTime H.264.

danm75035828

Participant

Well its end of an era then. I've been working professional in After Effects since 1999. I've been rendering quicktime H264 nearly every day since the codec became available on Ae and never had any buggy-ness anymore than with another quicktime codec. Not looking forward to working with Media Encoder as my dynamic link failed just the last time I tried to use it. I just wish Adobe gave us a heads up they were dropping it AND let us know the best alternative that compresses Quicktimes file sizes as well as H264 did. What can I use directly out of Ae that works as well as H264 did.

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WDTechnicalDirector

Known Participant

You can produce an uncompressed, lossless .mov file from AE. Bring that into Media Encoder, put H.264 codec on it or transcode to whatever format is offered.

danm75035828

Participant

I know, - I just don't like the idea of having to use two different software for one render. Its now become a two step process where it should only be a one step process. Its just another thing added to my job and another step where things can potentially fail - with Media Encoder, it isn't hard to imagine that happening!

ondřejh71856982

Participating Frequently

Oh and btw its so nice we must use AME to be able to get mp4 out of AE. It would be even nicer if the dynamic link worked, not freezing half of the time forcing us to do intermediate renders.

Adobe, you really should try using your products in real world production. Youd be surprised how much stuff is not working, half working or straight damn bugged. I dont know if you realise this but since 2015 quality of your products is deteriorating massively, its one huge mess.

Stop dropping the ball, noone needs new CC version every year, we all need WORKING and STABLE software and we dont care how often you roll out new stuff (that at this point inherently breaks old stuff or doesnt work at all - just ask premiere pro users how their projects from last years are totally unusable in new PP version).

Straighten up FFS

W

WDTechnicalDirector

Known Participant

Oh wow, you are totally correct. The Dynamic Link process is completely useless. Fantastic idea but just horrible on performance, bugginess, freezing....come on. We use all of these tools exclusive in our production workflow and it really is a giant mess. Everything requires too much RAM and then it uses cache to make up for shortcomings. Where is the GPU code? just dragging us along dangling carrots for things that are great ideas but just don't work in the real world. So frustrating being a slave to this giant subscription-based expensive discombobulated beast. It's such a love/hate conundrum. Adobe, take care of your professionals don't pull an Apple.

ondřejh71856982

Participating Frequently

This indeed is ridiculous.

Dear adobe, next time before you take out something you deem not needed anymore deal with all the providers of digital screens like JCD that REQUIRE mov h264. Persuade them to update their specs and delivery software to handle mp4 and only then take out something as fundamental as this.

Your decision just made me lose big chunk of production time cause i needed to find a workaround for your decision that limits me in what i can provide. Again companies like JCD (and im sure you know they are big platyer in europe owning like half of digital outdoor screens) really dont care what you deem to be unusable.

Deal with them, dont screw us. We after all pay for your service.

Thanks.

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