AE CC: Will no longer collect files

Report · Feb 27, 2014

Never ran into this before, started with the most recent update.
Whenever I try to collect files, it inevitably gets to:

After Effects warning: The file...... could not be found.

Then it ends collecting, so whatever is beyond that file is never copied. Incredibly frustrating. I thought at first it may be file names, long paths, etc. but right now I'm looking at a problem with a file named IMAC.png that resides in /(Footage)/Source/images/ - so that can't be it.

I have a RAID setup that I work from, so I also tried collecting to the desktop. Same thing.

Any thoughts appreciated.

Thanks!
Maria

AE 12.2.1.5

10.9.1 Build 13B42

2x2.93 6-Core Xeon

20GB RAM

Report · Feb 27, 2014

I have the exact same problem.. And it is frustrating as hell because it won't allow me to archive my work correctly.

Report · Feb 27, 2014

Formatik - are your specs anything like mine? Are you working on drives other than where the app is installed?

I'd love to at least have a direction to try... right now I'm out of ideas

I agree, it's frustrating as hell, because I'm now archiving 50GB projects that ought to be 10GB.

Report · Feb 27, 2014

Im on a macbook pro retina 2012, 4 core i7, 512 GB flash drive with 16Gb's mem. I use external thunderbolt Drobo's for storage. But active projects are on my main drive. Latest version mac OS and AE. But i don't think it has anything to do with system specs. I've had this problem since installing AE CC.

The thing is that inside of AE i have no missing media, even when consolidated or whatever. But still, when collecting it often says 'The file ... could not be found.'. It's driving me nuts. If i manually collect a project i will make mistakes and maybe leave a file or two out because i imported something from a different location. Collecting a project is absolutely essential if i want to keep everything in order.

And it's totally random, sometimes it works.. most times it will not. I've reinstalled CC multiple times, i've even formatted my main drive in between. To no avail.

I have no clue whatsoever.

Report · Feb 27, 2014

Yep. Exactly – no missing footage in project. I even tried to "reload" the file it stops on. I had a hunch that it may be a question of drives, but knowing that you're working on local makes that irrelevant.

Wish someone from Adobe would chime in....

Report · Feb 28, 2014

undefinedcreative wrote:
Wish someone from Adobe would chime in....

This is a user-to-user forum where people help out in their spare time. We are fortunate that Adobe employees come in here occasionally, but we can't count on it. If you want official Adobe support, there is an official customer support option available to you. Agents can even connect to your computer to help diagnose issues!

Report · Feb 28, 2014

Szalam, any idea HOW to get the offical customer support option? Poked around on the site and all I can find is the forum, the bug report and feature request. No actual "get help from a human" link. Could just be me, but it's not too obviously placed.

Report · Feb 28, 2014

undefinedcreative wrote:
Szalam, any idea HOW to get the offical customer support option? Poked around on the site and all I can find is the forum, the bug report and feature request. No actual "get help from a human" link. Could just be me, but it's not too obviously placed.

At the bottom of most pages on Adobe.com there is a link to "Contact Adobe". It takes you here.

Report · Feb 27, 2014

Same Problem here!

Server / Network / doesn't matter.

Filenames like BG01.psd in folder "_footage" wtf!?

AE 12.2.1.5

OSX 10.9.2

MacPro 5,1 2x 2.66ghz 6core

24Gig Ram

Report · Feb 28, 2014

Just an FYI, I chatted w/ adobe and theyre aware of the issue and their engineers are working on it. One thing we figured out was that if I removed any WAV file and any non-ProRes quicktimes it went through the collect process. So basically I converted my footage to ProRes and converted my WAV files to AIFFs and it collected successfully.

I know this isnt a good solution for anyone with alot of quicktimes in their projects, but it worked for now.

I hope that helps you until they fix the issue.

Chad

Report · Feb 28, 2014

Who, exactly, did you chat with at Adobe? This is not a familiar issue to me.

Report · Feb 28, 2014

Hi Todd,

I dont recall his name, I used the 'chat with an agent" feature on the Customer Care page. He helped me remove the WAV's and Quicktimes, had me try collecting again.... and then mentioned to convert any QT's to ProRes. I only had one Animation codec w/ alpha and I converted that to ProRes4444+ and it worked for me. I'm paraphrasing but at the end he said "we're aware of the issue, and our engineers are working on it".

Chad

Report · Mar 04, 2014

Chad,

Please give me the case number for your interaction with Adobe Technical Support. It is important that I know who you were talking with. There are no bugs in our system that resemble the information that you provided.

I don't doubt that something that you did helped you to get past your problem with collecting files, but I am very skeptical that it had anything to do with removing all WAV files and transcoding all QuickTime files to ProRes.

I want to get to the bottom of what the actual problem is, and a first step is finding out who among our Technical Support staff gave you that information and what they're basing it on.

Report · Mar 07, 2014

Hey Todd, I've been testing this on my system since I've had a number of projects to collect for clients this week. There seems to be no logic to it. One project I was able to copy to desktop and collect to desktop and it worked fine (after not collecting off the RAID drives.) Thought that may just have to be the procedure from now on, but then the next project (a much more complicated one, of course!) didn't work regardless of where it was or where I tried collecting.

Where should do I go from here – contact support?

Thanks!
Maria

PS: this is slowly killing me

Report · Mar 07, 2014

Yes, if you contact Technical Support and ask to be escalated to the tier 2 agents in the professional video queue, they should be able to work with you to isolate your issue.

Report · Mar 23, 2014

I installed CC after Effects this week on a new one of these a week ago.

I have a project on the desktop and I am collecting to it, except I am not because everytime I try

it bails at a different psd file and bombs.

You Adobe people HAVE to figure this out.

Thx,

Birgit

Report · Mar 23, 2014

We need more info than just the os version? What is the file structure? What is your version of AE down to the last decimal point? What changed?

Report · Mar 24, 2014

Hi Rick,

Thanks for the email. Maybe it would be easier to discuss over the phone?

Birgit

{Phone number removed by Forum Host}

From Forum Host Andrew Yoole:

Please don't post personal phone numbers in the forum (if you know what's good for you and your personal security!)

If you require personal interaction by phone to resolve an After Effects issue, I strongly recommend you call Adobe Customer Care in your region.

Otherwise, please provide substantive system and (in relation to this thread) file structure information if you seek assistance from other members of this Forum.

Report · Mar 27, 2014

I also keep getting the same error after updating to CC (CS6 used to do be fine). Extremely annoying!

Report · Mar 28, 2014

Not everyone has posted their OS version, but from what I can see most are on Mavericks. I think it's more of a Mavericks issue than an Adobe issue. That said afetr a bit of experimenting collecting the files to where the original AEP is stored on the same HD seems to work for me.

Report · Apr 06, 2014

I'm on Mavericks and after a few attempts I've found a work around the issue.
Once I get the error, I close the project, open it again and before collecting it I

search and open that especific file in the Project panel, just to tell AE "Hey, this

file DOES EXIST." I then run collect again and it works!

Not a great solution (and sometimes AE finds a second "missing file" and I

have to repeat this procedure for both), but at least it works until they fix it

in a future update.

Report · Mar 03, 2014

Thanks Chad. Doesnt do mu for me since 90% of the project I need to reduce is all over the map in terms of codecs....

Though if Todd isnt aware of the issue, this may hang around for a while

Report · Mar 07, 2014

Just went through a very helpful interaction with adobe support in live chat for the same problem.

I had been plagued for weeks with giant ae projects collects that would hang on a random psd file everytime, after copying it to the target directory.

These settings solved the issue completely for me:

in the collect window, select "for all comps" rahter than all

make sure the "obey proxy settings" is checked.

Voila, no more fail (for me at last)

It was not clear where the hang came from - it seems either AE or PSD were creating proxies that were not visible to the user (these projects contained many giant, multilayered psd comps with video layers). These proxies seemingly were breaking the collect process.

Report · Mar 08, 2014

the problem came back today... With the same settings I cannot collect files (that were collecting perfectly fine yesterday eve). Argh!!! Only thing I can think of is that I am using one of apple's fusion drives. could that be it ? Some file caching shenanigans ?

Report · Mar 08, 2014

The only way it works for me, is to restart in mac repair mode (command + R) in reboot. Use disk manager to repair disk and file permissions. After that AE collected files normally again.

After some time i get errors again. And when i repair both the drive and file permissions it works again. This should not happen.