Exporting images from AE

[Stefan Cargoski]

Hi Community.

When exporting images from AE timeline, I have noticed there's 2 ways to do it. One with clicking on the take a snapshot with the camera Icon, and the other done> composition?Save frame as.

Now do the PNG images when exported maintain their quality, or is there image degredation by exporting a still?

Thank you.

[Mylenium]

These functions export the images as they are displayed in the comp/ layer viewer, meaning they honor the resolution and zoom settings as well as any other layer switches or viewer and timeline settings. Unless you modify the export settings, of course this may not be representative of the final output.

Mylenium

[ShiveringCactus]

I tend to use the free FX Console plugin, it's snapshot feature takes a full resolution image and I can't tell any differences from the rendered version. 

[Warren Heaton · Accepted solution]

Take Snapshot and Show Snapshop is contained to After Effects and does not allow for saving the image.

Composition > Save Frame As > File... queues up the current time in the Render Queue where the Render Settings determine the quality of the rendered file and the Output Module determines the file format that it is saved as.